Laurence Olivier Talking Pictures


Laurence Olivier

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With smouldering good looks

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and a strong athletic presence,

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Laurence Olivier had a reputation

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as the greatest actor of the 20th century.

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In films like Wuthering Heights and Rebecca,

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he raised the acting bar to new levels.

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And for years, he led a life of high drama off the screen too.

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With a tempestuous marriage to Vivien Leigh,

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he became half of one of Hollywood's

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original super couples.

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Olivier was the youngest actor to ever be knighted,

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and the first to become a life peer -

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but famously insisted on being called not "sir", not "Lord",

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but simply "Larry".

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His acting talent and his future destiny

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were both apparent from an early age -

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something he talks about in this interview.

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First, on location at The Old Vic theatre,

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and then later from the BBC studios

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on the programme Great Acting with Kenneth Tynan.

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When you were 10 years old,

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Ellen Terry said, "The boy who pays the part of Brutus

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"is already a great actor".

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Can you remember playing Brutus?

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Oh, yes, I do. I do indeed.

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My father had a story about Forbes-Robertson.

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I never believed it, but my father used to tell it,

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so I'll tell it, for what it's worth.

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I don't know what it's worth in truth,

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but he said that he met Forbes-Robertson on that occasion,

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and as he put it, Forbes-Robertson had tears in his eyes

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when my father said, "My little boy isn't bad, is he?" or something.

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And, um, he said that Forbes-Robertson said,

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"My dear man, he IS Brutus," he says.

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Well, I don't see how I can have been at 10, but still.

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Your father was a high Anglican clergyman.

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He was a high Anglican clergyman.

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-Did he have a great deal of influence on your life?

-Oh, yes.

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Oh, yes, very much. Very much.

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You see, both my brother and I started,

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at least, with a great sense of ritual.

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And it was these elaborate rituals

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that gave you the idea, perhaps, of acting?

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Yes. Oh, yes. And my father's great prowess in the pulpit.

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Did your father approve of you going on the stage?

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Well, as a matter of fact,

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although my relationship with him

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had been extremely distant, all my youth -

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I was terrified of him,

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he was a very frightening father figure, Victorian father figure -

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I absolutely worshipped and adored my mother,

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who died when I was 13 years old.

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I often think and say that perhaps I've never got over it.

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Anyway, my father had to take over, not knowing me very much.

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I think, to him, I was rather an unnecessary child.

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I don't blame him at all,

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because I was probably very fat an absolutely brainless.

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But finally, when my brother went to India as an Indian rubber planter -

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not as an Indian rubber planter,

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but as an English rubber planter in India -

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I was filled with the glamour of what my brother was doing,

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and when we were seeing him off on his boat in Tilbury,

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we got back home to Letchworth, where my father was rector,

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I said, "Well, when can I follow Dickie to India, Father, please?

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"About one or two years? I don't want to go to the university."

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And my father said, "You're talking nonsense.

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"You're going to be an actor."

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-And this was a complete surprise to you?

-Yes, it was.

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I was amazed, A, that he'd thought things out for me at all,

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and B, that he'd thought things out that far.

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And that he'd had the...

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I secretly knew that he was right, that I ought to be an actor.

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Have you found it difficult to find bits of yourself

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in the evil characters you've played?

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What you need to make up your make-up as an actor

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is...observation...

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..intuition.

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You must, at its most highfaluting...

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..the most highfaluting expression of it,

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the actor is as important as the illuminator

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of the human heart.

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He's as important as the psychiatrist or the doctor.

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Minister, if you like.

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That's putting him very high and mightily.

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At the opposite end of that pole,

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you've got to find in the actor a man who will not be too proud

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to scavenge that tiniest little bit of human circumstance -

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observe it, use it, find it, use it - some time or another.

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Frequently observe things.

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And, thank God, if they haven't got a very good memory

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for anything else, they've got a memory for little details.

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And I've had things in the back of my mind for as long as 18 years

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before I've used them.

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And perhaps in those little tiny things

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may be the key to a whole characterisation.

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We're going to look now at a scene from the film of Richard III.

