Charles Dance

Speaker 30:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 30:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty eight, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:30

My castaway this week is an actor, a man who's forecast to be Britain's next big international star. He first came to public attention as the decent but dashing Sergeant Guy Perron in television's Jewel in the Crown. After that, on film, he played the dastardly Lord Errol in White Mischief. And most recently, back on television, he was the suave but misguided scientist Edward Forrester, who fathered, in more ways than one, a child which was half gorilla, half man.

Presenter0:59

With a name like a cavalier, and a face like a noble Roman, it's perhaps not surprising he's become known as the Thinking Woman's Crumpet. He is Charles Darns. Charles, I only put that phrase in because I know it makes you cringe, doesn't it?

Charles Dance1:12

Heavens above, what an introduction. Um well, it doesn't make me cringe so much, as it it it sort of leaves me quite cold now, when it was first coined.

Charles Dance1:21

by a shrewd journalist, in fact. It amused me greatly and came as quite a surprise, because it's certainly not something that I'd ever thought of myself as. Before the Duel in the Crown, which was my break as an actor, I had played mostly rather peculiar, austere, villainous characters, I suppose, on the stage.

Charles Dance1:46

And um I'd never seen Guy Perron as a romantic lead. He was just a very likable, amusing character I was glad to be with for eighteen months. And when people started using phrases like the Thinking Woman's Crumpet, it was, as I say, mildly amusing.

Presenter2:02

But it was meant to be a compliment. I mean I'm sure.

Charles Dance2:04

Yes, indeed, and I was very flattered. We all have egos, and it's nice to have them stroked from time to time, but, you know, one can't really take that sort of thing too seriously.

Presenter2:11

How good are you going to be at coping on the desert island when are you a practical

Charles Dance2:15

Yes, I am quite practical and I like the land and I like the sea. Sea's very important to me. Tide, something about

Charles Dance2:24

The tides.

Charles Dance2:26

But I am I'm not actually terribly good at coping with loneliness. Um

Charles Dance2:32

I'm not too good at being by myself with myself.

Presenter2:36

And will music be any help to you at all? Does it help you? I hope you'll die.

Charles Dance2:39

I would die without music.

Presenter2:42

So what sort of music have you chosen?

Charles Dance2:44

all sorts of music and it's extremely difficult actually to

Charles Dance2:48

to narrow um music that one knows down to eight specific pieces and also to justify them. Incredibly difficult.

Presenter2:59

Should we have the first one?

Charles Dance3:00

Well, the first one is Sweet Little Sixteen by Chuck Berry. It was really the first rock and roll record that I was made to sit down and listen to.

Charles Dance3:08

By a friend of mine called Henry Gresh Koviak, and he

Charles Dance3:14

used to frequent a coffee bar that I worked in when I was sixteen or seventeen.

Charles Dance3:20

And he had much better record playing equipment than I did.

Charles Dance3:25

And he would play me all this wonderful stuff, Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley and John Lee Hooker, all off the chess label and things, you know, and he'd say, Listen to this and

Charles Dance3:35

and used to drive me quite

Charles Dance3:38

Bananas were you listening to?

Speaker 23:41

They really like it in Boston

Speaker 23:44

And Pittsburgh PA

Speaker 23:47

Deep in the heart of Texas

Speaker 23:49

Then round the fresco be

Speaker 23:52

All of us to eat

Speaker 23:55

And down in New Orleans

Speaker 23:57

All the cats gonna dance with

Speaker 24:00

We lose anything.

Presenter4:07

Chuck Berry and Sweet Little Sixteen. So that was you, as I understood it, serving in in this coffee bar.

Charles Dance4:13

Yes. I used to pull the big handles, you know, on those huge dispresser coffee machines, you know, and

Charles Dance4:19

Clean out the lavatory as well.

Charles Dance4:21

And and help a wonderful old woman called Rita, who I'm sure is long dead, um, to make and serve the hamburgers in the

Presenter4:29

Where was this and what was it called?

Charles Dance4:31

It was in Plymouth, and it was called the El Sombrero, and it was the first espresso coffee bar in the south west, and it was at a time when

Charles Dance4:39

We were all going on Aldermaston marches and sitting on the beach at St Ives and being beatniks really. And um I used to go into this coffee bar in my school uniform, take my tie off, put it in my pocket, you know.

