Strictly Dance
07 Feb 2011 - 02:55 PM
Charles Dance is one of that exclusive
club of British actors who are instantly recognisable without ever
having been a tremendous star. At 64, he could easily pass for ten years
younger, his strong physique as upright as ever and the detached
twinkle still evident in those glacial grey-blue eyes. The voice too is
instantly identifiable: slightly elocuted, deep, resonant with an edge
that can turn brusque. His sandy hair, swept back in open defiance of
slight erosion and his senatorial nose complete the portrait of an actor
who has been on screens both large and small as well as theatres for
the better part of 25 years.
“I
prefer film,” he volunteers, as we get comfortable in the living room of
his tasteful but unostentatious house in North London. “I like the
people who work in film, I like the family atmosphere that is created on
a film. As an actor, I like the theatre when it goes well. We all get
into this business because we want to be appreciated and that is most
evident in the theatre. We all want to be loved. Any actor who tells you
different is lying. But theatre takes over your life. And it is
nerve-wracking. I’m not a sociable actor. I like to get out of the
theatre as quickly as possible after the curtain falls. Job done.”
Dance
was born in Redditch, Worcestershire, in 1946, the son of an engineer
who died when Charles was four. After his mother, Nell, a former parlour
maid, remarried, the family moved to Plymouth. Dance trained at
Plymouth Art School and then Leicester College of Arts and Design, where
he was encouraged to enter the theatre by two drama coaches. A stint in
provincial rep was followed by the RSC and he was on his way. In 1984
he became a household name in the role of Guy Perron in television’s The
Jewel in the Crown. Films and television followed consistently
including Plenty, White Mischief, Pascali’s Island, right up to Bleak
House and Trinity. His many fans (both male and female) believe he
should have played James Bond, but he settled for playing Ian Fleming in
TV’s Goldeneye. On stage he has distinguished himself in Coriolanus,
Shadowlands and Good.
While Dance was
awarded an OBE in recognition of his work in 2006, he assures me he was
never a hugely ambitious actor. “I have never been cardinally ruthless
about my career. I’ve never been to LA and camped out. When you get to
64, work begins to thin out. A few years ago I was too young to play the
parts I play now. The optimum age for a Hollywood lead is 30. I’ve
never been in a particularly marketable position. I’m not too proud to
put myself on tape or go for a reading as some other experienced actors
are. We’re all products and the thing is that we must make the product
look as good as possible.”
His
practical, no-nonsense attitude to his business does not mean he
undervalues the art. He is a pragmatist, understanding that film is
expensive and now requires ‘names’ just to get financed. It is clearly
annoying, but he speaks from direct experience, having written and
directed his first film, Ladies in Lavender, he is currently raising
finance for his second, The Inn at the Edge of The World, based on the
1990 novel by Alice Thomas Ellis. “I keep hearing that we are
dangerously close to closing the deal,” he says with a wry smile (he’s
good at wry smiles). “I had to halve the budget but it is still very
much cast-dependent. I could cast it tomorrow with wonderful British
actors, none of whom would raise a dime. The business side seems to be
swamping the artistic side more and more.” Indeed, when he tried to sell
Ladies in Lavender (“Two old ladies in a cottage in Cornwall and
nothing much happens”) to television he was rejected at every turn. When
he secured the services of Maggie Smith and Judi Dench he got the film
made. “Commercially, it did very well because the people who supported
it were the grey pound, or grey dollar. It is a market that is not being
catered for and it is really silly to ignore it.”
British
television is particularly prone to financial cutbacks, he says. The
BBC and ITV are “penny-pinching like Hell.” Things have to be made
faster and more cheaply and quality suffers as a result. There are the
odd moments of luxury: Terry Pratchett’s Going Postal which he did
recently for Sky (“They seem to be putting money into things”) and he is
having an enjoyable time shooting a film for German television in
Scotland based on a book by Rosamund Pilcher.
