Interview with Malcolm McDowell
Falling through the cracks
Highlights:
NEVER APOLOGIZE, the documentary of Malcolm McDowell’s celebration of Lindsay Anderson, their times and their colleagues, is a unique hybrid of film, theater and literature. It has been selected for presentation in the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, Cannes Classics section, where it will have its world premiere on May 25, 2007 in the Bunuel Theatre.
Anderson, the award-winning director, critic, essayist and anarchist, cast McDowell in his first starring role as the rebellious “Mick Travis,” in his film, IF…., winner of the Palm D’Or, Cannes (1968). Their working relationship continued through five additional film and theatre productions spanning several decades, including O Lucky Man! (Cannes, 1972) and Britannia Hospital (Cannes, 1982).
Directed by Mike Kaplan, whose friendship with McDowell began on Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange and who produced Anderson’s last feature film, The Whales of August (Cannes, 1987), NEVER APOLOGIZE combines McDowell’s personal reminiscences with his readings of pieces written by and about his friend and mentor. These are brought to life by the actor's often hilarious and moving impressions of not only the provocative Anderson, but also the notables in their circle, including Alan Bates, Bette Davis, John Ford, John Gielgud, Lillian Gish, Richard Harris, Laurence Olivier and Rachel Roberts. We visit a group of colorful personalities and witness the cultural, social and political climate of the period.
The Film Society of Lincoln Center welcomed actor Malcolm McDowell and director and producer Mike Kaplan during the New York premiere engagement of their film, NEVER APOLOGIZE: A PERSONAL VISIT WITH LINDSAY ANDERSON, Aug. 15-21.
Transcript:
Arguably amongst the most dynamic and inventive of world-class actors, yet one also capable of immense charm, humor and poignancy, Malcolm McDowell has created a gallery of iconographic characters since catapulting to the screen as “Mick Travis”, the rebellious upperclassman in Lindsay Anderson’s prize-winning sensation, IF...
His place in movie history was subsequently secured when Stanley Kubrick finally found the actor he was searching for to play the gleefully amoral “Alex” in A Clockwork Orange; when McDowell conceived the idea for the further adventures of “Mick Travis” in Anderson’s comedic epic O Lucky Man!; when he wooed Mary Steenburgen and defeated “Jack the Ripper” as the romantically inquisitive H.G. Welles in Nicholas Meyer’s Time After Time; when he destroyed “Capt. Kirk” in Star Trek: Generations, and when he pranced and parried as narcissistic ballet impresario “Alberto Antonelli” in Robert Altman’s The Company.
Those legendary roles have endured with legions of filmgoers while other adherents have been won over by: his compellingly sinister Caligula; his compulsive Gangster No. 1, in which he created a character both on screen and through nuanced voice-over; his complex villain who taunts Clive Owen and traumatizes Jonathan Rhys Meyers in Mike Hodges’ neo-noir I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead and his conflicted “Yurovsky”, who carries out the ...
Arguably amongst the most dynamic and inventive of world-class actors, yet one also capable of immense charm, humor and poignancy, Malcolm McDowell has created a gallery of iconographic characters since catapulting to the screen as “Mick Travis”, the rebellious upperclassman in Lindsay Anderson’s prize-winning sensation, IF...
His place in movie history was subsequently secured when Stanley Kubrick finally found the actor he was searching for to play the gleefully amoral “Alex” in A Clockwork Orange; when McDowell conceived the idea for the further adventures of “Mick Travis” in Anderson’s comedic epic O Lucky Man!; when he wooed Mary Steenburgen and defeated “Jack the Ripper” as the romantically inquisitive H.G. Welles in Nicholas Meyer’s Time After Time; when he destroyed “Capt. Kirk” in Star Trek: Generations, and when he pranced and parried as narcissistic ballet impresario “Alberto Antonelli” in Robert Altman’s The Company.
Those legendary roles have endured with legions of filmgoers while other adherents have been won over by: his compellingly sinister Caligula; his compulsive Gangster No. 1, in which he created a character both on screen and through nuanced voice-over; his complex villain who taunts Clive Owen and traumatizes Jonathan Rhys Meyers in Mike Hodges’ neo-noir I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead and his conflicted “Yurovsky”, who carries out the murder of the Romanovs in Karen Chakhnazarov’s Assassain of the Tsar. For the latter, The New York Times said, ‘Not since reaching his mature years has McDowell given such a fine, strong, crafty performance. It is acted with immense skill.”
McDowell’s 100 feature film credits include: My Life So Far; Royal Flash; Cat People; Tank Girl; Hugo Pool; Figures in a Landscape and Long Ago Tomorrow. Also, the brilliant literary editor Maxwell Perkins in Martin Ritt’s Cross Creek; the Chaplin-esque studio boss in Blake Edwards’ Sunset and the final incarnation of “Mick Travis” in Britannia Hospital, the third film in Anderson’s trilogy.
On television, he made his starring debut opposite Laurence Olivier, Alan Bates and Helen Mirren in Harold Pinter’s The Collection, directed by Michael Apted. Later televison was highlighted by the influential British mini-series, Our Friends from the North, with Daniel Craig and Gina McKee, and most recently, as the agency head in the hit HBO series, Entrourage.
In addition to Entourage, McDowell’s recent films include David Greico’s Russian-made Evilenko, Paul Weitz’ In Good Company, and Tamar Simon Hoffs’ Red Roses and Petrol. He has also created a lot of buzz for his recent three-epsiode role in the hit TV series, HEROES
In the Fall, McDowell will be seen in the starring role in Rob Zombie's HALLOWEEN, based on the John Carpenter classic, a major release. Future projects include Abraham Polonsky’s adaptation of the Thomas Mann novella, Mario and the Magician, to be directed by Mike Hodges.
McDowell was born in Leeds, England and acted in several British repertory companies before joining the Royal Shakespeare Company. Shortly thereafter, he began his film career with IF…
The Film Society of Lincoln Center, The American Cinematheque, The Deauville Festival, England’s National Museum of Film, Television and Photography, and the Australian Cinematheque have all accorded him major retrospectives. He is married to painter – photographer Kelley Kuhr and is the father of actress Lilly McDowell, director Charlie McDowell and the recently arrived Beckett Taylor McDowell and Finnian Anderson McDowell.
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