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Dorian Gray Interview
"No Nude Wrestling
These Days
for Alan Bates"
by Sandy Baker
HE SHARES a birthday with Yasser Arafat and Dame Edna Everage.
 He has the kind of
enduring sex appeal enjoyed by Sean Connery. it makes the mere
mention of his name make women of a certain age and discernment
go wobbly.
He is Alan Bates.
The man who wrestled naked on screen with Oliver Reed in "Women in Love"
back in 1969. At 67. he remembers the stir the scene caused but
laughingly declares it's not something he would care to attempt
today.
- Gothic -
Sex appeal, whether it be waxing or waning, is not something
that concerns him, but it does concern the character he plays
in "Dorian Gray."
Trevor Baxter's adaptation of Oscar Wilde's Faustian novel, "The
Picture of Dorian Gray," is the latest in a clutch of treatments
of this gothic piece.
"My character
is Mephistopheles, an evil influence but a man of seductive arguments.
He corrupts a young man on the cusp of his adulthood at a vital
moment. It is a story for everyone; a gothic tale of survival
based on choices."
It is set around the
turn of the 20th century and is, says Alan, "near enough
to our time."
Although not averse
to modern staging of classics, Alan says the message of the play
should come through if it is well done. "I'm happy if something
is done to huge, telling effect, but not if it is done just for
the sake of it."
"Dorian Gray"
comes to the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre, Guildford, from July 31 to
August 11, and a bonus for Bates fans, also stars Alan's son
Benedick.
 Benedick,
named after the character in Shakespeare's "Much Ado About Nothing," a role Alan always
coveted, and eventually played, has worked on stage before with
his father.
"We did a Simon
Gray and a Turgenev
play at Chichester together. I enjoy working with him; he's an
excellent young actor. There are a lot of good young actors about
and I worked with many of them recently at Stratford in 'Antony and Cleopatra.'"
Alan's co-stars in
"Dorian Gray" are Margaret Tyzack and Rupert Frazer,
and the cast includes David McAlister, Joe Scarby and Sarah Walton.
He's worked with most of them before, for as he says: "The
older you get, the more your paths cross."
- Acting is acting
-
From his first film appearance in "Whistle Down the Wind," in his first major
role in John Schlesinger's "A Kind of Loving" in 1962, Alan has made
an equal impact on film, stage and TV.
"'A Kind of Loving'
was a terrific start: great director, great script, and a great
cast including June Ritchie and Thora Hird. Like Tom Courtney
and Albert Finney, for example, I was in the right place at the
right time."
The 1960s was a time
of gritty drama from such writers as John Osborne, Harold Pinter,
Arnold Wesker and Simon Gray. And Alan was in the cast of "The
Mulberry Bush, the first production at the Royal Court for the
English Stage Company.
 Alan
was, and is, in the thick of it and his last Arnaud appearance
was in Simon Gray's well-received "Life Support," directed by Harold Pinter.
As well as opening
in Dorian Gray, Alan has just completed filming the role of the
butler in "Gosford
Park" for Robert Altman (of "MASH" fame) and
as the governor of Massachusetts in "The Salem Witch Trials."
"Acting is acting.
You can do it at whatever age you are, as long as you can still
get about! I'll play anything but I have been lucky in being
offered such good roles throughout my career. I've made choices
and I've wondered whether they have been the right ones sometimes.
But doesn't everybody, whatever they do?
"In the 60s we
all were aware that there was some good writing about. We were
born at the right moment and given the chance to show our ability
in these plays. And so it has continued throughout my career.
I've enjoyed it all."
- Awards -
 He's
garnered awards along the way for what have become landmark productions.
These include Best Stage Actor awards for Simon Gray's "Butley" and a BAFTA
in 1983 for his role as traitor Guy Burgess in Alan Bennett's
"An Englishman
Abroad."
Most recently, Alan
has been seen as the extraordinary father in the TV adaptation
of Nancy Mitford's "Love
in a Cold Climate."
Fans will be happy
to know that swimming and horse riding are keeping him fit for
yet another decade of wobble-inducing performances. Like his
character in "Dorian Gray," he's not planning to "grow
old and horrible and dreadful" quite yet. |||
Printed in the Farnham Harald and other
regional newspapers, 27 July 2001.
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