Derek Jacobi | Full Q&A | Oxford Union

Oh coming along this afternoon to nedra yeah so perhaps we could go back to the beginning must we will start there and go in decades and so what was that there is right Pedro so what was it a dream into acting first of all you started acting back back in high school before before high school actually at the age of six okay i starred in our local libraries Christmas show of the prints from the swineherd a dual role and that that was the sort of it really my my own an only child East London nothing in the family to do with theater or culture in any way really I I don't think I ever saw my parents read the book we didn't have many books and that Daddy is why I ended up at the library I had a I've been very lucky all my life you really are looking at one of the luckiest actors ever like his people ever I think I had a music teacher next door and and she introduced me to the world books and culture I suppose and she got me into the local library and I can't remember any Damascene conversion to acting I think it's something I I would wanted to do it was like some rogue gene got into the moment of conception where it came from I don't know my mother did produce an aunt who played the piano and she said perhaps I got it from her they talked about getting things like a disease but as far back as I can remember that's what I wanted to do and that that's what I did in those days of course you could shall I stand up because you I can't see you and you can't see me in those days the kids could play quite freely on the street you let the kids out in the morning and they'd play with their friends and as did I making up little stories dressing up in parents clothes I remember once I rifled through the Wardrobe Jim because both my parents were out to work rifling through wardrobes and I found my mother's wedding veil and I put it on and went out to play with the kids and it was the days of great privet hedges and running up and down the squeeze because I tore this veil to Fred's on the privet hedge ease and not for the first time in our life my mother forgave me and was absolutely wonderful daddy I'm My Luck started with my parents I have to say my parents were also my friends my dear friends and and they supported me throughout my my life when I when I was a child and also when I decided that I wanted to be a professional actor it was for them like I was going on to another planet it was a world that they had no knowledge of and a certain amount of fear of because it was totally unknown to them and yet they supported me my first job at the Birmingham rep they would cut it with fortnightly new player before weeks they would come up every play and they would see the play and they would eventually start giving me notes my mother my brothers first MOOC the birth game she saw me on a professional state she can't they came backstage and I said did you enjoy it and my mother said oh yes and we loved it but she said I've got one criticism and my heart sank yes yes my model she said well I think you ought to smile a bit more in the curtain call of course you've got a lovely smile whether her criticisms did get better as time went on one of my one of my precious moments with the time when they went to to London to see a play that I wasn't in I really felt that I'd scored at that point but as Michael said this was all a long time ago I went I had a normal school local primary local grammar and then the other place and and well I was very course acted all the time I did the academic work along with many of my contemporaries as and when I could I got Bob school the actors degree which was a tutu when she weren't completely dreadful at it all and there was a spark of academia about you and I acted all the time and at the end of three years I wrote various begging letters to referee companies it was I was very lucky again luck it was the height of the repertoire system there were many many reps all over the country and one of the most prestigious and the most classical traditional rep invited me to audition that was Birmingham and they asked me to audition because they had seen me play in one vacation we did a production of Marley's over the second which we took to the open-air theatre at Stafford on Aven in the Bancroft gardens and all the bigwigs from there I didn't of course had seen it and had enjoyed it so when my begging letter arrived they saluted the boy we saw playing over the second let's give him a chance so they auditioned me and I got into Birmingham and I stayed there for three years for Earth monthly rep so we got through a lot of plays in the course of his three years it was a huge learning experience it was my version of drama school really because I hadn't been to drama school I'd gone straight in game which tuber me and I learned a huge amount and of course it was all in front of an audience it was all practical learning about the classroom learning it was practical learning and at the end of that one luck again luck huge luck one Wednesday matinee I'm playing Shakespeare's Henry the eighth's and launched live years in the audience we are not told he's in the audience Belize on a tour of the the the reps to find some fodder really for his National Theatre which was going to start that autumn and I shared a dressing room with Cardinal Wolsey at the time and and so Lawrence came round afterwards and of course once we picked ourselves up off the floor the