Interview with actor Timothy Spall

Timothy Spall is an English actor. Born in London in 1957, Spall studied drama at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art before joining the Royal Shakespeare Company.
A five-time BAFTA nominee for his work in film and television, Spall has earned international recognition as a regular Mike Leigh actor. His collaborations with the filmmmaker include Secrets and Lies, Topsy-Turvy and All or Nothing.
He has reached wider audiences thanks to his roles in films like Enchanted, Alice in Wondeland and the Harry Potter series.
He has recently received the Best Ensemble Screen Actors Guild Award as part of the cast of last year's Oscar-winner The King's Speech, where he played the role of Winston Churchill.
Interview held by Alberto Ramos at the 2011 BIFFF, where Spall presented the film Wake Wood (clip after the interview).

Imitation of Life: The role of Arthur in Wake Wood had already been cast, but the actor in question had to drop out at the last minute. How did you get the role?

Timothy Spall: I was driving to Poole to go sailing with my wife when I got a call from my agent telling me that I'd been offered a really interesting role but that I had to make a decision by Monday morning. We were half way to Dorset but my wife had her laptop so she downloaded the script, we swapped seats and I read the rest of the way there. Just before I had finished reading the script, the battery ran out. At that stage, though, I'd already made my mind up. I thought it was a great script and a great part.

IoL: Did you know by then that Hammer Films was behind the project?

TS: Yes, I did know that it was Hammer and of course I was intrigued by that because of its associations. Then I read it and realised that this was Hammer for the beginning of the 21 century, because a lot of the Hammer films are instantly kitsch. With Wake Wood, however, I got the feeling that it pays certain homage to that but its fundament is more sophisticated, it's based on a social story and on human condition, much more than a slasher or an exploitation movie. It's a slight misnomer to use a brand name. It's like saying: 'you're in a Paramount film or you're in a Warner film'. I think Hammer, although I don’t want to speak out of turn, is nothing but a studio and there's actually a place on the river Thames near Windsor, where the queen has a castle (laughs), where they make films and television and promos, and that's it. I don’t think Hammer ever set out, originally, to have a particular smell to it. Is there a particular smell to Warner Bros? Is there a particular smell to any studio name? The Hammer carries, maybe not a stigma, but a whiff of some form of kitsch horror which is what you expect to see, but this film in particular and the ones they've made now, like Let me in [the English-speaking remake of the Swedish vampire drama Let the Right One In], they are not representative of what we all think of, retrospectively, as a Hammer film.

IoL: Actually when I saw the film last night, rather than Hammer, I had to think of The Wicker Man[directed by Robin Hardy, 1973] and Don't Look Now [directed by Nicholas Roeg, 1973, picture on the left]. This film is somehow a contemporary update of those classic thrillers of the 70s.

TS: Yes, it's more like that. Its centre has more to do with emotional journeys, often misguided or ill-advised. It's about people who embark on a journey because thay want to find something. It's more social drama and human interest than many of the old horror films, which were pretty blatantly exploitative. The centre of this film, and this is what attracted me the most, revolves around the question of what you do when you lose the thing that you love more, which is your child, beyond any possession, beyond any sense of power or personal gain. What are you prepared to do, given the opportunity to take it. Now, that’s ancient history, it's biblical. Most of our poetry is based on those Judeo-Christian principles. In the film, that is the fundamental hook because it starts with a tragedy and ends with a tragedy.

IoL: Last night in the Q&A after the screening of Wake Wood you were introduced as the actor of the Harry Potter series and Alice in Wonderland, which is funny in a way. I guess you are a different kind of actor for different audiences or generations. For many, though, you are a Mike Leigh actor. How do you feel about these labels?

TS: Yes, I'm associated with Mike Leigh and I'm very pleased to be so because I've done five projects with him and it's always lovely to work with someone you have like-minded feeling with. I was a fan before I worked with him and now he's a great friend. My wife and I met and got married almost exactly at the same time as I first worked with Mike, which is exactly 30 years ago, and we've been working continually ever since. But to go back to the original question about labelling. People, it seems, like to associate you with a certain creator, or a label, or a logo, but in the end if you are associated with these names it's because you're associated with something that is associable (laughs). I'm a freelance actor I don't sign up to any contracts and, to be quite frank, to be a Mike Leigh actor and to be a Hammer actor is so far from each other, it's so polar, that I really don't mind.