Charles Dance4:51

and it was the place to go at the time.

Presenter4:54

and Ogle the Talent.

Charles Dance4:55

Ogle the talent and sit around and, you know, put the world to rights, really.

Presenter5:00

But you weren't born in Plymouth, were you, Charles?

Charles Dance5:02

No, I was born in the Midlands, just outside Birmingham, in a place called Rednell.

Charles Dance5:07

which is now

Charles Dance5:08

part of a huge car manufacturing plant.

Presenter5:12

Tell me about i your family.

Charles Dance5:14

My mother was was a nippy in Lyons Corner House.

Charles Dance5:18

which is where she met my father.

Charles Dance5:20

And um he was a customer there.

Presenter5:23

This is in London now.

Charles Dance5:23

Crazy.

Charles Dance5:24

Yes, in London, yes. She was one of

Charles Dance5:27

Four children from the east end.

Charles Dance5:30

She went into service when she was fourteen.

Charles Dance5:32

and she didn't stop working really until she was well over sixty.

Charles Dance5:37

And um she met my father, and she was his second wife.

Charles Dance5:43

and I think it would be fair to say that she married above her station, probably.

Charles Dance5:47

And um he died when I was four.

Charles Dance5:52

And then my mother married again, and my stepfather

Charles Dance5:56

was a civil servant, and was posted to Devonport, working for the Admiralty.

Charles Dance6:03

So we moved down to Plymouth.

Charles Dance6:05

and my mother worked for an aristocratic family in Devon, as sort of cook housekeeper, and we lived in a tied cottage on their estate, just on the edge of Dartmoor.

Presenter6:15

But she was obviously a very hard worker, as you say.

Charles Dance6:18

She worked yes, she never stopped working actually.

Presenter6:21

When did she die?

Charles Dance6:22

She died.

Charles Dance6:24

Six months after my stepfather, having

Charles Dance6:27

nursed him through a long illness.

Charles Dance6:30

And she had a weak heart, she had a dodgy valve or something. And um I think the strain of nursing him

Charles Dance6:41

really finally put pay to her.

Presenter6:44

So she lived to see you um achieve the money.

Charles Dance6:47

Oh, yes. She'd been up to Stratford to see me do one or two things, but it but she um she did live to see the jewel and the crown, and was quite proud, I think, as any mother would be, I certainly would be, of my children if they

Charles Dance6:59

finally managed to get their act together and do something, you know.

Presenter7:03

Your second record.

Charles Dance7:05

It's John Lennon's Nobody Told Me There'd Be Days Like These. John Lennon, I think, had quite an effect on my life and everybody else's life of my age, really. And

Charles Dance7:15

and a continual reminder of his life and his death is something that I would like to have around me.

Speaker 27:21

All of something happening.

Speaker 27:24

Go on.

Speaker 27:26

Something cut.

Speaker 27:28

And then the pot

Speaker 27:29

They're stopping back in China, so finish what you got.

Speaker 27:43

Nobody told me they'd be big like me.

Presenter7:49

John Lennon's Nobody Told Me. So Charles Dance, despite the um aristocratic appearance, the background was modest.

Charles Dance7:57

Um to put it mildly, yes.

Presenter7:58

Uh

Presenter7:59

What about the accent? You don't seem to have a Midlands twang, if that's the same thing.

Charles Dance8:02

No, I don't. Well, I

Charles Dance8:05

was advised to do a lot of work vocally.

Charles Dance8:09

I had the good fortune to meet wonderful two wonderful old men.

Charles Dance8:13

who taught me what I would have learnt had I gone to drama school.

Charles Dance8:16

Um an Englishman called Leonard Bennett, who's now dead.

Charles Dance8:21

and a German called Martin St. John Burckhardt, and they had been together for about thirty years. They came to be in Devon because Leonard got T B and it was they were advised to move out of London.

Presenter8:34

But they were theatrical gentlemen

Charles Dance8:36

Yes, Lenin was a retired actor.

Charles Dance8:39

and teacher, on his own admission a better teacher than actor.

Charles Dance8:42

Martin was the only man I've ever met who can rightly about whom one could rightly use the title artist.

Charles Dance8:50

It's a m it's um an expression that's bandied about rather a lot and it's often mistakenly applied to actors, and I think we are f rarely artists. And um they had coached a couple of friends of mine for their drama school auditions, so I knew about them.

