March 20, 1999

They seek him here, they seek him there. George Frew talks to actor Richard E. Grant

Think about it. There are very few actors who are capable of playing an 18th The Scarlet century fop…”Sink me, Pimpernel sir!”, a loveable Dickensian Cockney…”Gor bless us, everyone!”, and a garrulous hardcase Glaswegian “See you, Jimmy? You’re deid, pal!”

There are fewer still whose gallery of characters to date also include cult-status, shambling, raving alcoholics, high-heeled camp kings of fashion, the Spice Girls manager and the occasional witchfinder.

Richard E. Grant has done all this and more besides. Last seen on television in fine and dandy form as “The Scarlet Pimpernel”, he has since completed a football film called “The Match” and is currently filming “A Christmas Carol” in which he plays Bob Cratchit opposite Patrick Stewart’s Scrooge.

In “The Match”, his character is a Glasgwegian. Now most English actors couldn’t do an authentic Glasgow accent if their Equity cards depended on it, but Grant had some help from Joan Washington, his wife of 16 years, who not only happens to be Scottish herself, but is also a voice coach. The couple live in Twickenham with their ten-year-old daughter, Olivia.”

At 42, he’s an actor with a following which has grown and a career which has burgeoned since he sprang to prominence as Withnail, that wild-eyed, drunken beacon of inspiration to malcontents everywhere in “That Film”. Richard E. Grant is not without his critics, though. Some say that his acting is ‘mannered’, conveniently forgetting that certain roles call for just that quality.

More annoyingly for some, he also writes rather well, which is why he’s been at the Oxford Union as part of the city’s Literary Festival, reading from his first novel, By Design. Neither acting or writing score very highly in the safe and secure career stakes. Many brave souls who attempt either profession as the calling of their choice end up spending their nights dreaming of landing spear- carrying jobs or their days papering their front rooms with publisher’s rejection slips.

So tell us, Richard…how do you manage it?

“I think one feeds the other,” he replies thoughtfully. “In the theatre or on film sets, there is such a lot of hanging around and that is very conducive to writing. By Design is a novel about celebrity, because the behind-the-scenes stuff that goes on is such a rich source of material that it’s irresistible…so when I got the commission to write the novel, I jumped at the chance.”

Grants first stab at writing produced “With Nails: The Film Diaries of Richard E. Grant”, culled from journals he’d been keeping for 15 years, since the day he arrived in London from his native Swaziland as a 25-year-old hopeful with two suitcases and no contacts. The diaries were an instant success, both in hardback and paperback, which led directly to the commission of “By Design”.

“Writing is a lonely job,” he admits. “Six months alone in a room…I had no experience of that sort of working situation and since I’ve done it, my respect for writers has gone through the ceiling. When you tell people you’re working on a novel, they say things like ‘Oh, I could write a book’ without having any sort of idea of the discipline involved.”

“On By Design, I was working to a time slot and an advance of money and while I’m not singing the blues about that, it was tough. The publishers didn’t want more of the diaries and stipulated that for the novel, I had to come up with a five-page synopsis. I found this very difficult initially, but being forced to do it helped enormously. I had only a vague outline at first but once I had set up the characters, they dictated how it would be.”

Mention to anyone that Grant is currently filming A Christmas Carol and the chances are they’ll say: “Oh…he’s playing Scrooge, then, is he?” Which is not to say that he can’t do good guys, merely that most people seem to associate him with mad, bad or downright eccentric roles.

“I wanted to play Bob Cratchit because I knew that Olivia would be able to see me in it and I wanted to work with Patrick Stewart again after being in “LA Story” with him. And it’s good to be playing a good and decent Cockney!”

“When we were making the Pimpernel, there was no time to pontificate about it all, but we had to get the balance right. It turned out to be easier than I expected to make him a fop without getting into all that ridiculous camp stuff.”

Grant says he’s wanted to act from a very early age: ” When I was six or seven, I was given some puppets as a present and then appeared in school plays. The line through to the present day is absolutely clear.”

When he’s not acting or writing, he reads. “I’m on three books at the moment, including The Rough Guide To The Internet and Steve Martin’s book, Pure Drivel, which is very funny.” Martin is one of Grant’s Hollywood pals. When With Nails was published, the American comedian was moved to write, “You’ll laugh, you’ll cry especially if you’re in the book like I am.”

There have been tears among the laughter in the lives of Grant and his wife. In 1986, their baby daughter, who had been born premature, died within half an hour. At the time, Grant remarked: “You get round it but you don’t get over something like that. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of her, but I’m not obsessed by it.”

But these are better days for Richard E. Grant. The books continue to sell and the acting jobs keep on coming. With Nails? Sometimes. With aplomb? Always. He will always have his critics, but he will also have the success and the awards to answer them.

Take it for Granted.

George Frew – 20 March 1999.

Richard E. Grant on…

Humour:- “I love Julie Walters in Acorn Antiques and I thought Fawlty Towers was wonderful. John Cleese just made it look like so much fun to be manic.”

Money:- “It opens doors and gives you freedom to decide how you’ll go through life.”

Fame:- “It’s fickle, fabulous and very unreliable. But it really does have great plusses…people always seem happy to see you and it makes you feel less alien when you’re in a foreign country.”

Ambition:- “Like rocket fuel to an actor…you’ve got to have it. And my ambition is to write and direct a film…but not appear in it.”

Love:- “Essential. The reason we’re here. The most important thing of all.”