great man came in said to me well done well done very nice many went over to Cardinal Wolsey and was fulsome in his praise of Cardinal Wolsey I had to say that I had already got out of all the makeup all the padding all the wigs all the moustaches of the lot so I wasn't looking that came to the eighth anyway he praised Wolsey left and about 20 to 30 seconds left after those are knock on the door he came back and he came over to me and he said you what Edward and I said yes yes and then he gave me some fulsome praise and the week later offered me a job from which was a titter which was the second-seeded the season this is 1963 Jesus sir is a year old and I'm I do wonder studies I'm given a lovely part in some Joan and that autumn that company or 99% flower company became the first National Theatre which opened on the 22nd of October 1963 at the Old Vic what comes in again I am down to it we're going to open with Peter O'Toole's Hamlet directed by Laurence Olivier I am done to understudy Laertes where it's going to be played by an act called Jeremy Brett who was a young star just before rehearsals began Jeremy was bought out by Warner Brothers to star in the film of my fair lady playing Freddie Anderson hero so instead of getting another young star to play Laertes they upped his understudy which was me so the first thing I ever give the National luckily wildly eighties to Peter's Hamlet and at the end of this story it's rather sweet because the first night came and all the good authority of London were there first neither the National Theatre ever and there was a big party afterwards in the auditorium and on the stage and I was boring the eyes of everybody by say it's best to have my sight I just pleaded to Peter O'Toole coming and it's like 20 to Perth day I mean it doesn't get any better than this does it and I was going nothing everybody was my choice until eventually somebody came on stage and called for silence on walked Shirley Bassey who sang happy birthday to me that was one of the books yes um so I and I stayed with Lawrence for the next seven years he was my my mentor my fellow actor my director my god and ultimately my friend and I owe him for Melissa Maddie was very very good to the youngsters in the company the youngsters being people like Michael Gambon Tony Hopkins and he was it was wonderful to us all and encouraged us he had many faces many hats he could be a bugger but um he uh no he was lovely and he he he one of the plays that he thought he was would absolutely right towards Saunders in the master builder who goes on and all about youth knocking at the door he was a very aware of youth knocking at his door but instead of disliking the youth that was knocking he encouraged it which said a great deal for for him as a man I think and as a fellow actor and so then I left the National and did telly films carried on and carried on acting that Phegley is a break free of what happened decades ago so say picking up on that water than you've done a lot of work onstage and coupled with that you said done television work and starred in films - what are the the main differences for you and do you feel acting on stages is you know more pure or more more legitimate than starring in Hollywood or being on TV um what yes of course theatre is what it's all about they say you know television makes a famous movies make you rich but Tokioka is what it's all about and for me certainly the anything to do with the camera doesn't give from this is me talk about me doesn't give the actor anywhere near the job satisfaction that theater work does skate work when you've played King Lear for four hours or Hamlet or Macbeth or any of them by the end of the evening you have climbed the Himalayas and the satisfaction you get from that is enormous the buzz is is I can't really describe it but you never I never get in front of a camera because in front of a camera you you literally unless you what a big big star um you're a Brad Pitt or whatever your father because what you give to that camera somebody else is going to decide what bits of what you will given actually get shown what the sound need the rhythm every actor is differentiated from the other actor amongst other things by rhythm and pace no actors have the same rhythm but in a film whatever rhythm you've given can be artificially manipulated in the editing suite so you you you give your all in the scene and you do everything on you and everything on the other person and then one all together but then somebody else picks which bits are going where and and you have nothing to do with that so what the public eventually sees is really your performance filtered through somebody else's vision on stage it's you and you are making the artistic and creative choices that in front of a camera somebody else is making for you you make the real telephone stages far more frightening far more terrifying on stage because a X number of people are watching you and they're seeing all of you they're not just seeing your face and movies and theater and television is mainly about face and mainly about these on stage it's about this and the voice and that requires a skill a craft and art tricks as well not such a nice word as craft tricks but actors have lots of tricks I mean gilgul was famous for saying when he was doing Hamlet eight times a week four times he was handed the other four times he sent technique on and which in a sense you have to you have to do I mean