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It's the scene after Richard has successfully made love

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to the widow of one of his victims.

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Was ever woman in this humour wooed?

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Was ever woman in this humour won?

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My dukedom to a widow's chastity,

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I do mistake my person all this while.

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Upon my life, she finds, although I cannot,

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myself to be a proper man.

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I'll be at charges for a looking glass.

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And entertain some score or two of tailors to study fashions

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to adorn my body.

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Since I am crept in favour with myself,

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I will maintain it to some little cost.

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Shine out, fair sun,

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till I have bought a glass,

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that I may see my shadow as I pass.

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Did you know at the time that that was going to be

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one of the key performances of your career?

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No. No.

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A lot of...

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things contributed.

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When I said, talking about scavenging just now,

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one thing that may lead an actor to be successful in a part -

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it may, not always, but may -

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is to try to be unlike somebody else in it.

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At the time, when I took over that part first of all,

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Donald Wolfit had made an enormous success

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in the part only 18 months previously.

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I didn't want to play the part at all

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because I thought it was much too close to this colleague's success.

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And, er...

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I had seen it, and when I was learning it,

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I could hear nothing but Donald's voice in my mind's ear,

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and see nothing but him in my mind's eye.

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And so I thought, "This won't do.

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"I've just got to think of something else."

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My first thought, I'd always had images, pictures I'd heard,

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imitations of old actors imitating Henry Irving,

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and so I did right away

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an imitation of these old actors

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imitating Henry Irving's voice.

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That's why I took on that sort of narrow kind of vocal address.

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Then I thought about looks,

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and I thought about the Big Bad Wolf.

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And I thought about a director under whom I had suffered

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in extremis in New York called Jed Harris.

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The physiognomy of the Big Bad Wolf

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was said to have been founded upon Jed Harris,

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and so hence the nose,

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which originally was very much bigger than it was finally in the film.

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And so with one or two extraneous externals,

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I began to build up a character - a characterisation.

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I'm afraid I do work mostly from the outside in.

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I usually collect, whether consciously or unconsciously,

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I usually collect a lot of details, a lot of characteristics,

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and find a creature swimming about somehow in the middle of them.

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Your excursions into contemporary plays,

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things like The Sleeping Prince by Mr Rattigan,

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John Osborne's The Entertainer.

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I adore The Entertainer.

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I think it's the most wonderful part that I've ever played.

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Let's have a look now at a scene from The Entertainer film.

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It's a scene in which the middle-aged

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and unsuccessful musical comic Archie Rice,

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knowing that his career is coming to an end,

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talks to his daughter on the empty stage

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of an empty seaside theatre where they're performing.

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You think I'm just a tatty old music hall actor.

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But you know, when you're up here...

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..when you're up here...

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..you think you love all those people around you out there.

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But you don't.

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You don't love them like...

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JAZZ MUSIC PLAYS

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Oh, if you learn it properly,

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you'll get yourself a technique... and smile down,

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you smile, and look the friendliest,

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jolliest thing in the world.

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But you will be just as dead and...used up,

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just like everybody else.

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You see this face?

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This face can split open with warmth and humanity.

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It can sing,

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tell the worst and funniest stories in the world

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to a great mob of dead, drab irks.

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And it doesn't matter.

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It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter, because look - look at my eyes.

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I'm dead behind these eyes.

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I'm dead.

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Just like the whole dumb, shoddy lot out there.

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Archie Rice was influenced by a Negro blues singer.

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Are there any actors who have influenced you to that degree?

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Yes, lots of them.

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I've mentioned Fairbanks, Barrymore.

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It was Hamlet I first saw when I was 17 years old.

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Um...

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Noel Coward, in his way, influenced me a great deal.

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He lent me a bit of stern professionalism.

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Of all people I've ever watched with the greatest delight,

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I think, was in another field entirely with Sid Field.

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I wouldn't like anybody to think that I was imitating Sid Field

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-when I was doing The Entertainer.

-There were a lot of things in it.

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Little things.

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But Sid Field was a great comic, and this man is a lousy one.

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But I know when I imitate Sid Field now, to this day,

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I still borrow from him freely and unashamedly.

