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The extraordinary British actor John Hurt discusses wanting to become an actor from a very early age, dropping out of school, before going on to Art school and then finally studying at RADA. Hurts breakthrough performance was in Little Malcolm 1966 at the Garrick Theatre. Film director Fred Zinnemann went to see him and decided to cast Hurt in A Man For All Seasons 1966. Hurt describes Zinnemann has being like a ‘Screen Godfather’ to him, someone who always helped and guided him. Hurt discusses his most influential role in the TV Drama The Naked Civil Servant 1975, it changed the both the publics and industry’s perception of him, Hurt describes the production as an extraordinary drama focusing on what was a taboo subject at the time. Hurt was advised not to do to take the role but went ahead as he considered it ‘perfect timing’ to portray an openly gay, flamboyant character. Hurt received a huge amount of mail from fans for this role, which was greatly appreciated. The next film discussed is Scandal 1989 Hurt talks about his terrific character Stephen Ward, again a portrayal on the cusp of old and new Britain. The Elephant Man 1980 Hurt describes the day to day physical difficulty of his role, 7 hours in make-up, several hours shooting and then a further 2 hours in make-up to return to his normal self. Alien 1979 Hurt talks here about how they shot the famous scene where his character ‘Kane’ is killed by the alien, pre-CGI and achieved by the use of props. Hurt goes on to talk about his favourite directors Richard Kwietniowski who he worked with on Love and Death on Long Island 1997 and Michael Caton-Jones on Scandal 1989. Hurt goes on to discuss his films Rob Roy 1995 and Shooting Dogs 2005 which he feels both missed out due to similar films being released around the same time. The Skeleton Key 2005 Hurt talks about the many differences in shooting a big budget movie to filming on a more independent picture, saying his preference is to make smaller films. Midnight Express 1978 clip is shown. Hurt also talks about his love of the theatre and how you simply can’t compare it to filming a movie or working in TV, ‘too very different animals’. The Field 1990 Hurt plays an Irish character and feels very lucky the Irish audience took it to their hearts. Directing is not something he aspires to do, however he does like to work closely with the director of a production, saying it was ‘something he learnt to do’ whilst filming with Richard Fleischer during 10 Rillington Place 1971.

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