try playing Lea eight times a week it's it ain't easy but my god it's wonderful if you can actually get there and provide I think theatre actors can travel over to film and television easier than somebody who is film and television orientated could move over to the stage because the stage requires you to be able to fill a space ah to fill the space and make it as real and as audible and is acceptable for people right up there as for people just there that is a skill it is a vocal mental psychological and physical skill and all those things can be pulled back for a camera but it is much more difficult if you are used to the camera the mic everything being picked up every tiny little fretwork being seen and that is the skillet in itself but then it's very difficult to take all that and blow it up out there so I think the journey for stage actor to bring it all back in is much easier than to blow it up and and give it out into a large space so for me the theater the theater is what it's all about it's it's not a lucrative profession theater I don't know any rich theater actors but I don't think there is an actor that I know who wouldn't say that the theater is the place where you feel that you have really achieved something it's frightening it's terrifying you stand in the wings even now thinking what a silly way to earn a living why do I put myself through this why am I so far even now a nice I'm frightened in fact now I think he's worse I I had two years I suffered dreadfully from something called stage fright for two years and I couldn't go anywhere near gate for two years and I still get informations of that at that time but it wouldn't stop me going into the theater and again the theater you can you can go on till you drop you don't have to retire you play the Jews you play the middle-aged I'm into granddad's and things now and it's great it's great granddad's and Leos now so on obviously one aspect of acting that really appeals to you is this electric engagement you get with the audience yes um today you know in an era of online streaming you know videos and films available online what more do you think can be done to really connect with audience members and have them going out to the theatre you were involved in the National Theatre live project for example before well anything can be done to regale denies they're both interested in lately and that's a little iPod use is very interesting very good terrifying to do I you good when I was playing King Lear at the dawn they did one of those national fears Eliab things and we were going out to 300 cinemas we got to the Dover Beach scene and the stage manager rushed onto the stage and said stop stop stop and 300 cinemas went blank the satellite had blown down and we would all sent back the dressing room and it took about 15 minutes to get the satellite back out and 50 minutes later we started the scene again we went back to the beginning of the scene started again and in three anissina miles around the country and in cinemas outdoors everywhere you know they said that most people stayed waited 15 minutes because nobody would nobody knew what had happened but it wasn't the same I remember going back and starting that scene again my good Tommy got to the end no it wasn't right it's all gone wrong so it has it's a craps that but it's wonderful for getting all the plays out there and I iced I think there's a magic innocence if once you've been to the theatre I think it's got you I think you know if what you've seen you've enjoyed I mean if you've been bored to tears but what you've seen and maybe not which is why it's so important for for youngsters to see Shakespeare early and to see good Shakespeare to see accessible Shakespeare to see understandable Shakespeare early rather than just read it and be tested on it because that's that's the killer approach Shakespeare but for me the idea the whole basis of all getting Shakespeare making sure it's very accessible is ain't what you say it's the way what you say it and a healthy disrespect of punctuation is essential if you want to make a lie means something in your interpretation of the character you make it feel so if you don't want that Cannavale you want to fall Scott put a full-stop I am NOT a fan of the iambic pentameter rhythm I think the rhythm is a killer because it puts you to sleep an idiom you don't understand it takes very difficult difficult for actors and if it's difficult at the end what do you think it's likely the audience's who haven't had all the preparation or the rehearsal all the discussion so if you can make it sound like spoken thought the way you talk absolutely normally the way you in tune absolutely normally the way you bring attitude to it absolutely not as you would a contemporary play then that immediately makes it accessible to the audience they don't necessarily have to understand exactly what you're saying because some of the words are archaic and and but if your attitude is right they know why you're saying it they know what you're saying by the way you say it they don't need to know word by word that's it that's a bonus if they do but they don't necessarily need to because your attitude your tone everything at your body everything else about what you're doing tells them what your goals are what you're meaning and it's and it's got to sound as natural and and as as as much spoken thought if you've got to think and you've got thinking it in a contemporary