It`s a glorious late autumn day in a rather seedy part of London, and few passersby stop to give a second glance to the solemn funeral procession slowly emerging from the grand old building that used to serve as the local town hall.
Which is odd because Alan Bates is leading the mourners and respectfully overseeing the placement of the elegant coffin in the back of a huge, shiny black hearse.
A scruffy Mickey Rourke is even less recognizable as he watches from the sidelines with some of his retinue.
And there`s no sign at all of third costar Bob Hoskins, who`s resting up in his trailer somewhere.
But then all the usual telltale signs of a location film crew at work are carefully hidden round the corner in a nearby schoolyard, and for this particular sequence, the cameras and director of photography are also out of sight, shooting from a first-floor window in a building on the opposite side of the busy street.
Bates, Rourke and Hoskins are all starring in ”A Prayer for the Dying,” a stylish $6-million thriller currently shooting entirely on location in London`s tough East End, and based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Jack ”The Eagle Has Landed” Higgins.
”That`s why we`re trying to keep a fairly low profile,” explains Bates during a break. ”We want the luxury of being able to film in everyday locations without gathering tons of crowds and drawing too much attention to ourselves–and it`s not easy.”
A low profile suits the distinguished British actor who noticeably eschews most of the trappings of stardom both on and off the set. Intensely disciplined and serious about ”the business of acting,” as he puts it, Bates nevertheless finds time to chat and joke with crew members in between takes, and isn`t averse to standing in line for lunch with everybody else.
Mickey Rourke is also keeping a low profile–albeit in a slightly different way. The reclusive American star turned up for work with an entourage of half a dozen camp followers that included a voice coach, a trainer, the agent, a minder, a personal aide, and actor friend and constant companion Lenny Termo (who always appears in Rourke`s films, including this one).
It`s a style of traveling that`s prompted several acidic comments from the British crew about the very visible difference in approach between the American and British thespians.
But costar Alan Bates, who back in the `60s experienced a similarly fast ride to the top of the acting profession thanks to such triumphs as ”Look Back in Anger,” ”Zorba the Greek,” ”Far from the Madding Crowd” and of course ”Women in Love,” diplomatically defends Rourke`s intense, self-absorbed method-school techniques.
”I don`t find it ridiculous or too much. After all, he plays an IRA hit man, so it`s understandable to bring along a voice coach to get the Irish accent just right,” points out Bates. ”In fact, I rather like the American method of analyzing a role`s requirements and questioning your character`s motivations in depth.
”Too often, English actors tend to assume too much and rely on their great technical abilities and play something off the top of their heads,” he continues. ”It`s a facility that I feel sometimes tends to become quite shallow. Now, that`s not to say that English actors aren`t as good as they`re cracked up to be–I think they are,” he laughs. ”But I have a lot of time for the American approach, and I find I can learn a lot from it.”
Bates certainly had ample opportunity last year, when he spent more than 10 months treading the boards in the highly successful Los Angeles production of John Osborne`s ”A Patriot for Me.” ”Yes, and I found the American actors really interesting and quite challenging in the way they go into things. It was a very enjoyable time for me,” he says, ”and I`m quite impressed with the American theater scene at the present.”
But he`s quick to put Hollywood and the film world of Los Angeles firmly into focus. ”It`s strangely provincial in many ways, and of course once you`re in the public eye there, you`re forever watched like a hawk. You can`t slip away and do something totally different, for fear you might lose your box-office clout. That makes it very hard for an actor to take chances or go back to the theater once you`ve had a huge hit with a film.”
Bates himself has learned not to worry about his career in such terms.
”I never really plan very far in advance, because I like to just do whatever grabs my fancy at the time,” he explains. ”The only thing I`ve ever really tried to do is something you probably can`t really do–and that`s a little bit of everything, including film, theater and television.
”In the end, perhaps you should choose to concentrate mainly on one area, but I like being able to do everything. So after `A Patriot for Me`
ended, I turned down a bunch of fairly lucrative film offers because I wanted to do Strindberg`s `The Dance of Death` instead–it was something I`d set my heart on after seeing Laurence Olivier do it some 20 years ago.”
Typically, Bates glosses over the fact that when the golden opportunity to play the coveted role of Edgar finally presented itself, it was at London`s struggling Riverside Studios–and for the princely sum of $225 per week. Despite rave reviews, it was hardly likely to pay the bills.
”That`s why I went straight into two films back-to-back–`Duet for One`
with Julie Andrews, Max Von Sydow and Rupert Everett, and now `A Prayer for the Dying,` ” he adds. ”The tax man came banging at my door, and I suddenly realized I had to start making some money again.
