Interview: "World's sexiest dad?" by Fiona Hudson (Brisbane Courier - Mail)

Archived completely due to unavailability on the internet

Colin Firth is the quintessential romantic lead so why, asks Fiona Hudson, is he appearing in a movie with children.

Staring at an empty seat waiting for Colin Firth, I wonder if this is his idea of a gag, for his latest film, Nanny Mcphee, features a vacant chair that at times threatens to overshadow the talented actor. Am I meant, like in the movie, to converse with the striped upholstery instead of the handsome star?

Before I can pop a question to the plump cushions, heart-throb Firth arrives. Things don’t start well as I recount a colleague’s tale of her recent trip to a London members-only bar where the toilets are marked with “Milk” and “Honey” instead of symbols. Uncertain which to choose, she entered “Honey”, and found Firth behind the door. To her dismay, he apparently made a hasty exit-which seems to be exactly what he’d like to do now. 

I had hoped the story might lead to a playful game of words, with Firth choosing between options such as film or stage, love or fight, an pride or prejudice. My reasoning was that Firth-aka Mr Darcy-is probably sick to death of the standard promotional trail questions about that scene a decade ago when he emerged from a lake in those britches. Except, he doesn’t seem too keen.

Business, I ask, or pleasure?
“Pleasure,” he says, showing none.

Crosswords or sudoku?
“I loathe both,” he almost snarls.

Parliament or pressure group?
“Pressure group, definitely,” he says, warming to the task.

Hugh Grant or Kevin Bacon?
“Depends on what we’re talking about,” he says.

Given he recently filmed sex scenes with Bacon in the edgy film WTTL, there’s plenty I would like to talk about but this is a family newspaper and he’s here to talk about a family movie, so we move on to Nanny Mcphee.

In it, Firth plays the widowed father of seven wild children who finds a women on his doorstep, and she soon gets them all into shape. The actor says he liked working on the film, though he initially doubted he was right for the role. “I’d never done a film for children of this age and I wasn’t sure about it,” he says. “I usually play the fairly complicated characters and I wasn’t sure if I was cut out for the innocence of it. Once I got over myself a bit, and it took a couple of days, I had a great time doing it. I like characters whose good side doesn’t come easily; who resist doing whatever it is they are being called upon to do or to be.”

Perhaps, something akin to his attitude to the promotion treadmill…. Firth was especially attracted to the idea of working with Emma Thompson, who wrote the script as well as playing the title role. “I thought, this is an opportunity to have a very enjoyable time,” he says.

He couldn’t resist creeping on set wearing Nanny Mcphee’s full garb-including a hideously bulbous nose, snaggle tooth and warts. Widely regarded as a dreamboat, Firth says given the chance to erase an unwanted facial feature, as happens in the movie, he wouldn’t bother. “I’m quite happy to let the face go where it goes, really. We can, if we want, evaporate our facial features. Members of my profession go rushing to the surgeon all the time.”

Other actors in the film, including Angela Lansbury and Kelly Macdonald, don’t need surgery-their faces are hidden under colored pies, cakes and other foods during a mass foodfight. “What looks a rollicking good time is a painstaking and drawn-out process. Those things weren’t edible. My children came to the set and saw all these pink and purple buns - I had to tell them not only would you break your teeth if you tried to eat one, you’d be hospitalised if you succeeded.” 

Given Nanny Mcphee is a children’s film, will he take the young ones to see it? “I don’t push myself at them, the little ones are very little. It’s weird to see a parent on the screen and I don’t think I’m going to hasten towards that moment. They’ve seen me in magazines and on buses, but they probably think everyone’s dads are on buses.”

Firth says he was thrilled by the reaction to Nanny Mcphee in Britain, where it doubled expectation at the box office. “Really, the film is just trying to delight all kids,” he explains. “there is something quite uplifting about that. We are actually trying to please children. It’s that simple.”

Thanks to Gumby, Australia

Interview: "Don't photograph me from the waist down!" by John-Paul Flintoff (The Sunday Times...2 pages)

But just as Martin starts to take some pictures, the publicist says we can only photograph Firth from the waist up. Otherwise, Sunday Times readers would see his Roman trousers and Timberland boots, also customised to look Roman. And we can't have that.

It's at this point that the artist loses his cool. He throws up his hands and says: "I can't do this. I can't make a hundred compromises in one day!" The artist in question is Martin.