way too because to these reasons the sound was contemporary the thoughts were contemporary and that's what I try to do and I answered your question yeah yeah and more and more so you are you are extremely modest your success and today put a lot of it down to to luck what else would you suggest apart from being lucky to these youngsters today you know knocking on these doors getting in touch with his rep I think you need I when I say luck I mean luck in the sense of being given the opportunity to strut whatever stuff you've got described and I have been given many many opportunities luck in my sense has meant that I've never had to really hustle I've never had to work the room it's kind of happened you've got to serve the goods once you're given the opportunity but I think apart from that you obviously you need a modicum of talent you don't need a huge talent you need an aptitude for acting and a love of it and a commitment to it you also need stamina you also need Health physically acting is very draining when you're playing the big stuff or any and is a part that you're on the stage for a long time even a short time you you've got to be physically adept and you've got to and you've got to be vocally adept particularly if you're playing one of the big shakespeareans because the people are going to be listening to your voice for a good three hours so you've got to be able to play more than one tune with your voice you've got to be not the entire orchestra but several of the leading instruments in that Orchestra to keep the audience's attention so you need you need the talent you need the vocals dexterity dexterity you need the physical stamina and dexterity and also the physical your own knowledge of your body and what it can do and what it can't do and then you need the luck which is the the thing that says okay now here is a chance to show all that that's whether that comes in and while you're showing it you're you're learning don't ever stop ever ever stop learning don't stop don't ever think you've made it you've got it you've cracked it and don't ever stop discovering and delving and asking see when actors in a rehearsal situation an actor would said the director will give a nose or something outside no nothing like that I cut my character wouldn't do that that's out of character rubbish we spend our lives doing things out of character a situation is what's important not who you are but find out who you are in that situation in that any situation we're all all capable doing anything the situation tells us not who we are but where we find ourselves um that is what is important so don't ever say my character wouldn't do that because your character would in given circumstances would I mean do you know Hamlet he's a mass murderer by the end of the play eat the damages the one great situation play anybody can play Hamlet to it it's the great personality part to play Hamlet it's it's how you look how you sound what charisma you give off what sex you are um girls who played Hamlet those boys you can be fat thin tall short black white it doesn't matter what matters is you put that personality who you are as an actor and put it in to Hamlet situations that's when your Hamlet becomes individual that's when your hand it becomes you it's the one part don't don't worry about character in Hamlet you are Hamlet whoever you are you are in now work out how you're going to react as you not as Hamlet to all these situations it's it's it's the great personality role and it's it wonderful it was while playing Hamlet that I I put the worm of doubt in my head that led me to two years some day fight we were coming to the end of a world tour unless the other thing of course acting kicks around the world you get to see places and you we took Hamlet in 1979 to to China the first english-speaking Western company to perform in in Beijing and Shanghai and and also when when you visit these places as part of an acting troupe you are part of the scene you are part of what's going on what's on offer you're not just a tourist you do touristy things during the day and not try not to die is about too much for the show at night but you are there as part of the spirit of whatever city whatever country you're in which is which is wonderful we were coming to the end of this tour we were in Australia we were in the Majesty's Theatre in Sydney and it was dark' we had two matinee in an evening and during the matinee our interval was uh before the nunnery scene so the first thing I had to do after the interval was could be uh not to be when anybody playing Hamlet says to be or not to be there is a tangible silence on the audience it's as if everybody comes forward just a little bit more it's the one line everybody knows some know another couple but everybody knows to be or not to be and when it's said there is such such as well I'm in the wings thinking this and and and thinking you know why what a catastrophe if the admin hadn't so Gossett for what happened it's a supposed to be a must be anyway QK I went on I started to be allowed to be that you the question whether it is nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a sea of troubles and i cried i didn't know what was coming fortunately I had played Hamlet nearly 400 times and and automatic pilot took over and after what to me was a sickening pause I got back onto it by which time every pore in my body had opened my costume had turned black we sweat I was pouring