Charles Dance9:05

I had been to art school for three or four years, so there was no way that I could get a government grant to go to a drama school. So I phoned Leonard up and told him who I was and what I wanted to do, and he groaned down the phone at me.

Charles Dance9:18

and suggested I met him in a pub called the Royal Oak at Bigbury the following Wednesday, which I did, and there was this man who I had never actually seen before.

Charles Dance9:27

who was huge, big man in old tweeds, looked like Samuel Beckett.

Charles Dance9:32

And he looked over his glasses at me as I walked into this crowded pub.

Charles Dance9:36

And he said, Sit down, boy.

Charles Dance9:38

And I sat down, and uh he said,'Drop your jaw' and I said,'I'm sorry' He said,'Open your bloody mouth, boy' and I had to sit in this crowded bar, a rather ghost twenty one year old.

Charles Dance9:50

Ah, I with my mouth dropping open, while he peered down it. He then poked and prodded around on my face, you know.

Charles Dance9:57

He said there's a lot of work to be done, boy.

Charles Dance10:00

Buy me a drink so I bought him a pint of mild.

Charles Dance10:03

and two pints of mile became payment for the lessons that he gave me two or three evenings a week.

Charles Dance10:10

and after a few months I was allowed to go and meet Martin.

Charles Dance10:15

And um Martin was a very different kettle of fish. Martin was a much more gentle man.

Charles Dance10:21

and I used to dig the garden for Martins on Sundays.

Charles Dance10:25

And and just listen. I would sit and listen, because I had everything to learn, really.

Charles Dance10:30

And um

Presenter10:31

Listen to what?

Charles Dance10:33

Oh, listen to their opinions about what it was like to be an actor.

Charles Dance10:39

how to move, how to fall, how to fight, how to speak.

Charles Dance10:44

I had learnt a lot more than I would have learnt had I gone to drama school.

Presenter10:47

How long did it all take?

Charles Dance10:48

I spent about two years with them, really, and I worked as a plumber's mate in the meantime to make money, you know.

Presenter10:53

Then how did they launch you on your career?

Charles Dance10:56

We arrived at a time when Lennett said, Well, that's it, boy, I can't teach you any more.

Charles Dance11:01

and brought me up to London.

Charles Dance11:04

And I worked as a dresser. I dressed all the chorus boys on Fiddler on the Roof.

Charles Dance11:08

How do we do it?

Presenter11:09

After all that training.

Charles Dance11:10

Absolutely.

Presenter11:11

You help them put their britches on.

Charles Dance11:12

That's right, yes.

Presenter11:13

Shall we have another record?

Charles Dance11:15

Sure.

Charles Dance11:16

I have a very good friend, an actor called David Robb.

Charles Dance11:20

Who introduced me to the music of bagpipes. He's a patriotic Scot.

Charles Dance11:27

And he has recordings of uh a lot of pipe music.

Charles Dance11:31

And this is one of the most haunting tunes that I have ever heard.

Charles Dance11:36

And made me realize, and I hope anybody else who listens to it, that the pipes are

Charles Dance11:42

Very beautiful instrument.

Presenter12:43

The first battalion of the Scots Guards playing Dark Island. So Charles, are you going to march up and down on this island? Strut up and down on this island, pretending to play the bag bagpipes.

Charles Dance12:52

I might well.

Presenter12:54

You're you're a keep fit fanatic, I'm told.

Charles Dance12:57

Well, yes, I sort of have to be, really. I don't think actors can afford to be ill.

Charles Dance13:02

And since the Thinking Woman's Crumpet label was stuck on, you know, I've been sort of asked to take my shirt off more than once, and I think if I'm going to take my shirt off, there better be something worth showing, you know.

Presenter13:12

You don't mind playing up to all of that?

Charles Dance13:15

Well, it's not a question of minding playing up to it. If if I'm playing something somebody like Joss Errol in White Mischief, you know, then

Charles Dance13:22

You took his shirt off quite a bit, then I was going to say that.

Presenter13:24

And a bit more than you share.

Charles Dance13:25

And a bit more than nice shows, indeed, Susan. Yes.

Presenter13:28

So how do you keep fit?