Firth steps down off the crate. "I'm sorry about your compromises." He looks sincere, but it is impossible to rule out the possibility that he's also a little amused. Martin is already regretting his outburst. It's not Firth's fault, he says, and apologises effusively. Firth steps back up and Martin places me behind him, holding a screen of black felt. Look closely at the picture and you can see my fingertips.
It's not that Firth asks much, he says jovially. He doesn't demand outfits by Armani, for instance, or Hugo Boss. He's willing to be photographed with his hair and face smeared in glycerine - lending him a sweaty appearance appropriate to a legionnaire but less so to a movie star. He'd just prefer not to be pictured in trousers with a leather gusset, if that's possible. "You try to be a good bloke," he says, "and to make yourself available. But I don't want to open a magazine and think, 'Why on earth did I let them do that?.....more

Interview: "Don't call me Darcy, says Colin" (The Ilford Recorder)

Firth: I've been hearing year after year after year, "well this is a departure for you, isn't it?" I don't know how many departures I have to make. I think if someone hadn't seen Bridget Jones, or Pride and Prejudice, and had only seen Trauma or, going back further, seen Tumbledown or Master of the Moor, they'd probably wonder why I always killed people.
I don't do things in order to change the pattern really, I just do it because I like a script and think it might be interesting.....more

Interview: "Colin Firth chats about "Where The Truth Lies" (Close-Up Film)

How did you deal with the sexually frank scene at the heart of the story?
Firth: We have to do so much weird stuff as actors anyway. I know this crosses a threshold which I think most non-actors find the least comprehensible and the most difficult to get their heads around, because most people wouldn't want to take their clothes off in front of their colleagues. But by the time you've been through drama school you've had to go through a bit of that anyway, and by the time you're in your mid 40s you've been round the houses a few times. That doesn't mean you think nothing of it. There's always a slightly tricky moment when you go from being dressed to undressed and yet you've got a scene to play. In the case of this film it was quite a tricky scene, emotionally. We had to get that right while also framing out peoples' private parts. A lot of the time you're wrestling with the technical requirements, as you are on any film. Even if you're not naked you're having to hit a mark and hit your light and move in accordance with the camera movement, while looking as if on take 15 you've said it for the first time and it's spontaneous.....more

Interview: "Mr Darcy dares to bare everything" by Caroline Briggs (BBC News)

The film explores the dark side of fame, fortune, and celebrity, something Firth says he was immediately attracted to.
"I liked all the dark stuff, the unpredictability of the character, and I thought it had a lot of possibilities," he told the BBC News website.
"[Darker roles] are not entirely new to me. In Trauma, which I did about three years ago, and throughout the 1980s, I was playing characters who were less than pleasant."It's not a reaction to typecasting - I just tend to like that territory. "I have reaped enormous benefits from doing rom coms... but I tend to be more comfortable in drama than in comedy."

Tortured is always good for an actor. I don't know anyone who doesn't want to do a bit of torturing," he added.
"It is hard to imagine any central character in any film that is happy at the beginning, happy in the middle, then happy at the end. What story has there been?....more

Interview: "Without prejudice" by Peter Ross (Sunday Herald)

If he will allow it, though, I'd like to clear something up. One of the great Firth myths is that he is modest and self-effacing, and he nods when I mention this, dismissing it as "a load of British shtick". It is essentially the Colin Firth act that he slips into in public. But the truth is that acting requires enormous amounts of self-belief, even arrogance, and he certainly has those personality traits.

"Yeah, it requires huge ego," he says. "I remember one of my grandfathers, who was a minister in the church, said that he had to have quite a considerable ego to get up in front of people, tell stories and preach to them. He said that's what got him up there, and over his nerves about being the centre of attention."

This is typical Firth, making a point about himself by referring to his family background. He does it a number of times during our relatively short time together; he clearly believes in the importance of bloodlines and a certain level of genetic predestination.

Anyway, he is not finished talking about ego.....more

Interview: "Is that Mr Darcy taking part in an orgy?" by Sheila Johnston (The Telegraph)

Aside from its more lubricious elements, one of its presiding themes is the shifting sands of showbusiness and, in particular, the seismic shift between the star-struck 1950s and the ruthless 1970s when celebrities' secret lives became fair game for the media.
It's something that both Firth and Bacon - though both men's lives are mercifully scandal-free - are well-placed to comment on.
"My parents get weird phone calls and people showing up at their house," Firth says. "They're innocent about it - they want to be nice to absolutely everybody because that's the kind of people they are, and they answer questions politely. Then they'll get me on the phone saying, 'How could you tell them about the Batman outfit I had when I was 19?' The press are pretty determined and they'll do anything. It doesn't matter to them what the wreckage is in someone's life after the one-day story....more

Interview: "Director's edgy moment of 'Truth" by Roger Moore (Orlando Sentinel)

Archived completely due to unavailability on the internet

It's been a rough few weeks," says director Atom Egoyan.