sweat I got through to the end of the show then I had to live again that night I have never been so frightened in my life I my toes became talons that great before to stop me falling over I was so tense it was a terrible performance but at the end of that I thought I I can't I can't do this I can't do this tit I lost it I I kind of put a worm of doubt in my head III I was questioning my ability to act my desire to act my love of acting and all the requests silly questions that people ask an acting how'd you learn your lines yes good question how do I learn my lines how do you stand up in front of 500 people another good question how do I stand up in front of 500 people once I'd ask those questions to myself I answered them in the negative no I can't forgive her no I thought oh good and I never questioned that I never thought about that that's what I do but one side questioned it I couldn't do it and I couldn't do it two years and what got me answer it Fox the age-old thing an offer I couldn't refuse which was the RSC Stratford and curiously I was in I was in Bavaria I was in studios in Munich playing adult hit in a television American television series based on Albert Speers autobiography inside the Third Reich and I was giving my adult and I am I'm sitting in a canvas chair when they say there's a phone call for you Derek and I'm dressed of Hitler so I took the call and it was what shakes their company and they said we want you to be in next season and my heart sank I can't no I can't do it anymore I can't do theater anymore and I said what what what you want me to do what do you want to play and they said we wanted to do Benedick in much ado Prospero in The Tempest Cyrano de Bergerac in surrounded the Deseret and Peer Gynt in Peer Gynt I thought if I say no to that I will never work again I will never be a direct again I've got to do it terrified I said yes yes I've always wanted to be with the RSC and now it's an ambition fulfilled and I'll do it about my heart within like a but I think is probably a lesson to learn that if you've got problems like that the best way of curing the mr. face them there's to admit them and say no no no no you're a big nasty pear but you're not going to get me mr. bear I'm going to punch your nose and you'll run off and I think that's what I did that's what I didn't like I played those those four parts I can't concede now the number of number of lines I must have had in my head we did four played four huge roles wonderful wonderful roles but I've forgotten the question now I think that's plenty of advice for the ER the youngsters of today right great of questions let's yeah let's take some questions from the audience okay so our first question now let's go to the hand in the middle over there thank you what has been your favorite role to play outside of Shakespeare and it would have to be Siriano have to be Savannah it's a genius play at that apparently a trot song wrote 69 plays only two can survive one is called leg long which is about Napoleon son and the other is Serrano so Ryan is a five act romantic drama superbly written and we had a Anthony Burgess translation which was a fabulous translation even to read it on the page was a moving experience to actually get up there and say those words was extraordinary it is a wonderful play in that it it has humor or masses of humor masses of romance and masses of heartbreak and the fifth act of Cyrano de Bergerac I defy anybody to survive if if if the actors got the first four axé right by the time you get to the fifth act you are so rooting for Serrano and there is a wonderful moment when Serrano woods has been attacked and he's dying he comes to see your ox on who for the last 15 years has been a nun in a Carmelite nun away and he comes in she sits him down he visit he has visited over the years regularly this time she doesn't know it but he's dying he says he asks her if she kept Christians last letter to her Christian was the beautiful young man that she was in love with who loved her but he had no soul had no poetry no no romance and Serrano had written all the letters of course and she said yes of course I kept it letter and she plucks it out of her bosom and starts to read it and she gets to sentence with Ian and he starts saying letter and she suddenly realizes that all these years it was him and if you've got it right it's unbearable it's unbearable um but it just a little jokey side to that I'm playing Serrano in the Gershwin Theatre on Broadway in 1984 with sinéad Cusack playing Roxane and we get to that moment when I asked her does she have the letter under she such as Cole she's kept his letter will you read it to me of course and there is no letter she hasn't said the letter what are we going to do so she rushes into the wings and the letter is on that side I'm sitting there dying literally all I can hear now remember Sinead is an Irish lass all I can hear is why the Fox she eventually finds the letter and she comes back on and she's in such a state that she's absolutely wonderful she plays it superb I'm sitting there rigid we get off and she said I'm so sorry love I should go don't work don't work sometimes fine we get back to the the dressing rooms and about 15 minutes later knock on my door and is she married with an actress who in her day was famous method actress name of Shelley Winters now Shelley Winters was one of the Lee Strasberg ladies in the act of studio in New York famously