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I watch... I had...

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I watch all my colleagues very carefully.

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Admire them all for different qualities which they have.

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And I think the most interesting thing to see

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is that an actor is most successful

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when not only all his virtues

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but all his disadvantages come into useful play in a part.

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Laurence Olivier's first love was always the stage,

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which perhaps explains why his move into films

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in the 1930s wasn't easy.

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It had taken two attempts to crack Hollywood

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before his talents were able to fully flourish.

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In this interview from Line-Up Film Night,

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we see him talking about that journey,

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and how he eventually combined roles

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of film producer, director, and actor.

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When you began to make a name for yourself in the West End

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in the early '30s,

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it was rather surprisingly not in classical roles at all,

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but in light comedy and rather matinee idol parts.

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One thinks of the fact that you played opposite Noel Coward

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in Private Lives, that you played Beau Geste.

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Not opposite Noel Coward,

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but it was alongside him and way down the corridor.

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But I had done quite some juvenile leading roles,

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I suppose you'd call them,

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from about 1928 to 1930, that sort of thing,

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and then I joined up with Noel in Private Lives,

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and played that terrible part, Victor Prynne.

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Which I must say he had the decency to apologise about since.

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And it was very exciting to be in a hit for the first time.

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I mean, with such glamour figures as Gertie Lawrence and Noel,

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you can imagine how glorious it was.

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And then we went to New York with it,

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and then it was in New York while we were playing there

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that my wife - my first wife, Jill - was in the play.

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Then she and I signed up with Hollywood,

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and we had little

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not terribly demanding approaches from all the studios,

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but the one we chose was RKO.

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Because that was sold us by the lady who sold the idea to us

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because that was the youngest studio.

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It was better for youngish people to belong to a younger studio.

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I don't think it worked out at all. I did three pictures in two years.

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And the first of it... The first of which was an extraordinary...

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I would hate to see it now.

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..it was called Friends And Lovers, with Adolphe Menjou -

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"Adolphe", as he was called -

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Lili Damita, Erich von Stroheim, and myself.

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And then I played two other films there in two years.

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That's all I did, and I came back... home, rather in disgust.

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But of course they had that terrible Wall Street crash,

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and the film industry had gone through a fearsome time.

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I did start about three or four other pictures,

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but about the second day, little men with black coats and spectacles

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would come down onto the floor and say,

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"That's it. That's all. Wrap it up."

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And then when you went back to Hollywood

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towards the end of the '30s, of course,

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you began to make tremendous successes

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in films like Rebecca and Wuthering Heights.

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Did that change the whole picture of Hollywood for you?

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The man who changed Hollywood for me, and the whole idea of it...

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I was very snobbish about films.

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I did them to make money and said so, all over the place.

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Much to the disgust of the Sam Goldwyns of this world.

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But the man who changed me was the man I quarrelled with

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most bitterly of all, really, and that was William Wyler.

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And you'd be amazed at the scenes

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between Merle and myself and Willie Wyler

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that took place beneath

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that heart-throbbing romance called Wuthering Heights.

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You'd be amazed at the temperament and the spit and the fury

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and the passion and the rages with each other we went through.

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And we were very narky with each other on the floor,

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but it was he who said, persuaded me, simply with patient talking.

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He wasn't a pleasant director to work with,

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but he was a very interesting man to talk to.

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He was much more coherent off the floor than on it.

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But he told me that I must understand there wasn't anything

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that could not be done in that medium,

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if you found a way to do it.

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And it was he who persuaded me

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that you could even do Shakespeare successfully on a film.

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When I came to make Wuthering Heights -

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I'm sorry, Henry V -

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and he was a major in the army,

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staying at Claridge's hotel,

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which so many majors in the American army seemed able to do.

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And I asked him if he would direct Henry V.

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He said, "Well, it's sweet of you. No, thanks. I can't."

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He said, "You'd better do it yourself."

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And so that's the way it turned out.

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But if it hadn't been for him, I'd never have thought of making Henry V.

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And is it true that before him, and before Wuthering Heights,

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you had in fact been turned down

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for the lead opposite Greta Garbo in Queen Christina?