Charles Dance13:30

Well, I run, I play tennis, I lift weights and, you know, all the usual boring things.

Presenter13:37

Your career? Where were you? Oh, you were a dresser. I was a dresser. Then it was off to Rep in Colwyn Bay and Panto in Swindon. There's tricking for you.

Charles Dance13:39

I was a drug.

Charles Dance13:41

Then the

Charles Dance13:44

Treading the view. Absolutely, treading the boards. Yeah. I did 16 weeks of weekly rep at the Prince of Wales Theatre, Colwyn Bay.

Charles Dance13:53

doing things like Charlie's Aunt, you know, stuff like that. And as Noel Coward said, you really only have li time to learn the lines and avoid the furniture. You don't you can't get hung up on motivation. You know, your motivation is your modest pay packet at the end of the week.

Presenter14:08

And then you joined the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Charles Dance14:10

I joined the Royal Shakespeare Company in nineteen seventy five. I'd done a lot more rep and pantomime and old time music hall and stuff like that.

Charles Dance14:18

And um and I was uh asked to go and audition or work out, as he put it, with Terry Hans, and I spent the afternoon.

Charles Dance14:27

with our Terence, and um was asked to join the company and I was very chuffed at the time and it was um a very good move because I learnt a lot there in five years.

Presenter14:37

Five years you spent there. And then came the big break.

Charles Dance14:40

Well it came a couple of years later. I mean I just arrived at a point with the R S C when I thought either I stay here for another five years or I get out now, and I wanted to work with cameras because the process of filmmaking fascinates me greatly.

Charles Dance14:54

And um so I started to do more television as well as a couple of more plays.

Charles Dance14:59

And um up came the jewel in the crown.

Presenter15:02

The Raj Quartet. We shall pause and hear that story in a minute, but let's let's have another record for a minute.

Charles Dance15:03

Force.

Charles Dance15:07

Well, now this is the second movement of Beethoven's sonata, the Apachinata. Um I first heard it when I was doing Travesties in Leeds, which is a wonderful play by Tom Stoppart.

Charles Dance15:20

And Lenin's wife is talking about Lenin as this piece of music is being played.

Charles Dance15:27

And she says I remember him one evening at a friend's house in Moscow, listening to a Beethoven sonata.

Charles Dance15:33

He then says

Charles Dance15:35

I don't know of anything greater than the Appasionata.

Charles Dance15:38

Amazing superhuman music.

Charles Dance15:41

It always makes me feel, perhaps naively, it makes me feel proud of the miracles that human beings can perform.

Presenter16:49

The second movement of Beethoven's sonata number twenty three in F minor, the Appassionata, played by Alfred Brendel.

Presenter16:56

So Charles Dant's the big break jewel in the crown. How did that happen?

Charles Dance17:02

A friend.

Charles Dance17:03

Phoned me and said, Have you ever read The Raj Quartet? I paul Scott, and I said I hadn't.

Charles Dance17:09

And she said

Charles Dance17:11

Granada Television are going to film it next year.

Charles Dance17:15

There's a part in it you should play.

Charles Dance17:18

His name was Ronald Merrick.

Charles Dance17:20

So I read the Raj Quartet and thought, yes, this is a wonderful part. Uh why does this friend think I am

Charles Dance17:28

uh so right to play a sadomasochistic homosexual.

Charles Dance17:32

Um

Presenter17:33

And a nasty piece of work to build.

Charles Dance17:35

I've never really answered that question. But it was the portion to Tim Pickett Smith about a year before I ever got to it, and um bloody good he was too, so that was all right. Um and anyway, they they asked me to play another part.

Charles Dance17:53

And I won't tell you what that is,'cause it's not fair to the actor who played it really. And the script arrived and I started to read it, and um this character was the one character really who suffered in the adaptation. It was a wonderful adaptation by Ken Taylor, but this particular character became really no more than a cipher.

Charles Dance18:11

And I thought this is going to take about eighteen months to do.

Charles Dance18:14

I want to spend that time with somebody I like, somebody who amuses me, and somebody hopefully the audience will like and be amused by.

Charles Dance18:21

and I was sort of drawn more and more to the character of Guy Perrin, who was really Paul Scott, or as Paul Scott would like himself to be seen.

Charles Dance18:31

So I had my agent get in touch with Grunada and say Charles doesn't want to play Da da da da da da, he's very interested in playing Guy Perron.