Occasionally,
aware that he is getting on his high horse, he reins himself in. It is
almost as if he feels that to become too complaining would be somehow
untidy, disorderly. “I like order and I strive to maintain it, though I
don’t always succeed,” he confesses. “I’m a creature of my environment.
Time seems to go much more quickly than it used to.”
Aware,
though not obsessed with the ageing process, Dance has a regime that is
almost military in its precision. Every morning he goes swimming for 30
minutes in the unheated Lido on Parliament Hill Fields – winter aside –
and works out with his own weights and cycle at home. “I do something
every day, a bit of yoga, pilates and a bit of military stuff.”
Clearly,
it is a regime that pays off. I have noticed several English actors who
have the commanding presence and authority of soldiers, in spite of
never having been near the army. The late Edward Woodward had it in
spades. Dance has it, too, with a dash of old-school colonialism thrown
in. This may be an associative hangover of some of his roles, Guy Perron
in Jewel in the Crown, the Earl of Errol in White Mischief, but in
person he has the same easy authority and command that makes him a
natural for such roles. He begins the day with a bowl of fruit and I am
slightly surprised to find that he still smokes, albeit the relatively
non-toxic cigarettes American Spirit. Some vices are harder to give up
than others.
He keeps his private
life to himself as far as possible. His two children, Rebecca and
Oliver, by his former wife, Joanna, are doing well, he says guardedly.
Neither of them are actors, though Oliver works in film as a third
Assistant Director.
But while we had
agreed not to stray too deeply into personal territory, Dance cannot
help himself. He asks my opinion of a bronze bust of himself sitting in
his living room. It is a fine likeness; I voice my approval and he
smiles.
“My girlfriend, Eleanor, did that. Talented as well as beautiful.”
He shows me a photograph of them together just to prove his point. It is not vanity but genuine pride – and perhaps surprise – that he could have landed such a gifted, gorgeous girl, some years younger than he.
He shows me a photograph of them together just to prove his point. It is not vanity but genuine pride – and perhaps surprise – that he could have landed such a gifted, gorgeous girl, some years younger than he.
He
has, it seems, a particular penchant for clever, vivacious women. Among
his dream dinner party guests he includes Josephine Hart and Fanny
Ardant. “I’ve done a lot of poetry readings with Josephine. I’m one of
her pool of readers. She is informative, interesting and she likes
actors. I’ve learnt so much from Josephine. I’m not very well read and
she has opened doors for me. I met Fanny Ardant at the Institut Francais
and we have talked about doing a project together. I’d love to do The
Lion in Winter with her but the rights aren’t available. But we text
each other and have lunch whenever I’m in Paris. There is a gratifying
amount of mutual admiration.” He also recalls his first meeting with
Catherine Deneuve, another subject of his admiration.
“I
gripped her hand and started to gabble,” he recalls. “After a while I
could see her smile turn into a fixed grin of alarm as if she was
thinking: ‘Is this man ever going to let me have my hand back?”
When
this digression on the allure of grand French actresses comes to an end
by mutual agreement, he lights another cigarette and we discuss his
current reading and musical tastes. He pushes a book towards me, The
Junior Officers’ Reading Club, and heartily recommends it. It is by a
former officer in the Grenadier Guards, Patrick Hennessy, and it uncaps
the reality of what it is like to be in Iraq and Afghanistan. “I was at
The Sun Military Awards at The Imperial War Museum and I was seated at a
table with three guys from bomb disposal unit. These men are risking
their lives every day for us. They don’t get paid much and the
government still takes income tax. I don’t think any soldier on active
service should pay income tax.”
He
says he has got into trouble making similar remarks before but it is a
fair point and he is quite impassioned about it. Strangely enough,
although he is by no means an agitating actor in the manner of Corin
Redgrave or, lately, Jeremy Irons, he possesses the cool authority and
quiet passion that would be perfect suited to the political arena. Like
Joanna Lumley did with her Gurkha campaign, one feels that Dance could
make a difference.
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