The Canadian maverick had received an estimated $25 million to make his "most commercial" film, with a "name" cast that includes Kevin Bacon, Allison Lohman and Colin Firth.

It was in the can, ready to hit a few film festivals and then head into North America's movie theaters this fall.

Then he ran into a little thing called the MPAA -- the studio-run Motion Picture Association of America, whose ratings board decides what to label movies: G, PG, PG-13, R -- or the dreaded adults-only NC-17.

Egoyan, director of The Sweet Hereafter and Exotica, earned commercial cinema's equivalent of the death penalty. As reported in Variety, the MPAA identified four scenes in the sexually explicit murder mystery, including a menage a trois that Egoyan could not cut to its satisfaction. His studio appealed, but no dice.

ThinkFilm decided to release Where the Truth Lies without a rating. To no avail, as it turns out.
Truth won't be coming to a theater near you.
The studio gave up on rolling it into new cities, including Orlando, as of Friday.

"I was happy, at least, to see the film in its uncut state," Egoyan says. "The last time I saw it was at the MPAA's screening room in Los Angeles in our 'final cut' version, and I was really unhappy.

"It was a very confusing moment for me, because one side of me really wanted to get the R, and the other side didn't want the movie to go out that way. I guess I'm just relieved that the film won't be tampered with."

Movies with NC-17 have a hard time advertising on mainstream outlets. The rating also restricts the audience, ruling out those 17 and younger. Releasing a film unrated skirts that stigma, though studios prefer to have films rated, widely advertised and able to reach the largest audience.

Truth is based on a lurid serio-comic novel by Rupert Holmes, the singer-songwriter of "Escape (The Pina Colada Song)." The film is about a reporter (Lohman) who investigates a long-covered-up scandal, a murder mystery overshadowing the breakup of a beloved comic team (Firth and Bacon). Her research uncovers the kinky sexual overtones of the mystery and how they relate to the long-estranged comics.

The MPAA doesn't make public statements about its edicts, but filmmakers are certain that the movie's suggestions of gay sex earned it that NC-17 stamp.

"I think they offered the information early on that this is 'not, repeat not, about the homosexuality,' " says Bacon. "And that's a pretty good indication to me that it is about the homosexuality."

Firth seconds that.
"We're being penalized for the nature of the sexuality," Firth says. "I've seen many movies with more nudity. The sex here is not pornographic or titillating. It's this business of them telling us, 'Well, there's one thrust too many' that is so maddening about this. It's hypocrisy at its worst."

Egoyan says that the very fact that his film has a name cast "and all this Hollywood studio machinery behind it is what is transgressive about it. If this had been an indie film with lesser-known actors, there wouldn't have been any fuss whatsoever."

In any event, it's the uncut Truth that took its shot in theaters, and failed. But look for it on DVD.

Interview: "We find Where The Truth Lies" by Sam Toy (Empire Online)

Looking at the stuff that you have coming up on IMDB-
I'd take it with a pinch of salt, IMDB. I find that I'm involved in things I've barely heard of. They're things people try and set up, the order of things have been changed. So none of those are certainties.

Would you still consider rom-com roles in the future?
I consider anything that’s good, really. The criteria is quite broad for why I would take on something. As I said in the case of Atom Egoyan, a director could be the first hook. I’ve done jobs because there’s a group of people I want to work with. But a good comedy is hard to come by and I’ll definitely do it if I feel it’s worthwhile. One of the things on that list is called Gambit, which is written by the Coen brothers. Having said that I’m not really up for comedy at the moment, this came along which is so brilliantly written - it’d be stupid not to jump at it, if it happens.....more
 

Interview: "Sex on legs! Me?" by John Millar (The Daily Record)

While you can imagine the Firth children one day getting a lot of fun from seeing dad making a fool of himself in the pie fight, Colin is quite content to keep his children distanced from his career.
He said: "I'm not particularly anxious for my youngsters to see my work early on. Until they start to get really curious about it all I will leave it. It's a bit odd watching dad running around in a film....more

Interview: "My Firth, my last, my everything" (Colin on The Last Legion) (Empire Online)

"We’re in a bit of a father and son role there as well really," says Firth. "It’s Ancient Rome you see, so I’m appointed to guard this last, child emperor at the moment where the whole thing collapses. Apparently this is true, that the Goths, when they finally did sack Rome, spared the life of the Emperor because he was so young. We don’t know any more, but the writer just supposed, 'Well, what about the guy who was sworn to protect him? Is he going to carry on protecting him even though he’s not the Emperor any more?' It’s about that kind of relationship.....more 

Interview: "Film stars leave crowds spellbound" (The Press Association)

Archived completely due to unavailability on the internet 

British film stars Emma Thompson and Colin Firth left crowds spellbound at the premiere of their magical new movie Nanny McPhee.

