Doubtless, Finney shares Silas’s love of food, reflected in his girth which, in one episode, is shown in all its splendour as he luxuriates in a hot tub. It’s all gentle, harmless stuff, apart from one episode in which Silas battles an old foe. Finney somehow makes himself a believable fighter – no mean feat. ‘Tom Jones with a bus pass,’ was Finney’s own description of the character. ‘Silas is an old country rogue, a bit of a poacher who drinks homemade wines and tries to grab every passing female he can.’
Critics generally took the series on its own terms. John Carman in his review for SFGATE said:
There’s so little to My Uncle Silas except for Finney’s bawdy romp as a mischief-making senior, and a pleasant feel for rural England in the early 1900s, it’s worth hanging around just to see Albert Finney gorge himself on the script to the point of bursting. Though not what you’d call a fine figure of a man, Silas manages to charm females of all sorts, from the overburdened wife [Annabelle Apsion] of a teetotalist hotelkeeper to an upper-class lady [Charlotte Rampling] who invites him into her bed under unlikely circumstances. There’s not a great deal of meat in the script, but Finney feasts on whatever’s available.
‘The script is light and simple and tailor-made for Finney,’ said David Stanners. ‘He is brilliant as Silas. Perfectly cast, his rosy red cheeks, white surfboard sidies and hip flask full of homemade wine are every bit the happy country bumpkin.’
As ever, Finney was popular on and off the set. Lynda Bellingham recalled in her autobiography, ‘I make no bones about my admiration for this amazing actor and I was so thrilled to get to work with him. He is just a lovely man.’ One episode had Bellingham, as a wicked widow, being chased around her orchard in her petticoats by Silas. Unfortunately, Lynda fell over and pulled a muscle in her back. The next day, she had to play a love scene in which Finney was to untie her shoelaces and throw her on the bed. Bellingham was in agony throughout but she remembered Finney’s kindness and understanding. So much so that she decided to throw a big lunch party at her house to which Sally Bulloch and Lynda La Plante were invited. The party lasted twelve hours. Bellingham, who tragically died in 2014, wrote that we could all learn something from Finney: ‘He works to live. Too many of us live to work.’
Finney could still charm ladies of all ages. Sue Johnston recalls taking her 90-year-old aunt, a long-time Finney fan, to the set. (The actress, it will be remembered, had been in the audience in Stratford when Finney replaced Olivier in Coriolanus.) Johnston mumbled something about being tired, and her aunt turned to Finney and said, ‘Wait until she reaches our age, Albert.’ Finney, then 64, twenty-six years younger than Johnston’s aunt, just laughed, ‘How old do you think I am?’9 But he didn’t take himself seriously. (Johnston later reported that she showed the finished series to her mother, ‘The look of delight on her face … She said it was like being back to her grandmother’s time. It was exactly how it was for her as a child – horse-drawn carriages, the countryside.’)
At least people saw My Uncle Silas, so much so that it stretched to two series. And everyone agreed that it was a pleasant diversion from modern life. The same cannot be said for Delivering Milo, a movie so obscure that few have heard of it. It is not a good film but perhaps a guilty pleasure for the bored on a rainy day if only for Finney’s expansive turn as (yet another) old rascal, Elmore Dahl. It’s essentially a one-joke movie. Dahl is dead but is summoned back to the world by an earnest-looking committee ‘on the other side’ that entrusts him with a special mission. A baby – who we are to understand is named Milo and who, inexplicably, seems to be an 11-year-old boy (the late Anton Yelchin) – does not want to be born. Dahl’s job is to take him round New York, show him the joys of living and, hopefully, change his mind. That way his mother (Bridget Fonda) can finally give birth. No babies can be born unless Milo agrees to come out. Heavy stuff!
Finney must have been attracted by the idea of a free trip to New York. It can’t have been the prospect of playing this ‘real class-A jerk’, as another character describes him. Yet, as ever, he’s a likeable class-A jerk. We first see Finney emerging breezily from a lift (he rises from the basement, implying he’s in hell) about to be briefed on his mission to ‘save’ Milo. We know what’s coming. Finney is determinedly cheerful, brimming with avuncular charm. He will show Milo a good time, whether munching on a pastrami sandwich, walking around Central Park, taking a boat ride on the Hudson or feeding slot machines.