Metford and she came in and she Ned said listen to Shelley and apparently that moment walls for Shelley absolutely real and absolutely wonderful because of course the woman was a nun and she wouldn't be doing all this in front of the serrano of course she would leave the stage to get the letter and come back decorously come back so for surely it was a hit of the evening so much for a method great let's take another question let's go to the gentleman here on the second row please thank you so I think the first thing I saw UN was and I've sort of Frazer that you get started yes where you play the Shakespearean actor of Hal Lanier Jackson Hedley yeah I wondered what it was like for someone of your talent to play such a bad act easy easy no it was everyone's them that came up with blue actually to be cleaned up one day and said they want to play a part of a bad Shakespearean actor in an episode of Frasier again but an offer you can't refuse really so I went out to Los Angeles and they were all very sweet to me it was a bit daunting I have to say because on the first read through you sit around the table to cast audit on the table and write on the edge are all the producers about 30 of them producers writers all the people are writing the gags they're all sitting there and all the the Joseph grammar and everybody there and you've got to read and pray that these guys are gonna laugh and Kelsey starts and they roar with laughter and then the Hyde Pierce comes in and he says some of these and they're roaring with laughter they've all written it go wrong and then I say my first line silence my second line third line some gorgeous woman laughs and gradually they came around gradually and it was was a joy to do a real joy and I loved it I loved I loved amber but that was a job out of left field you know and but she all they will all those jobs when you think with that further my career to play a bad Shakespeare actor in Frasier yes indeed yes gotta Nellie so yes it appears great was a great time right let's go to the the hand at the back over there and I Claudius is my favorite program ever and I was obsessed with ancient Rome and it's your fault and a few years ago you returned to it to play or Gustus in the radio program so I was wondering whether it was a particularly special story or book for you oh very very special yeah what can I say well I wasn't first choice by any means and they were scraping the barrel bit when they got to me the first originally they were going to have to Claudia a young a young one and an old one and for the old one who they wanted Charlton Heston and then because the whole thing was owned by America it was owned by London films which is an American company and they didn't get child Heston today they went to Ronnie Barker and then in in some office discussion my name came up because I'd done a piece for the BBC BBC two called man of straw man straw was a high paced on the heinrich man novel it was the sixth part of a BBC two and do innit I had to age from teenager to sixty and it was the same producer and the same director as I Claudius and he said what about Derek why don't we have one actor doing it and we'll age him up ah I said fine so they suggested this to the Americans who didn't know me from a hole in the ground so I was taken to dinner in a Italian restaurant in Shepherds Bush to meet the representatives of London films that was the best performance I ever gained I think I had to charm the bejesus out of them by the end of the evening they said okay it's a risk but we'll go with him we'll go with him and for the next six months we filmed it at the BBC it's to say that it changed my life is not quite good it certainly changed my career within two years I was on Broadway and I done what six ball B plays now all stemming from Claudius I have to add that he was 41 years ago was 19 1976 but it was it was unique in that it was beautifully written with a 1 little script because when you read the books they at the graves books there's there's very very little dialogue in a Miss mainly description and so Jack Pullman who adapted it had to create all this guy lobe which he did absolutely brilliantly I mean isn't Claudius is doesn't say anything I didn't thinking I've were the two books but he's on every page because he's writing it and it was full of sort of old-fashioned television techniques and long scenes long takes and it was in the days of TV studios down in White City so there wasn't much money available I remember I got an extra six hundred pounds at the end of it for my conduct took rehearsals but so that it was done on honours a shoestring if you watch carefully when sometimes not always but a lot of the time when we go from one scene to the other we are actually in the same seeing the same set the potted plants have moved that's how they change theme and when we are in the Coliseum looking down at the gladiators we are on a 10 foot rostrum about twice the height of this looking down at chalk marks on the floor where the gladiators are the camera men's lying on his back on the floor looking up at us so it looks as if we're up there with all those wonderful sort of old-fashioned tricks but the main thing was that it was we were encouraged to be a kind of theatrical group all those actors because the characters themselves were so theatrical it was a wonderful story and the characters were so larger what do you think of Johnny hurt his Caligula Brian Blessed