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Yes, that's true. But she was right.

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I wasn't up to her standard at all. I hadn't got...

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I hadn't got the stature necessary to be her leading man.

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Anything like it. She was absolutely right.

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She was very sweet to me years later,

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and sort of I had apologetic messages through George Cukor and people,

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and I said, "Please tell her she was absolutely right.

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"I wasn't up...

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"I wasn't... Couldn't hold a candle to her."

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I was too young for her. I was about two or three years younger.

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I was very light. I was only about 25, I think.

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And she was not light.

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She had immense personality.

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Colossal experience.

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Tremendous presence, and was a great, great artist,

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and completely understood every single thing

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that was to be thought or understood about her medium.

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She was a mistress of it. Queen of it.

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I didn't know anything about it. Little, little, little.

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But what I knew was no match for her.

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She was quite right to fire me.

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Of course I nearly cut my throat

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and nearly threw myself out of windows afterwards

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because it was very highly publicised, as you could imagine, at the time.

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However, one gets over these things.

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And when you came, in more successful years, to make Henry V

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and Hamlet and Richard III,

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those three films over which you had control,

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-not just as actor but also as director...

-Yes.

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..they are the three, I think, for which you will be always remembered.

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Is that just coincidence, or is it always better

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to have one actor in charge of one film?

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Well, I think it had not been done very much except by Orson Welles,

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marvellously and masterfully,

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in Citizen Kane.

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And that film in which he really made a landmark in films,

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that really was a landmark.

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And it was a marvellous herculean task he undertook

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and fulfilled brilliantly.

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And he was the subject of great admiration,

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and absolutely unstinted admiration,

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I'm sure, the world over,

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except possibly in his own country,

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where people who likened themselves to the character he played

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were a little bit offended about it, I think.

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But in the realm of film, I mean,

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Orson's name will go down to posterity I'm sure

0:18:260:18:28

as being one of the masters.

0:18:280:18:30

And...

0:18:300:18:32

..I suppose in England,

0:18:330:18:36

I suppose I was about the first actor

0:18:360:18:39

to produce and direct his own film.

0:18:390:18:41

I think I was.

0:18:410:18:43

I wouldn't like to swear that, but I think I was.

0:18:430:18:45

Do you think you learnt much from him directly

0:18:450:18:47

in terms of acting and directing?

0:18:470:18:49

Or was it just the same...?

0:18:490:18:51

Oh, no, I didn't mean that. No, his style.

0:18:510:18:56

He created a style in Citizen Kane,

0:18:560:19:00

which you can say if you like -

0:19:000:19:02

I wouldn't mind anybody saying -

0:19:020:19:03

I sort of copied in Hamlet.

0:19:030:19:06

In that...during that,

0:19:060:19:09

Gregg Toland developed this deep focus work,

0:19:090:19:14

which had never been done before.

0:19:140:19:16

As a matter of fact, I was in the very first deep focus shot ever,

0:19:160:19:19

when Gregg Toland was photographing Wuthering Heights.

0:19:190:19:22

And at the end of a certain take,

0:19:220:19:24

which was Merle in the foreground in what we call a "three-shot",

0:19:240:19:27

and I was full-length in the background.

0:19:270:19:30

And he said, "Did you notice anything about that shot?"

0:19:300:19:35

And I said, "No,"

0:19:350:19:37

and I could bet my bottom dollar

0:19:370:19:40

that Miss Oberon was in focus and I wasn't, that's all.

0:19:400:19:43

And he said, "You're wrong about that.

0:19:430:19:47

"That's a new sort of shot.

0:19:470:19:49

"Didn't you feel your key light very strong?"

0:19:490:19:52

I said, "Well, yes, I think I did."

0:19:520:19:54

"You wait till the rushes."

0:19:540:19:56

"You mean I shall be in focus AND Miss Oberon will be?" "Yeah."

0:19:560:20:00

And that was the very first shot he'd ever tried it with.

0:20:000:20:03

And that also was Wyler.

0:20:030:20:05

And Wyler was always... always had Gregg Toland with him.