Sadly, the gulf between Finney’s fun-loving self and the dour, introspective child is too great. Finney is in the attic and Yelchin is in the basement. It’s painful seeing such a great actor caught up in this cartoon-strip, one-dimensional drivel. Olivier probably turned in his grave. Perhaps only Woody Allen could have salvaged this script from utter banality.
The other problem is that it’s set in the New York of late 2000, with the Twin Towers still visible in the background. Its release date in America could not have been worse, just a few weeks after 9/11. Americans simply weren’t in the mood for a feel-good walkabout in New York.
‘Without Fonda’s performance of bare-deep conviction or Finney’s turn as an older but still ribald Tom Jones (albeit with a growly Bronx accent) helmer Nick Castle’s fantasy would be pretty dreary,’ said Variety. Fortunately, hardly anybody has ever heard of this film, let alone seen it. Yelchin, however, said he learnt a lot from Finney. He also has another memory. When Finney discovered his young co-star was an avid Beatles fan, he went out and bought him a complete set of their classic CDs.
By the time of My Uncle Silas and Delivering Milo, Finney, in spite of his loathing of typecasting, was usually seen as a kind of incorrigible (larger than) life force. What was needed was a role that made the most of Finney’s gargantuan presence but without lurching into self-parody. Britain’s greatest wartime leader gave him just that chance.
26
A CHURCHILLIAN TRIUMPH
Finney gives one of the performances of his career.
Nigel Kendall in The Times.
Portraits of Hitler and Churchill, superficially attractive for an actor, can spell trouble, prone as they are to caricature. Playing Hitler as a monster overlooks his dark, hypnotic charisma. Playing Churchill as a hero is just as wrong. Churchill is, for one thing, not universally popular. Some of his wartime decisions have since been subject to ‘revisionist’ re-evaluations, usually for political point-scoring.
Richard Burton’s portrayal of Churchill in a 1974 movie proved controversial, not because of Burton’s impersonation but because of his subsequent comments, perhaps prompted by an attack of class-based bile, in which he said he ‘hated Churchill and all his kind’. Burton’s friend, Robert Hardy, subsequently cornered the market in Churchill impersonations from the eighties, playing him in a wonderful television series, The Wilderness Years, followed by a West End musical, Winnie, through to the TV series Bomber Harris and War and Remembrance.
More recent Churchills have included Timothy Spall in The King’s Speech (dismissed by the Daily Telegraph as akin to ‘a distended bulldog who’s been chewing wasps’) and Rod Taylor (essentially a cameo) in Inglourious Basterds (Taylor had originally recommended Finney to Tarantino). Brendan Gleeson played him rather well in the HBO production Into the Storm and then there was Ian McNeice in an episode of Doctor Who and the late Warren Clarke in a stage play, Three Days In May. Yet, on film at least, the definitive portrayal is now Finney’s in The Gathering Storm. (But, doubtless, Finney’s old friend Michael Gambon will give him stiff competition in Churchill’s Secret.)1
Finney took some convincing before he would accept the part, ‘It’s difficult playing a historical figure because you might get bogged down in impersonations. I was very loath to do it at first. But I suddenly thought, oh, bugger it, just play it!’
The Gathering Storm was successful because it managed to make Churchill a hero in spite of his personal flaws. Hugh Whitemore’s script does not gloss over his shortcomings. It shows Churchill as a pre-war parliam
entary pariah involved in a lonely, but righteous crusade against appeasement. Yet it’s not afraid to show us where Churchill was wrong, for example in his irrational hatred of Gandhi. Brendan Gleeson, when he played Churchill, said, ‘I had to get the idea of him as a hero out of my head. In fact, I couldn’t sleep properly until I had made that decision.’ Thankfully, it appears Finney reached a similar conclusion in the earlier film.
Whitemore’s Churchill is extravagant, greedy, impetuous, self-obsessed, vainglorious and, occasionally, outrageously rude to underlings. And, so the screenplay hints, he has a romantic vision of war. He is also prone to savage self-pity and depression. ‘I’m finished, a ghost witnessing my own demise,’ he says at the beginning. Whitemore’s skill is to show Churchill’s shortcomings and eccentricity with illuminating little episodes. He dictates to his secretary while lying naked in the bath, even giving us a glimpse of his bare behind.