is or Gus curse of Shawn as Libya they were huge overblown characters that we were allowed to play like a theater company in there and it it was wonderful and it was I think actors I think most actors would like to have a peak in their career some have more than one some have a hole in the layers of them one one part that they are associated with you know some don't get that part as I say some get more than one Claudius was my one so this was the one that when people said I Claudius they thought of me and that's that's a great gift for an actor and it wasn't one their dad is expecting at all so I bless Claudius let's take a few more questions we go to the hand there against the wall the middle and I was wondering about your opinion on the phenomenon of so-called star theater especially in regards to what you said about so long to live your appreciation of youngsters yeah the idea of star theater as being something that we can use to get more young people coming to see theater but then it has been criticized for young people who don't truly Anessa Sara Lee appreciate the theater as a place to go and I complained I was being using their phones to film things and getting autographs and yeah I was wondering what your opinions on that idea it's a good question it's a saddens me that one of the most lucrative cooks to get people to go to the theater is to present somebody they've not necessarily a star but somebody whose name they know somebody whose stardom merely means that they have appeared on telly usually maybe in a reality program maybe in a dance program maybe in a quiz program but they are scars in the sense that they are they are known they're what they look like and their name is known but to to call that a star performer no it's not it's not it's it's a hook to get people in into the theater it happens particularly at Christmas when all those pancakes you know with the people you've never really heard of but um but you seem maybe on Strictly Come Dancing or coming no I it's it's a shame there are some there are some real stars there are the duty Dench's and the Maggie Smith and the Albert Finney's and you know who are truly stars who in their own right can attract people to the theater which is which is wonderful but now I know I said the bottom line of course is we need bums on seeds we need people in the fear we need people to to play to to what to work for and if that is a way of doing it it's a legitimate as any other but it's not the real thing no in the park so yeah yeah got a better view up there tonight I thank you so much I know that you're a supporter of a reasonable doubt theory of Shakespeare so could you give us your main argument that it was Earl of Oxford have you time till midnight I may be one of them oh it's a such a huge question as I'm sure you know now I am an authorship doubter III don't I do not say the other box about the plays or bacon or Malinois or any of them or several of them we do not know what at what I would nail my flags the mast to say along with my mother staunch to the border is Mark Rylance and I both say it was not the man who lived in Stratford upon him there is a huge amount of evidence that it wasn't that it couldn't have been I really can't go into it now because we literally would be here for many hours but there are at the moment many books on the subject there have been a lot of research at last the subject is almost legitimate it's still illegitimate what Mark and I would love is for the question to be legitimized so that we could actually debate it but when we say what we say where would they just throw mud at us well I mean we both Bend in the press that we will end up in lunatic asylums there's just fight cooporation there is no debate there is no evidence given it is just we are snobs we are anti Shakespearean no we're not ng with anti strap for diem but no and strip Shakespearean but it's just as I said there's a lot of a problem search being done there was a lot of Kreacher opener fascinating literature I would anybody's vitally interested I would see an American author whose name of course Alzheimer's out time as I'd forgotten called the unorthodox Diana price diana price Shakespeare's unorthodox biography if you were tall interested in the subject and she doesn't say it well of Oxford he doesn't say any of that she just traces the non-existent paper trail to the man from Stratford it's a fascinating book and is a wonderful you're at all names were said it's at one of starter for ten that book it really is I to my great regret appeared in a film called Anonymous which shot itself in several feet big because what the good thing about anonymous was that it got the authorship question up on a big screen for millions to see millions who've never even considered that the man from Stratford wasn't the author so that was a plus from there on it was full of minuses particularly the main one being that they introduced what his name was the Prince Tudor theory the Prince Tudor theory states that Edward de Vere was the illegitimate son of Elizabeth by Thomas Seymour who was then spirited away and brought up as the Earl of Oxford's son who then became the 17th Earl of Oxford who then had an affair with his mother Elizabeth and produced the Earl of Southampton not that silly I remember that's very but that was one of the main arguments of the film which which was sad because it got the question up there but but it reinforced all those