0:20:050:20:09

And Orson very wisely took Gregg Toland.

0:20:090:20:12

Now, there were a lot of shots in Hamlet.

0:20:120:20:14

This is when it was final and we're getting to the point.

0:20:140:20:16

There were a lot of shots in Hamlet which had very deep focus indeed,

0:20:160:20:19

very deep focus.

0:20:190:20:20

There was one shot of little Jean Simmons, as she was then.

0:20:200:20:23

The back of her head is showing every hair in focus

0:20:230:20:26

just right in the foreground,

0:20:260:20:28

and I was, through a mirror, 120 feet away

0:20:280:20:32

as Hamlet, and also in the shot.

0:20:320:20:35

And that was the style, and I...

0:20:350:20:39

I wouldn't like to say I would have thought of that style

0:20:390:20:42

if it hadn't been for Orson.

0:20:420:20:44

Three years after that interview,

0:20:440:20:46

Olivier took on a role

0:20:460:20:48

that would become one of his and the public's favourites,

0:20:480:20:50

starring alongside Michael Caine

0:20:500:20:53

in the classic thriller Sleuth.

0:20:530:20:56

Here's a report from the film set,

0:20:560:20:58

again by interviewer Sheridan Morley.

0:20:580:21:01

CHATTER

0:21:030:21:04

OK. That's all right.

0:21:060:21:07

-MORLEY:

-While the Sleuth team were filming at Athelhampton

0:21:110:21:13

we went to watch them at work,

0:21:130:21:15

and I had a number of tries at getting a few words

0:21:150:21:17

with one of the film's co-stars, Laurence Olivier.

0:21:170:21:19

-But he needed some persuading.

-It's an invasion of privacy!

0:21:190:21:23

The other star of Sleuth is Michael Caine,

0:21:230:21:25

playing a part which, it's fair to say,

0:21:250:21:27

is far above and beyond anything

0:21:270:21:29

he has previously tried to do in 10 years of film stardom.

0:21:290:21:32

-CAINE:

-Can we get this before lunch, gentleman?

0:21:320:21:35

Stand on the final step.

0:21:360:21:38

-VOICEOVER:

-Together, Olivier and Caine form a screen partnership

0:21:410:21:44

which those who've already seen the film in America say is electric.

0:21:440:21:47

In terms of the sheer length of your part, has Sleuth been a very difficult film for you?

0:21:470:21:51

It's absolutely terrible! It's been... It's really very long.

0:21:510:21:55

I didn't have time to learn it, I was terribly busy

0:21:550:21:57

at the National, I didn't have time to learn it before we started.

0:21:570:22:00

And really that's the only thing to do.

0:22:000:22:02

What I'd have loved to have had time to do was to have taken it

0:22:020:22:05

on a baby road tour or something, if they'd have allowed me to,

0:22:050:22:08

-and played it for four weeks, possibly with Michael.

-On the stage?

0:22:080:22:12

Yes, it'd be been marvellous, made a bit of dough. We'd have known...

0:22:120:22:15

We'd have known all the thoughts then, we'd have known

0:22:150:22:18

all the different colours, we'd have known the signals along the line.

0:22:180:22:21

We'd have known why we did something,

0:22:210:22:23

because something followed, and why to avoid doing something,

0:22:230:22:26

because it would be obvious if we did it in such a way

0:22:260:22:28

because something else followed, you know.

0:22:280:22:30

All sorts of things that concern an actor all the time.

0:22:300:22:33

And, er...it's been a great effort to learn it.

0:22:330:22:38

I don't think I've let the production team down

0:22:380:22:41

more than once or twice by just frankly not being able to learn it.

0:22:410:22:45

My part is very hard, because very clever author, Tony Shaffer,

0:22:450:22:50

as he is, has written it as an author

0:22:500:22:52

speaking in the way that an author would like to speak.

0:22:520:22:57

And therefore that's not quite... a very colloquial way of speaking.

0:22:570:23:01

It's always rather... The mot juste is always just round the corner.

0:23:010:23:05

And there's plenty of alliterative occasions, which are always

0:23:050:23:09

probably hard for the author to find in the first place.