The funniest scenes come when he bickers with his butler, Inches (Ronnie Barker), in his final role. The film’s PR spun it that Finney had somehow lured Barker out of retirement. Actually they had never met. But Barker enjoyed working with Finney, ‘He’s lovely, very professional, very nice, very easy. He knew his lines, did it well, didn’t do many takes and was very nice to me. He seemed to respect me as a performer.’2
Celia Imrie was pleased to get a role as Churchill’s secretary. She met one of the great man’s real-life secretaries who pointed out some unlikely dialogue, notably Winston swearing in her presence. Celia emerged from these encounters brimming with creativity, ‘I would come on to the set in the morning and barely manage to say “I’ve got an id …” before Albert Finney, who played Churchill, shouted, “Oh Christ, not another bloody idea!”.’3
Finney’s Churchill is cavalier about household expenditures and frets over the absence of Dundee cake. He is sometimes aggressive and unreasonable. Then he becomes like a wounded, chastened puppy after a row with Clemmie (Vanessa Redgrave), a scene which Max Hastings described as ‘one of the most moving in the film’. The vulnerability just makes this great figure all the more human.
Finney gets the rhythm of Churchill’s speech, that undulating style of oratory. At 65, he was a similar age to Winston in the thirties. Finney, with a little help from make-up, also looks and sounds uncannily like him, overweight, heavy-jowelled and with a thick, foghorn growl very like the cigar-chewing, brandy-swilling Churchill. Most importantly, Finney has that indefinable gravitas.
Michael Dobbs, creator of House of Cards, said such a part is not easy:
It’s very difficult, actually, to portray Churchill because if you listen to the recordings of him, he does have a voice which is incredibly slurred. What you should try to do is to capture the heart and soul of a character. Which, of course, is much more than a simple accent.4
Vanessa Redgrave got on well with Finney, having worked with him several times before, notably in A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Stratford in 1959, and in Murder on the Orient Express. ‘I said I’d do it, and then heard that Albie had come on board. That was a great day,’ said Redgrave. And Finney and Redgrave played off each other beautifully, even though she admitted finding it difficult not smoking (Clemmie never smoked whereas Redgrave does) while acting opposite ‘Albie puffing on a cigar all the time in the most wonderful way’.
Phil Gallo, in Variety, hailed the excellent lead performances:
Physically, Finney makes for a great Churchill, and the mannerisms, not to mention the deep, authoritative tone in his voice, all suggest tremendous character study on Finney’s part … Redgrave gives Finney a run for his money on the acting front. She is consistently dignified, and her two mood shifts – one to anger, the other to reflection – are startlingly affecting.
Ron Wertheimer, in the New York Times, focused on the eccentric depiction:
How did Winston Churchill prepare for the rigours of leading Britain through World War Two? He moped about the countryside, smoking fat cigars, even during meals. He drank prodigious quantities of champagne, although he could barely afford beer. He kept telling anyone within earshot what a great man he was. And he acted selfishly toward everyone from his wife to his butler, all of whom responded to his boorishness with devotion.
‘With a larger-than-life personality like Churchill there is an insidious temptation to hope that exaggeration will cover imprecision. Finney repulses it, and gives as exact a rendering as we are ever likely to see,’ said Paul Smith in the Sunday Times.
Nigel Kendall in The Times said:
Finney gives one of the performances of his career. Shambling, determined, sentimental and devoted to his country, Finney gives us a rare glimpse behind the myth of the indomitable bulldog to reveal a vulnerable man whose career was effectively over until war was declared.
Max Hastings thought that the production reminded us ‘how marvellous television can be when it is skilful and intelligent, when the medium does not seek to cheapen and diminish human affairs as it does for, say, 350 days of any calendar year’.
Finney deservedly won best actor at the Baftas for what was his greatest screen performance since Miller’s Crossing. His Churchill was simply magnificent.
Finney looked quite heavy as Churchill. And somehow when I saw him in Big Fish I was reminded of a great beached whale, albeit an ultra-loquacious one. And he had one thing in common with the character; many who know Finney well mention that he is a great raconteur. Interviewers have come away charmed by Finney’s anecdote-a-minute stuff, everything from working with old greats like Wilfred Lawson and Olivier through to tales of his latest film. It’s possible that a well-told story is Finney’s way of fobbing off interviewers lest they penetrate the ‘hard top’ that he carefully guards.
