|
I think that one of Tim's great qualities and abilities is in what seems like a thumbnail sketch to get something quite telling, very simply, when you're doing it or being in that thumbnail sketch, you don't feel that it's important.
I don't really look back at all. When I've made a film, I've made it. They kind of go out into the world and they're on their own really.
I like playing accents, and doing things like that, it was fun. It was fun.
No, no, I go where the work is, wherever it is. I'll go, I mean, if I select it, but I don't try and ration it out or balance it at all.
You are with a new set of people, you are in a new location, there is always something new about it. I still enjoy that. It's still good fun.
I have this wonderful voice lady called Carla Mayer who lives in L.A. and I have worked with her on a couple of movies.
She goes on the set with headphones and gives you notes. She's terrific and I always run to her now, because she is just great to work with, as well as very good at different accents.
It's a marvellous life, a gregarious life that we've had. We're very lucky in that way. Unlike writers or painters, we don't sit down in front of a blank canvas and say, 'How do I start? Where do I start?'
She was absolutely in top form everyday. Came on, knew it, was on top of it - was an absolute professional and a joy.
We're given the springboard of the text, a plane ticket, told to report to Alabama, and there's a group of people all ready to make a film and it's a marvelous life.
I was flatly surprised by that, that we both came from across the pond, but I've played Americans before and so had Ewan and so, I don't think that Tim thought it was a problem.
The only thing that Ewan and I conferred on was how we cast a fishing line. We said we'd do it round arm rather than over, and that was the only time that we conferred, really.
You kind of think, "Oh, well, I will just do kind of an American accent." But you have to try and be more specific than that, because there are differences which a lot of people might not notice but you, as a pro, your pride gets affected.
No, she is right up there with the best I've worked with. I was very impressed with her, I really was.
The sweetness and the niceness of the guy. That continued to surprise because the project seems to be huge, the film, and yet, he seemed to have time for everyone and as Jessica said, the way he ran about was funny.
You mean actors? There are quite a few. There is an old saying: "Old actors don't retire; their parts just get smaller."
You can't when you're filing, you're just busy, but I didn't see... I used to come home and my girl would make me dinner and it was lovely.
You come on as a guest. You don't get the girl anymore. But that is our lives. You start off as the boyfriend, then you are the lover, then you are the husband, then you are the father, and then you are the grandfather.
When I read the script, I liked the script very much and I thought it was a marvelous part for her, because I think it is a change of pace. I mean, we know how wonderful she is in romantic comedy.
My girlfriend and I rented a nice house on the river and I was there for about two and a half months, and we were just out of Alabama. I hardly got to see Alabama.
We meet before the movie and she gives you charts with sounds on them and makes a tape of examples. While they are setting up the scene, I go with her to the trailer and we go through the scene and correct the speech.
He'd just run, run all the time, and he walks about, doesn't he, he never stops. I think that they put an odometer on him one day and he walked miles.
He just lets you go, really. When we were kind of supposed to rehearse, I don't remember rehearsing at all. We just sort of gossiped and chatted.
So, I won't do theatre as much now, I think.
I don't plan on digging that stuff up that I've kept down with my feet. Why would I want to dig it all up and examine it like an archaeologist?
To be a character who feels a deep emotion, one must go into the memory's vault and mix in a sad memory from one's own life.
My dad was great. He was very droll, very dry.
Well, I've always thought that my career was in England, really. I used to do more in the theatre, and I felt that I should be there. It's not far is it? It's amazing the way that special FX have taken a quantum leap in what they're capable of doing.
I'm doing another Churchill. I did a Churchill for HBO and that was up to 1939 and there's talk of the war years. They were going to do it this fall, but the script wasn't going to be ready.
I was in London. It's a long way to go for a very long party, sitting there for six hours not having a cigarette or a drink. It's a waste of time.
I mean, I did a film, a musical of 'Scrooge', in '70, and the tricks were done by flat clothes and mirrors. I hope that the day will come when we don't have to turn up at all.
You just feel comfortable with him, and he certainly makes sure that you're comfortable. He makes sure that you feel good and that you're happy with what you're doing.
She is up there with the best of them. I can only talk about my experience, but it was genuinely special.
There might've been wires, but I have this ability to make myself light. Well you know what, in ballet, when you kind of lift yourself here, it's all up in the head.
They have to exist or not in their own right. I mean, with kids, you don't say, 'Which is your favourite,' or 'Which did you enjoy bringing up the best?'
I don't enter, I'm entered. It's up to someone else. It's up to them.
You offer things up, I suppose, and he probably gently maybe changes it a little bit one way or another, but you don't feel directive as it were.
He tells you stories, but then, after a while, when you want more, he doesn't give you more. He insists on this old elaboration, the old stories that never changes.
You're less likely to get the part, many parts, if you're playing people your age as opposed to people who are younger. There are fewer parts around.
From the beginning of the film, I thought that I was somehow in safe, good hands with Tim. I think that all the actors did.
I don't think that we necessarily lie. I mean, we make our living by pretending that we're someone else. I don't tell tall tales. I always tell the truth.
I haven't seen the film yet because I just got in from London. In the scenes where the two characters are bantering with each other, it is like bobbing at the net in tennis.
All we did in Alabama was have a read through with the script, but there was, 'No, well, it needs more. You've got to do this, Albert. You've got to do that, Jessica.' It didn't feel like that at all.
That is one of the reasons one enjoys acting. Now and again, you get scenes where you work with somebody really good and you have a good time trying to make it really work and really work well.
I'm not bothered by the paparazzi and I don't feel hemmed in, I've never felt that. My youth, mind you, there wasn't quite the same attention to celebrities as there is now, but I've never felt that.
It was great to do and it's exciting to do those things. That's another thing, that one enjoys the game.
I think that I'm busy in the present, and I don't want to go back. Well, there's been an unauthorized biography, and you can't stop them. It didn't worry me.
Within two weeks of working with her, I realized how good she was for the role because she was absolutely with it and she has got terrific instincts, I think, as an artist, too.
|