0:23:090:23:12

He's got to sort of find it. Therefore you've got to find...

0:23:120:23:14

It's not the word that immediately springs to mind.

0:23:140:23:17

Those alliterative things are always difficult.

0:23:170:23:19

-You know, I haven't congratulated you yet on your, er...game.

-Oh!

0:23:200:23:26

-It was jolly good.

-You really think so? Good!

0:23:260:23:30

I must say I was rather delighted with it myself. I say...

0:23:300:23:34

Did you really think your last moment on Earth had come?

0:23:340:23:37

Yes.

0:23:370:23:38

You're not cross, are you?

0:23:400:23:42

Cross?

0:23:420:23:44

I don't understand. That's one of your words.

0:23:440:23:47

Look, as I explained to you, when you were playing Doppler,

0:23:470:23:52

I had to test your mettle to see if, as I suspected,

0:23:520:23:56

you really were my sort of person.

0:23:560:23:59

-A games-playing sort of person?

-Exactly.

0:23:590:24:02

-And am I?

-There's no question about it.

0:24:030:24:06

Compare your experience this weekend, my dear Milo,

0:24:060:24:10

with any other moment in your life.

0:24:100:24:12

If you're honest with yourself, you'll have to admit

0:24:120:24:14

that you lived more intensely in my company than in anybody else's.

0:24:140:24:18

Even with Marguerite. We know what it is to play a game, you and I.

0:24:180:24:24

That's so rare.

0:24:250:24:26

Two people brought together, equally matched, having the courage

0:24:270:24:33

and the talents to make of life

0:24:330:24:35

a continuing charade of bright fancies.

0:24:350:24:39

Happy invention.

0:24:390:24:42

To face out its emptiness...

0:24:420:24:45

and its terrors by...playing.

0:24:450:24:49

By just...playing.

0:24:490:24:53

Larry, whom I've known for many, many years,

0:24:550:24:58

of course I've never had the opportunity of working with

0:24:580:25:01

but remains the dream choice to play, er, Andrew Wyke..

0:25:010:25:07

..understood the character completely.

0:25:080:25:10

Little bits of Andrew Wyke always reminded Larry,

0:25:120:25:14

and me, of people we'd actually known.

0:25:140:25:18

And, most importantly, in Larry I had this incredible, er...

0:25:200:25:25

..Comstock Lode of experience and...

0:25:270:25:31

..er...

0:25:330:25:34

..his absolute...total command of every form of human expression

0:25:360:25:42

and projection, er,

0:25:420:25:45

to help keep the...the constant interplay of these two characters...

0:25:450:25:51

..er...exciting. In other words, no two scenes could be played alike.

0:25:510:25:57

This childlike grown-up man

0:25:570:26:00

who's constantly going off into little fantasies,

0:26:000:26:04

playing detectives, playing parts of charwomen.

0:26:040:26:08

Larry, with his tremendous store of experience, I mean, he does

0:26:090:26:14

everything from a Restoration rake to a 20th-century charwoman

0:26:140:26:20

in the film, and does it almost en passant in the characterisation.

0:26:200:26:26

And this is something you can't...you can't

0:26:260:26:30

do near realistically.

0:26:300:26:31

You can't find somebody off the street to do it,

0:26:310:26:33

it had bloody better be as close to Laurence Olivier as you can get.

0:26:330:26:36

But having Laurence Olivier playing Andrew Wyke

0:26:360:26:39

must be fair competition for you.

0:26:390:26:41

Is there a danger of being overshadowed by him?

0:26:410:26:44

Er, I think there's always a danger of being overshadowed.

0:26:440:26:48

The thing is, I suppose you just rely on the lighting man

0:26:480:26:51

and hope he can light shadows!

0:26:510:26:52

Um, it's not something you worry about, especially in a two-man piece.

0:26:530:26:58

There must eventually come a time when, er...

0:26:580:27:01

..you get your own sort of turn

0:27:030:27:05

and then it's very nice to have someone like Lord Olivier off camera.

0:27:050:27:10

-Roy.