Charles Dance18:40

So I sat with Chris Morahan and Jim O'Brien and I um read practically every scene that Guy Perrin was in and

Charles Dance18:47

Eventually convinced them I was the man for the job.

Presenter18:50

Did you sense, though, that that this was the big part for you, that this was going to be the big break?

Charles Dance18:55

No, I had no idea, really. I was just having a lot of fun doing it. It was a quality piece of work and it was made by the company that made Bride's head.

Speaker 219:02

Yeah.

Charles Dance19:02

Uh So chances were that it was going to be successful, but I had no idea that it was going to be as successful as it was, nor that it would do what it did for me.

Presenter19:11

It was a huge success in the States, too, wasn't it?

Charles Dance19:13

Well, they went absolutely potty in the States. Um they liked it to the extent that even now, after it's been screened.

Charles Dance19:22

The tapes are now available to buy, even if you hadn't made your own pirated copies, and people have dual in the crown marathons.

Charles Dance19:30

They assemble at somebody's house on a Friday night, you know, and they get all the food in and shut the door and lower the curtains and things, and they sit down and they watch three or four episodes and they have supper.

Charles Dance19:41

Then they watch another couple, then they go to bed, then they get up on the Satur on the Saturday and they have a brunch or something. Then they sit down and they watch a few more, and this goes on from Friday night through to Sunday afternoon, all fifteen hours of it.

Presenter19:53

Your fifth record. What's that?

Charles Dance19:56

Well, this is Vivaldi's concerto in G major. This is, as far as I'm concerned, good time music. If I'm listening to music in the order in which we've played them, then after listening to the Appasionata, I think one needs a bit of an up, and uh this piece of Vivaldi always gives me an up.

Presenter21:12

Vivaldi's concerto in G major for two mandolins, and string orchestra with Bonifacio Bianchi and Alessandro Pittrelli on mandolins. It was, it said, um, as a result of that part in in um The Duel in the Crown, that uh the great Meryl Streep chose you to be her leading man in plenty.

Presenter21:31

But you and she did not entirely get on, is that right?

Charles Dance21:34

Well, it w it wasn't that we didn't get on. It it was it was my first major role in a decent film. And I suppose I mistakenly assumed that more effort would be made to make me feel at ease and more comfortable. But it wasn't. But then with hindsight, I c I I can appreciate now the sort of pressure under which Merrill works. She's not just an actress, she's probably the most accomplished screen actress of her generation. She's also hugely bankable.

Charles Dance22:08

and people are therefore watching her grosses.

Charles Dance22:11

Now that hasn't happened to me yet.

Presenter22:14

Watching her one.

Charles Dance22:14

Watching her grosses. I mean, people go to see a film that Meryl Streep is in because it's a Meryl Streep picture. If the number of people going to see her film starts to fall off, those are her grosses, then the people who finance films think to themselves

Presenter22:30

I'm just thinking it must must be very nasty when your groceries fall off.

Charles Dance22:30

Tinker.

Charles Dance22:34

Indeed, indeed. So, you know, one has that continual worry.

Charles Dance22:39

So I suppose making life easy for some young

Charles Dance22:45

Green Ed.

Charles Dance22:48

young English actor. He's he's not very high up on her list of priorities.

Presenter22:51

But perhaps all you wanted was that she might smile at you and share a cup of coffee, and you didn't get that.

Charles Dance22:56

Not very much, no, no.

Presenter22:59

But you got it with Shirley MacLean.

Charles Dance23:01

With Shirley MacLean, yes. Well, a bucket full. Yes, I worked with Shirley a little while later and and and Shirley is more than a little eccentric, but she makes it her business to communicate with people. One doesn't always agree with what she says, b but, you know, sh m Shirley MacLean was a huge star when I was a little boy in short trousers. She wouldn't mind me saying that. And The Apartment is one of my favorite films. And she's um

Charles Dance23:28

She's a great lady, actually.

Presenter23:31

How does your wife cope with all of this, you and all these leading ladies, or you being the thinking woman's grumpet and all of that? I mean, does it get on her nerves?

Charles Dance23:39

No, I don't think it gets on her nerves. I think

Charles Dance23:41

The attention that she gets if she's with me.

Charles Dance23:47

she finds sometimes intrusive.

