Bluntreview with Malcolm McDowell 8/21/02

Emily: Some have said Gangster No. 1 is your most violent film since "A Clockwork Orange." Do you agree?

Malcolm: It's a fairly violent film, isn't it? I can't remember all of the films that I've done. I'm nearing 100 films somebody told me. I can't believe that. I suppose it is fairly violent but it's very different from "A Clockwork Orange" because the violence in "A Clockwork Orange" is much more sort of a mental thing. There's no real gore in "A Clockwork Orange," believe it or not. People think there is, but it's much more psychological violence in that film. The core root of that film is really the right to choose. That's what that whole film is about, if you narrow it down to one sentence. The right to choose whether one is evil or good. Everybody should have that right. That's what Anthony Burgess was saying. In this film, it has nothing to do with that. It doesn't have any political overtones or anything. It is basically, it's very Shakespearean to me. It's not like a genre gangster picture in that sense. It's about friendship, love, betrayal and all that which is like a great Shakespearean tragedy. You take a character like Lear or MacBeth that have all these gaping faults in their character and of course. So here's a man who's a total psychopath. Let's face it. You wouldn't want to meet this character in a dark alley or in any alley. Having said that, it's a great part for an actor. It's so much fun to play these nutsos. I suppose because I'm very unlike this character myself. You'd have to ask my wife that. [laughs]

Emily: Won't people go to the film expecting a gangster movie?

Malcolm: Yeah. And they'll sort of see it. It is in a way. It's not "Lock, Stock [& Two Smoking Barrels]." It's not a fun caper romp. This is the real deal. It is violent and it is profane. If those two things offend, give it a miss. I remember saying in New York, in introducing the film, if anyone's offended by the word 'cunt,' walk now because you're going to be offended. In England, you can say, You silly cunt. That's actually a term of affection. In America, it's horrendous. That's why I got it on the table right now.

Emily: Yes, the "C" word is not exactly endearing here! Let me ask you, how did you perfect that menacing gangster walk in the film?

Malcolm: [laughter] Oh dear. Do I have one? It may be my walk. I don't work like that. I didn't do any research into this thing. I spoke with Bruce Reynolds, he was one of the great train robbers [from a notorious British robbery]. He's a very intelligent man. I just wanted to know if my Cockney accent stood up because I'm not even from London, I'm from Liverpool. It's a whole different thing. These yarbows from London; they behave in a despicable way and they talk in a funny accent. The way I approach most of the work I do, it has to be intuitive. I'm playing a complete psychopath and I have to go into areas of my psyche, my mind, where I've never been before. It's something you tap. When I started to do the scenes with David Thewlis for instance at the end, I'm going on a journey I've never gone on before and I don't know how its going to go. I don't know if it's going to be explosive or quiet. I knew the basics. I felt like the character was on a spring that was fully wound and was ready to explode. He's always ready to pounce. Why he's like that, God knows. You'd have get a psychiatrist to fill that out. That doesn't interest me. I'm just there to serve the script. I have to play a charismatic gangster. He has to be charismatic otherwise why would all these people follow him. He has to be more than just Jack the lad.

Emily: Your all over the place again…what's going on?

Malcolm: I like the money [laughter] No…no… I wasn't paid anything for this. I've always worked a lot. I'm a working actor. I've done a lot of crap. Some of the stuff I see I think, My God, I must have been desperate. But it's not that. The fact is this. I think it was Robert Ryan who said, I work all the time because it hones my craft. Honestly, it does. You do become a better actor. It's easy to be great in a Stanley Kubrick film or a Lindsey Anderson film but when you get Joe Bloggs it's not quite so easy. I've always been one just to do the work and not worry about whether I'm making a masterpiece because I know if you get one in a lifetime, you should get down on your knees and say thank you.

Emily: You are doing a film with the great and beautiful Sophia Loren…was it a super thrill?