-And Arnold.

0:27:130:27:15

Roy. Have you got the glasses or have I got them?

0:27:150:27:19

I must have left them upstairs.

0:27:190:27:22

CAINE: 'He was cast first and was asked who he would like to play the part

0:27:220:27:26

'and he said me.

0:27:260:27:28

'I mean, I suppose presuming I wouldn't overshadow him!'

0:27:290:27:33

Laurence Olivier would enjoy other successes in the '70s,

0:27:350:27:38

with The Boys From Brazil and Marathon Man,

0:27:380:27:42

his role in both earning him Oscar nominations.

0:27:420:27:45

Another landmark was his 80th birthday.

0:27:470:27:50

Amongst the celebrations was a pageant

0:27:500:27:53

hosted by the National Theatre, and news and television tributes

0:27:530:27:57

looked back on his life and his work.

0:27:570:27:59

-VOICEOVER:

-He was to show his genius again when he turned to television.

0:28:010:28:05

-The boy here?

-Yes, dear, he's here.

-Mm!

0:28:050:28:08

Don't let anyone ever deceive you

0:28:100:28:12

into believing that the world was created in six days.

0:28:120:28:16

Would you like your coffee now, dear?

0:28:160:28:19

The evolution of the horse was the most tortuous process.

0:28:190:28:23

This coffee's frozen. Like a sort of...Arctic mud.

0:28:270:28:31

-Shall I make you some fresh, dear?

-No...rather like it.

0:28:320:28:36

In recent years, Lord Olivier battled cancer and heart disease.

0:28:360:28:40

Each performance was a triumph over physical hardship.

0:28:400:28:43

But as he approached his 80th birthday at his Sussex home

0:28:430:28:46

his main concern was, of all things, the sudden onset of stage fright.

0:28:460:28:50

I've suffered for the first time in my life from stage fright slightly.

0:28:520:28:57

And that...that is a worry.

0:28:570:28:59

I'd say most people get over that when they're about 17,

0:28:590:29:03

but I never was frightened about anything when I was 17,

0:29:030:29:06

and all the time until now I'm, you know...

0:29:060:29:10

-I don't know where the hell I am. What am I, 77?

-80.

-80. Um...

0:29:100:29:16

I begin to be a little nervous of personal appearances.

0:29:160:29:20

It's not only vanity, because I know I'm not very pretty, but it's...

0:29:200:29:26

I don't know what it is, I really can't account for it.

0:29:260:29:32

I think it's just one of those naughty things that nature

0:29:320:29:36

does to one, trips one up just when one's least expecting it.

0:29:360:29:41

Staunchly supportive of his wife's acting career and those

0:29:420:29:45

of their three children, who followed them into the profession,

0:29:450:29:48

Lord Olivier once said his aim was to make the audience believe.

0:29:480:29:52

As tributes pour in from the arts world,

0:29:540:29:56

it's clear he succeeded as few actors have.

0:29:560:29:59

God bless you, old cock.

0:30:020:30:04

And you!

0:30:060:30:07

Not surprisingly, Laurence Olivier acted right to the end.

0:30:080:30:13

His final performance was in Derek Jarman's War Requiem.

0:30:140:30:18

A year later, aged 82,

0:30:180:30:21

he died at his home in Ashurst, West Sussex, with wife Joan Plowright

0:30:210:30:27

and his family and beloved children by his side.

0:30:270:30:30

His passing prompted tributes from across the globe,

0:30:320:30:35

acting colleagues saying his death marked

0:30:350:30:39

the closing of a very great book.

0:30:390:30:42

Laurence Olivier left a towering legacy,

0:30:440:30:47

not just in performances but also in the concrete walls

0:30:470:30:51

of the National Theatre, of which he was the first artistic director.

0:30:510:30:56

The announcement that his ashes will be buried in Westminster Abbey

0:30:560:31:00

was a final, powerful indicator

0:31:000:31:02

of the high esteem the nation had for him,

0:31:020:31:05

and recognition of his devotion to his art

0:31:050:31:09

and his enduring status as the greatest actor of his time.

0:31:090:31:13

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