The actors wowed fans that gathered in Leicester Square in London's West End, performing the now-obligatory walkabout to greet the hundreds outside the cinema.

In the family movie Thompson, 45, plays a warty, severe, black-gowned nanny with magical powers who joins the family of recently widowed Firth and attempts to tame his unruly kids.

The actress who looked stunning in a blue dress by designer Tashia and Jimmy Choo shoes said: "It was liberating having moles for this part. I always find it more strange being glammed up."

Commenting on starring in a movie with a large cast of children and some animals, the actress, who also wrote the screenplay for the movie, joked: "It was really good but working with the donkey was tricky. But the most difficult thing of all was blancmange and porridge - trying to get them to do what you want."

Her co-star Firth famed for his TV role playing Jane Austen's Mr Darcy and parts in the Bridget Jones films described his experience of working with the young cast.
He said: "They do warn you not to work with children. There are risks about it however delightful they are that they're not going to be working along the same wavelength as you," he joked.
Asked how he felt about another actor playing the Mr Darcy in the new movie of Austen's book Pride and Prejudice movie he replied: "I don't own that role. I enjoyed it once in 1995 but if somebody can take it and run off with it, good luck to them."

The movie contains a host of British stars, from veteran actor Derek Jacobi, stars from Gosford Park and Gladiator to character actresses Celia Imrie and Imelda Staunton, who played the lead character in Mike Leigh's film Vera Drake.

Firth was well liked by his co-stars with Staunton making the wry comment: "I've known Colin a long time, we have a lot of fun. But he's got too much talent for my liking."

Interview: "Colin Firth: the charmed life of a late-blooming heartthrob" by Liam Lacey (Globe and Mail)

"I've always been taught that without resistance, you can't develop -- whether it's your muscles or your voice or your acting ability. It's a tragedy really when creative people get so rich and famous that people open doors and smile all the time and give them everything you want. Now I've worked in America a lot of times and by far the majority of actors [there] are very well-grounded, [with] enormous senses of humour and very professional. But I've seen star behaviour. It's not even the star's behaviour, but watching it being connived at by people around them: not rolling their eyes, not questioning, not laughing when they hear something particularly pompous, all of which is destructive to the person who's being fawned on.....more

Interview: "Bacon and Firth consider comedy dates" (Contactmusic)

Firth wishes he and Bacon could find the nerve to visit select comedy clubs with their act.
He tells Canada's Toronto Star newspaper, "It would have been fun to have the time and the guts to do that sort of thing.
"We fantasised about getting an act together. We had a pretty easy crowd (on set) paid a lot of money to laugh at us very loudly. I don't know how we'd go down with a hostile crowd. But they had us convinced that we had something going.....more 

Interview: "Firth and Bacon upset about NC-17 rating" (Contactmusic)

"The actual sex is not explicit. I've seen much, much, much more explicit sex on the shelves of Blockbuster (video/DVD store). I think there's a discomfort in the drama, which shows that the drama has been successful. And that's exactly what we were looking for.....more

Interview: "Why Colin Firth is full of beans for the latest fair-trade coffee venture" by Julia Fields (Sunday Herald)

Firth, however, has also been part of the venture since its conception two and half years ago and contributed a five- figure sum to the £300,000 used to set up Progreso, along with Matthew Algie and Oxfam.

Why become involved? “I’m increasingly uncomfortable about being part of a problem, which is just gross unfairness. We are complicit.”

Until now, Firth has kept his involvement quiet. This is his first interview on the subject, and the brown-eyed charmer almost appears embarrassed about using his celebrity.....more (to be published)

Interview: with the cast of "Where The Truth Lies" (at Cannes) by Berge Garabedian (Joblo.com)

I think we'd be foolish to be surprised by the reaction, since it really does happen every time, it's extraordinary what it stirs up. And over the years, particularly where actresses are concerned, that one movie that they did where they took their clothes, has haunted them, it's been mentioned in every article somebody has written about them subsequently.....more