”Of course it`s not just financial,” he hastens to point out. ”I`ll only do a project if it really interests me, and although I love to work with a live audience above all, I get a big kick out of doing films and going on location and working with the intimacy of the camera. I`ve also been very lucky in that I was part of the generation that grew up doing film and television alongside traditional theater work. Before then, most British actors like Olivier, Gielgud, Ralph Richardson and Alec Guiness would work almost exclusively in theater, and then go to Hollywood to make the occasional film. But then they`d always come back to the theater.”
Despite his own considerable successes in such big production Hollywood studio pictures as ”The Rose” with Bette Midler, ”An Unmarried Woman” with Jill Clayburgh, and ”The Fixer,” which won him an Academy Award nomination, Bates` cinematic travels haven`t been dissimilar, and the Derbyshire-born, country-raised actor has always maintained a very British screen persona.
”I suppose that`s true,” he agrees, ”because I certainly didn`t rush off to Hollywood and base myself there–alhough there was no shortage of big offers after movies like `Zorba the Greek` and `Far from the Madding Crowd.`
The peculiar thing is that when I am actually working out there in Hollywood, as I was doing all last year, I never get offered a thing! It`s only when I`m sweating away at a role in London or New York that they call.”
As if to prove his point, Bates was immediately offered both ”Duet for One” and ”A Prayer for the Dying” upon returning to the London stage.
”So I always tell all my actor friends who ask for advice about Hollywood, `Go there, enjoy the beaches and all that great sunshine for a month or two–and then think of your career and get the hell out of there!`
” he adds.
Ironically, the current production, which is being filmed entirely on location in London–”for that gray, gritty, wet look,” explains the actor
–is suffering from all-too balmy skies. ”It rained hard, which is exactly the look we wanted, right up until the day we started shooting. Unfortunately, it`s been absolutely glorious weather ever since,” he moans, ”and many of the scenes, including one in a cemetery, have almost been ruined by all the sunshine. In the end, we had to use gallons of fake rain to make the scene look realistically damp.”
As ”Dandy” Jack Meehan, an underworld mobster with a front as a respectable funeral parlor director, Alan Bates has spent a lot of time among the dead lately. ”So far, we`ve gone from a cemetery to a crematorium to a real-life funeral parlor, which had only just been vacated,” he says. ”We used the coffin and embalming rooms for some of the most dramatic scenes in the film, and it was rather eerie as all the grisly tools of the trade were still lying around the back rooms–the place the public never sees.”
The actor cuts a suitably sinister figure in his black frock coat as he shows prospective clients the ”Blenheim,” ”Wellington” and ”Sandringham” range of luxury caskets, and although it`s a far cry from his usual romantic leading men, Bates is obviously thoroughly enjoying himself in the
unsympathetic role of the psychopathic crime lord. ”It`s high villainy, with a lot of very black humor, obviously,” he chuckles. ”The trick is not to overplay it, I think.
”It`s funny how things work out,” he adds. ”I`d originally been offered the part of Father Da Costa (now being played by Bob Hoskins), but I hadn`t liked the original script and I turned it down. Then, to my great surprise, they came back and offered me the part of the heavy, and as the re- write was a great improvement, I jumped at it.”
Meanwhile Hoskins, who himself had originally been cast as Mafia heavy Al Capone in the current American production of ”The Untouchables,” had been paid off (for a reported $300,000) when director Brian De Palma suddenly found he could get Robert De Niro instead. That left Hoskins free to play the part of the priest in ”A Prayer for the Dying.”
It`s also been a slight case of musical chairs with the film`s director. Producer Peter Snell, riding high on the recent success of ”Turtle Diary,”
and with enthusiastic backing from the Samuel Goldwyn Company, had assembled his first-rate cast and hired Frank Rodham (”Quadrophenia” and ”The Bride”) to direct the taut thriller.
But they parted company before the cameras even started rolling, citing tht old standby ”due to artistic differences.” ”Rodham apparently wanted to make an Irish `Rambo,` ” reports Bates, ”whereas Peter was aiming for something with far less violence and far more suspense.”
Apparently the producer has found the right man in director Mike Hodges, who`s still fondly remembered for the gripping early `70s thriller ”Get Carter,” starring Michael Caine, despite such recent questionable activities as ”Flash Gordon” and ”Morons from Outer Space.”
In spite of all the juggling and maneuvering–”par for the course in this business,” comments Bates–the actor is more than happy with the production so far. And there`s one more interesting twist to the project, he points out, which is already slated for an early summer release worldwide next year.
It turns out that everyone in the crew is working for a flat fee–”no overtime at all, which is unheard of,” adds Bates. The result is a grueling schedule and long working hours, but there`s been a minimum of complaints so far.
”I think it`s because everybody`s totally committed to the film, and they`re all really enjoying location work for once,” suggests the actor.
”It`s all this bloody sunshine, you see . . . ”