Theatrical anecdotes are repeated down the ages, sometimes apocryphal, or the names are interchangeable. The audience is advised to treat them with caution. In the case of Richard Burton, another scintillating storyteller, his daughter felt that his addiction to spinning a yarn came partially from nervousness, a way of avoiding real conversation. Perhaps, then, Finney identified with the character of Ed Bloom, a compulsive storyteller – but of fact or fiction? – who is visited on his Alabama deathbed by his son (Billy Crudup) in Tim Burton’s enjoyable fantasy, Big Fish. Bloom has told so many anecdotes that in the end he has fallen out with his son – until that is, his illness raises the prospect of reconciliation. Finney’s scenes, mostly bedbound, were shot at the beginning. He plays Bloom with a luxuriant southern drawl, almost lingering over his dialogue. (To have to listen to these oft-repeated tales in that slow voice must have been torture for Bloom’s family!)
Rising star Ewan McGregor, who had a bit part in Karaoke, played Bloom as a younger man. ‘It was a huge honour to meet Albert Finney because he’s a legend, you know, and when you do meet him, he’s a beautiful man. He’s a really sweet guy,’ said McGregor. And McGregor does bear a striking resemblance to the young Finney. (Once I caught myself looking at the Finney character in Charlie Bubbles and could have sworn it was McGregor.)
But what are we watching? It’s a charming, picturesque, Forrest Gump-ish stroll as Finney recounts his misadventures. Whether the stories are real is perhaps not all that important. By the end, when characters from Bloom’s past appear at his funeral, we are inclined to believe they are based on some truth, albeit embroidered into elaborate mythologies. A mixture of Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny perhaps, all heightened by a fantasy sequence at the end.
Burton thought Finney’s larger-than-life, zestful image was ideal for Bloom:
Albert’s got that real passion for life, very much like the character, and he brought a lot of himself to the role, while Ewan captured that heightened reality and open-heartedness – it’s beautiful when actors can be open-hearted … The stuff with Albert was so intense and then we did the Ewan stuff which had a completely different energy. Ewan still came at the beginning but we didn’t shoot much but he still came by. He was a quiet observer at times. We discussed things
and Albert and Ewan spent a little time together, and we had a couple of dinners. With Ewan I sense he thinks a lot and does his own quiet study and research, and then he doesn’t want to talk about it too much but he’ll go for it. I sense that with him. I always sensed when he was ready to start shooting. I could see him quietly watching Albert and soaking it all in.5
Finney was initially surprised that Burton chose two Brits to play the old and younger Bloom, ‘But I’ve played Americans before and so had Ewan and so, I don’t think that Tim thought it was a problem. I enjoyed it too. I like playing accents, and doing things like that.’
Finney soon settled into what he called a ‘lovely’ set:
I didn’t know any of the actors before but it felt almost like a family within the first few days. From the beginning of the film, I thought that I was somehow in safe, good hands with Tim. I think that all the actors did. You just feel comfortable with him, and he certainly makes sure that you’re comfortable. He makes sure that you feel good and that you’re happy with what you’re doing.
Finney said he was struck by Burton’s ‘sweetness and niceness’:
That continued to surprise because the project seems to be huge, the film, and yet, he seemed to have time for everyone and as Jessica [Lange] said, the way he ran about was funny. He’d just run, run all the time, and he walks about, doesn’t he, he never stops. I think that they put an odometer on him one day and he walked miles.
Like many fine directors, Finney found that Burton was not so much directing as suggesting. He allowed the actors to fly with it:
He just lets you go, really. When we were kind of supposed to rehearse, I don’t remember rehearsing at all. We just sort of gossiped and chatted. There was no specific rehearsal. All we did in Alabama was have a read through with the script, but there was no, ‘well, it needs more. You’ve got to do this, Albert. You’ve got to do that, Jessica.’ It didn’t feel like that at all. He very much lets you be. You offer things up, I suppose, and he probably gently maybe changes it a little bit one way or another, but you don’t feel directed as it were … I think that one of Tim’s great qualities and abilities is in what seems like a thumbnail sketch to get something quite telling, very simply, when you’re doing it or being in that thumbnail sketch, you don’t feel that it’s important. You just feel what the scene is, what it’s about, be it a minute scene or a two minute scene, or a five minute scene, the scene in the bathtub that we had together, someone was talking about that before, but it didn’t feel that we were doing anything sort of significant or dramatic, but we just got on with it. I think that Tim can do that in the film and he does it quite often. He has a very simple stroke.6
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