Presenter23:50

I'm sure it's very difficult because if people consider that your husband is public property.

Charles Dance23:55

Yes, indeed.

Charles Dance23:56

Yeah.

Presenter23:57

But you've been married for eighteen years. Yes. You've got two children.

Charles Dance23:58

Yeah.

Presenter24:00

Ten goldfish, two newts, and a cat called Johnson.

Charles Dance24:03

A few fatalities as far as the goldfish are concerned. There are only about five now. I think there's three.

Presenter24:09

Most important, more important, perhaps, how do the children react to having a a daddy who's a star?

Charles Dance24:14

Yeah. They're not too keen on it either, really.'Cause both of them are quite shy. My daughter's not quite as shy as Oliver, but Oliver is now fourteen, so he's

Charles Dance24:22

Just beginning adolescence, which is that awful time, you know, I remember what I was like. And he hates it, actually.

Charles Dance24:29

But I say to him, you know, it's

Charles Dance24:31

Much better that uh I'm being noticed than I'm not, you know. Don't knock it, kid.

Presenter24:37

What's your grosses? Sixth record, please.

Charles Dance24:39

A sixth record, yes. Well, um I think one of the events really of the decade was the the live aid concerts that were, you know, organized by Bob Geldof and Mid Journey.

Charles Dance24:53

And um the song Drive.

Charles Dance24:56

by the cars evokes memories of of that extraordinary day that was brought about by the hard work of a rock musician rather than by successive governments of whatever country.

Speaker 225:07

Drive me home

Speaker 225:11

Two nights.

Speaker 225:14

Yeah

Speaker 225:15

You know you can't go out

Speaker 225:27

Who's gonna drive you home?

Presenter25:37

Drive by who else but the car. Charles, how do you judge if you're a good actor?

Charles Dance25:43

Leonard and Martin were hypercritical.

Charles Dance25:46

I'm hypercritical about me. I'm never pleased. Sometimes I'm more happy than others, but I'm never completely satisfied.

Presenter25:54

But how do you judge whether you're um an actor who's having a good run?

Presenter25:59

Or you're a star.

Charles Dance26:01

A star really is just an actor who sells tickets.

Charles Dance26:04

That's a star.

Charles Dance26:06

And there are now so many stars that they've had to make up other words like megastar and and it's another one of those things about the business, one of the many things that one shouldn't take too seriously.

Presenter26:17

You are a star. You may be about to become an even bigger star. But you could have been a large star had you agreed to be James Bond, which you were offered, weren't you?

Charles Dance26:26

Well, no, I wasn't. Um I was asked if I would screen test for it, and I declined that offer.

Charles Dance26:34

Because it's not something that I wanted to do anyway. It's just I would have found it rather limiting.

Charles Dance26:39

You know, I b I b because I wouldn't have been able to have just done one.

Charles Dance26:43

I would have had to have done two or three and then

Charles Dance26:46

I'd have to worry about um, you know, hair dropping out, whether I had too many lines around my eyes, and I'm not I don't want to be concerned with that because part of the attraction of being an actor is that as you move into a different age then more and more interesting parts become available to you, you know.

Presenter27:03

So growing old doesn't worry you.

Charles Dance27:06

Sometimes it does. It would worry me a great deal if I was depending upon playing a character like James Bond.

Charles Dance27:14

for my living, because I'd have to stay the same age.

Presenter27:18

Your seventh record, please.

Charles Dance27:19

A couple of years ago I had the good fortune to work with

Charles Dance27:23

Two Italian directors, Paolo and Vittorio Taviani.

Charles Dance27:28

And they are master filmmakers. And.

Charles Dance27:32

I spent six weeks making this film called Good Morning Babylon, playing D. W. Griffith.

Charles Dance27:38

And

Charles Dance27:39

It was probably the happiest six weeks of my life. I would swap.

Charles Dance27:43

Eighteen years as an actor for the six weeks I spent with them.

Charles Dance27:47

And I would like to have this piece of music around Lest I Ever Forgot.

Presenter28:23

A theme from Good Morning Babylon, La Bottega dei Miracoli, composed by Niccola Pielvani.

Presenter28:30

Charles, do you worry, despite your success, um do you worry about your career and about where the next job's coming from?