people who said that no debating loonies they need it was a Lizabeth son and then he then he had an affair with the one produced it's ludicrous any tears I'm afraid I think it could be true we don't know but I don't think don't think it is I'm sorry for one or two more questions the answer yeah yeah yeah hi I wasn't sure whether or not to mention this but as you mentioned it in a story I just wanted to say it's my 21st birthday today and it's absolute privilege to be able see oh I'm like Shirley Bassey I'm not going to 35 and what I wanted to say was you talked a lot about all of the luck that you've had and all the roles you've been really lucky to have what about are there any roles that you look back on that other people have done that you wish you'd been able to do oh gosh um I mean I missed out I missed out on Romeo but I don't think I ever Wallaroo Mia really I've always I've always felt that I I haven't got a suffering face I've always asked father Christmas of cheekbones and he's never sent them because because there's a certain part you need cheaper before and I've never had them no I think if I'm honest I'm satisfied with the parts that scum might have come my way and I haven't I don't think I've ever really sat in the audience thinking it should have been me I don't if I'm honest no I can't I can't say I'm very satisfied with the parts I've done and I've another great for yeah great we've got time for one final question let's go to eat why don't you pick your birds Ikey Oh what Gumby yeah make him work yeah at the back yeah hello I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who thinks I Claudius is one of the best television series lovely ha I was wondering what your best and worst memories were from the production of that if you thought the clothes got ever got to you and if your significant talking about tortoise I was also wondering what your mind died in egde of your mother of ambitious is Oh considering we never see her and you always go on um what was the what was the thing about vision i I went your mother's your because we never see oh and you go on about her so much of vicious your mother your image of the mother on the end of the time you do see her I do yeah she died in one of the thing oh well well the weight bearing England make it begin I all told revetted when Ian and I celebrated our anniversary she collapsed and died anyway anyway um sorry no I I call this was was basically a joy a joy throughout I think one of the hardest things was at the beginning I had to the whole prosthetics thing it took hours this was as I say it's 41 years ago they weren't too clever at prosthetics then I had to get into the dressing room at about 5:00 a.m. every morning to have the prosthetics laid on piece by piece with spirit gum everything and then bled into each other so it looked like one mask that was bad enough but during the course of the day of course so that it didn't crack I could only I could have soup to his for because I couldn't chew anything I mustn't because it did tend to crack round here when I spoke but then at the end of the day to get it off was even worse that was that was quite painful and we could only shoot me as a young Claudius but we would had you Oh Claudia second because when I took it off I've got I was covered in sometimes blood and spots and looked awful eventually we found the best way of getting it off was to lay in a hot bath full of chuckled baddie gas which was a foaming bath thing with a snorkel and breathe underwater and gradually it was lift off somewhere I know in a draw at home I've got a mold ring full Claudia face that came off in one but that that was that thing the worse and then of course it was the twitching was it was very difficult at first a when you first see him of the old man of course he wasn't twitching nearly so much when the first time he seen as a younger man he's twitching all over the place the poor little boy who played me very young we watched him one day in rehearsal and Margaret Tyzack of the playing my mother said look look at Richard I said Jesus very good for you use Marvis of me she said no no no no he's twitching the wrong way and the poor little boy I'd started to twitch that way and he was twitching that way and we told him about it and he just did that perfectly it was but the first time I did I had to go and see the Sybil to find out what was gonna happen to Rome and I said to the rector had you had to go out and greet a Sybil and of course we didn't know so we had to make something up so it was raise your hands high in the air and you bow your head and then Herbie said not now do some twitching so I start you and Richt my neck so I had to wear one of those white collars for the first month so you can still actually when we filmed would had to take it off but you can see the pain in my eyes as I'm preaching and immediately finish back when the neck great so they were the nasty moments the rest was pure joy pure joy great well unfortunately that is all we've got time for and this evening could ask that you please remain seated until after the speaker has left the room but before that please join me in thanking Sid Eric one final time you

Channel: OxfordUnion

Views: 68,376

Rating: 4.9325843 out of 5

Keywords: Oxford, Union, Oxford Union, Oxford Union Society, debate, debating, The Oxford Union, Oxford University

Id: lyUvvE-V_hI

Length: 63min 57sec (3837 seconds)

Published: Fri May 26 2017