Malcolm: She was adorable. I'd do anything with her just to look in those beautiful eyes. That was called "Between Strangers," I believe. I'm supposed to go to Toronto for the opening, then it goes to Venice. It's Eduardo Ponti, who's Sophia's son. Who is adorable and damned talented. No nepotism. I'd do anything with this kid. He's so talented. Then I've got "I Spy" with Eddie Murphy, who's an extraordinary talent and Owen Wilson, who I thought was wonderful.

Emily: What do you play?

Malcolm: An industrialist. Two or three things just to scare people then I disappear. I go, where does he go?, to Betty Thomas who I loved. She said I don't know. That's a good question. Do I come back to be killed. Just to work with her, that's why I did that. I must say I did try to get out of it because it was just after 9/11 and I didn't want to fly to Budapest. I said to my agent please get me out of this film. I'm not getting on a plane for anything. It was just that week. They said, we want you to do the part, we'll send you a private plane. So I got on this private plane. I couldn't get my wife to go with me. She wouldn't even get on a private plane. So I'm sitting there and I noticed all these boxes in the back of Cheerios for Eddie Murphy. The plane was for me. It was actually full of Cheerios and I just got a ride on the Cheerios plane. Yes, I brought the Cheerios.

Emily: [laughter] So he's a big cereal fan?

Malcolm: [laughter] I guess so.

Emily: Did he bring anything else to the set?

Malcolm: He brought his enormous talent. Eddie is extraordinary. I loved working with him. My name was Gundose or something like that. He'd take the name and pronounce it different ways. Just hysterical. Hopefully, it will be good. Who knows?

Emily: Who would you like to work with?

Malcolm: To work with Robert Altman again. I'd worked with him in a play. One line. I played myself. I've been a friend of his for 30-odd years and they had a retrospective of my work at the Lincoln Center and they played "Gangster No. 1" and he came along to see it. He said, come by the office. He had a new editing room in New York. I went down the next day and he said I have this part. And I said, why don't you get Alan Bates? He said I don't think so. He said don't be disappointed if it doesn't happen. Next thing I know he calls to say, he taken a Paul Newman film but apparently that didn't work out for various reasons. So he's back doing this. Neve Campbell's in it. It's about a ballet company like the Joffrey and I'm the artistic director so I've got to get in shape.

Emily: Are gangster films big in England?

Malcolm: We have our own gangsters and we're very proud of them. They spend most of their time in Parkhurst on the Isle of Wight, which is a maximum security prison. We had the Crays, the Richardsons. It's all that. They were, as you see in this film, vicious, horrendous. They make Jimmy Cagney look like a Disney cartoon really. Even they were probably copying Al Capone because the world's standard in mobsters is Al Capone in Chicago in the 1930s. Jimmy Cagney, George Raft, Humphrey Bogart, all those great (actors who portrayed gangsters) are who I think of when I think of gangsters. In a weird way, there's a shot (in the movie) that's an homage to Jimmy Cagney who is my favorite actor of all time. I just threw it in but it's very transparent, apparently. I love Jimmy Cagney. He could read the phone book to me, and I think it would be great. I love the energy, the explosiveness, the watchability of this actor. It's just phenomenal. Even doing Shakespeare, he did "Midsummer Night's Dream." He played Bottomweaver, directed by Max Rheinhart in 1939.

Emily: How much did you work with Paul Bettany on this character? Did you get together with him beforehand and discuss how he would walk and talk?

Malcolm: No. That wasn't up to me. That was up to him. I sort of set the standard because I'm the older guy. I said all of the work on this is up to you. I'moff. Bye-bye. He was force-fed a lot of my early films so that he saw a lot of my films. Then he was on the set. I did the first week up. The scene at the end with David Thewles, all of that stuff in the flat we did first. So that Paul observed it. He was on the set. I never discussed the thing. The only thing I said to him besides don't fuck it up was [laughs] and he didn't fuck it up, be very, very still. It's the kind of character where everybody has to come to him, he never puts out. Everybody comes to him. The stiller you are the better you are. That's the only note I have about the character. Other than that, I have no idea how it's going to play because you learn the lines, then you go on a ride, then suddenly looking at David Thewles with a lot of makeup on looking like an old guy. And suddenly you go into the farthest recesses of the mind. Honestly, I have no idea what comes out. Sometimes, it doesn't even look or sound like me.