Charles Dance28:37

Oh, yes, I'm a born worrier, and if I haven't got anything to worry about, then I worry about that. Um I think most actors tend to be paranoid and deeply insecure.

Speaker 228:44

But no hiking

Charles Dance28:46

I don't personally hang on to the idea that I've made it. I just think I'm going through quite a good spell, and I hope it lasts.

Presenter28:54

So what is the ambition to um to shake off the romantic image a bit and and dig into the character part?

Charles Dance29:00

The ambition is is to

Charles Dance29:03

I had the good fortune to work with John Gielgud, as well as Meryl Streep on Plenty, and Gielgood was eighty one, I think, eighty two at the time. Still greatly in demand. Ah, well, I would like to get to eighty one or eighty two and be greatly in demand. That's my principal ambition.

Presenter29:17

And what is your ideal part then if you could choose if uh from stage or film or television? Who or what would you love to play?

Charles Dance29:25

The most complex of characters are the are the parts that attract me.

Charles Dance29:30

I read a book a couple of years ago, called Hiroshima Joe.

Charles Dance29:34

by a writer called Martin Booth.

Charles Dance29:37

And

Charles Dance29:39

This character is the most complex I've ever read.

Charles Dance29:44

He's a social outcast, he's he's a down-and-out living in Hong Kong in the 50s. He's an opium addict, he's an alcoholic, he's possibly homosexual.

Speaker 229:46

I

Charles Dance29:53

But he's a survivor. He's called Hiroshima Joe because he was in um a camp just outside Hiroshima when the bomb was dropped. He's a prison of the Japanese.

Charles Dance30:01

and um we now meet him in the fifties and when he's decided to stay out in the Far East.

Charles Dance30:07

And he's just uh the most fascinating.

Charles Dance30:12

Deeply complex character.

Presenter30:14

Your last record then, if you will.

Charles Dance30:15

My last struggle. God, it's come so quick. Well.

Charles Dance30:19

I suspect I might be on this island. I you know, I think one one has to be prepared to be there for some time and

Charles Dance30:25

I I might be there through through Christmas and my favourite carol is Silent Night and I prefer it sung in German. And um and this is it, sung by the Bach Choir, conducted by Sir Davy Wilcox, Stule Nacht.

Speaker 230:44

I even know.

Speaker 230:48

God is shaped by someone.

Speaker 230:55

Who has tried to do it?

Speaker 230:59

I never thought.

Speaker 231:03

Hold and come back in Looking and Lord.

Speaker 231:12

Are we shall rule?

Speaker 231:19

God in the show.

Presenter31:27

Stillenacht, sung by the Bach choir, conducted by Sir David Wilcox. So which of those records, Charles, could you really not do without?

Charles Dance31:37

Oh, heavens above. Probably the theme from Good Morning Babylon, I would think.

Presenter31:43

and a book you can have to help you and combat your loneliness. What would you like to take? We give you the Bible. Well, they're already there, actually. And the complete works of Shakespeare, so you can do your rehearsing.

Charles Dance31:52

Continue

Charles Dance31:54

Play everything then.

Presenter31:55

Mm.

Charles Dance31:55

Well, a book that I take with me everywhere that I found in a bookshop about fifteen years ago, and it's a romantic novel in verse by Richard Aldington, and it's called A Dream in the Luxembourg.

Charles Dance32:08

I'm a romantic, and it appeals to the romanticism in me.

Charles Dance32:12

And I would have

Charles Dance32:15

A lot of dreaming probably to do on this island, and the book begins.

Charles Dance32:21

There are plenty of people to despise the dreamer of day dreams. And I've a friend, a learned friend with a wistful smile, who calls it a disease we inherit from Rousseau. But never mind him, let me tell you my day dream. And it begins, and it's quite beautiful.

Presenter32:36

And your luxury. What would you like to have?

Charles Dance32:37

Well, my luxury item would have to be my guitar that um I used to play a lot better than I play it now, um principally because I've I have not made time to practise sufficiently. And if I'm kicking my heels on this desert island, I have all the time in the world to practise, so I might leave the island a virtuoso on the guitar.

Presenter33:00

And you're allowed lots of strings as well, I think, in case you break some, if you'd like that. Then you're all set up. Chance Dance, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island discs.

Charles Dance33:05

Drive to

Speaker 333:17

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk/radio4.