Emily: What did you know of Paul before making the movie. He was back when this film was made, practically unknown.

Malcolm: Yeah, two or three years ago. I didn't know him from a hole in the wall to be honest with you. I'm thrilled for him because this was his real big thing. Everybody saw this film in the business even though it hadn't opened. I know that Paramount had seen it. All the casting people there. I know they liked it and liked him a lot. He's extremely good in it. Being a first film, it's great for him. It's a really wonderful part. He only has like six lines but it doesn't matter because that look is so great and he does it really well. He was wonderful in "A Knight's Tale" but the one I really liked him in was Ron Howard's film ("A Beautiful Mind"). I thought he was really good in that. He was up with the likes of Ed Harris and it's really Paul that you remember, for me, anyway. He was really fabulous in that film.

Emily: Why didn't they make him the older gangster by applying make up etc.?

Malcolm: I don't know. It wouldn't have worked. It's impossible to play younger than you are. But to play older for any length of time and to do the voice-over, because the voice-over is the play, there's pages of it. It's a whole different performance. That's the soul of the film. That's the play basically.

Emily: How many times did you have to redo the "voice over" for your character? It was so eerie and precise.

Malcolm: [laughter] I did so many. When I first went to London, I was there on another picture. Paul McGuigan who we haven't talked about, he's the glue that makes this all work, his work is absolutely great. He's a wonderful new director. He's going to be a force to be reckoned with. When I went to London, Paul said would you do a temp track. I said yeah. My cockney accent was all over the place but that's what they worked with until we shot the film. I came to London again and zipped in and did another track. But by this time, I'd already played the part, so it was totally different. That was a given, we knew it.

Emily: There's a great scene, reminiscent of a Cagney film (I wont spoil it) but unlike the ranting Cagney your guy takes off his clothes to go mad. Why?

Malcolm: I always thought of it as a cleansing thing for him. There's no real reason. In the original ending, it was on a London bus and he's sitting on the top of the bus and he starts talking to the other passengers. We shot this actually. He starts mouthing off. He's gone over the edge. That's a carryon from that scene. He was sitting there in his underwear on a bus. They moved it up to the rooftop, which I'm glad about. It's better up there. It's good that he's obviously snapped. He didn't find morality. It is a morality tale. You can say it's violent and all the first of it but at the end of the day it's actually a very conventional good guy thing. What it's saying is that to progress as a human being you have to have a moral core. And Freddie Mays finds that in prison. It's rather simplistic. The Gangster is obsessed by being No. 1. It's meaningless. It's not what life is about, is it?

Emily: You've done tons of TV too any plans to head back to the "tube"?

Malcolm: I doubt it. I enjoyed it. I had too much to learn and too short of a time. They were giving me huge speeches to do every week then changing them every two minutes. I couldn't learn it. I'd spend six hours a night learning this stuff then suddenly hear the fax machine and go, those bastards. They'd change the whole thing. I'm from the stage, I don't like that kind of stuff. I know some actors who won't take line changes without 24 hours notice in writing. I'm not like that but that was oh? They would change my speech as I'd be doing it. It ages you.

Emily: This Gangster is really a bad ass. You know America's current "it" bad guy is Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini). So lemme ask you who's tougher, your guy or Tony?

Malcolm: [laughing] I think I could eat old Tony for breakfast. He's seeing a psychiatrist. For Gangster No. 1, I'd love to be a fly on the wall in their first session with a psychiatrist. Are you calling me a cunt? Fuck you. [jokes] That would be a lot of fun. I think the Sopranos is fantastic. I'm looking forward to a new one. Six Feet Under too, I love that.

Hosted by www.Geocities.ws