Terence Stamp

Speaker 10:00

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. The programme was originally broadcast in two thousand and six, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:29

Mike Castaway this week is an actor. He came to fame in the sixties, a decade that he seemed to personify with his working class background, devastating looks, and effortless success. In films such as Far from the Madding Crowd, The Collector, and Modesty Blaze, he established his reputation as a great star in the making.

Presenter0:48

But when his love affair with another sixties icon, the model Jean Shrimpton ended, he disappeared from the scene, reappearing only much later in a series of character roles, most notably perhaps as a transsexual in Priscilla Queen of the Desert. I've never worked a lot, and I've never worked as much as I'd like to have worked, he says, but that turned out to be a blessing in disguise. He is Terent Stamp.

Presenter1:12

Why is it a a blessing, Terence? I mean, you've missed out, haven't you? You could have done so much.

Terence Stamp1:18

Yeah, no, I g I guess I could have, but but my life has been full, you know. I've I've been everywhere, I've met wonderful people, I've I've learned to have a life like outside of my movie career.

Presenter1:30

But did you choose to do that, or did it rather happen to you?

Terence Stamp1:34

I think uh it's hard to know.

Terence Stamp1:38

When the sixties ended.

Terence Stamp1:40

I think because I had been so identified with it, I kind of ended

Terence Stamp1:44

as well. And I thought if I could uh be good looking and if I could be successful and if I could be famous, everything would be solved. And when it all kind of came to an end, I thought to myself there's been lots of fun, but there hasn't been any kind of real deep internal satisfaction.

Presenter2:06

Mm.

Terence Stamp2:07

Say B

Presenter2:07

So being called the most beautiful man in the world, or one of them anyway,

Presenter2:12

was not I mean that was in i in the pressure in the end

Terence Stamp2:14

No, no, I love that, of course.

Presenter2:18

Push it.

Terence Stamp2:18

But you know, when the thing is that when I woke up in the morning, I was me, you know. So it wasn't a reality, as it were.

Presenter2:22

Yeah.

Speaker 42:22

Yeah.

Presenter2:25

Oh, I did.

Speaker 42:25

Yeah.

Terence Stamp2:26

So I I bought a round the world ticket, which was kind of epic, and I just thought to myself, if I like anywhere

Terence Stamp2:35

I'll stay there.

Presenter2:36

And you just opted out. I mean, d you.

Terence Stamp2:38

And I o I was distraught. I mean, I I never imagined this would happen.

Terence Stamp2:44

I always thought after six months or you know some great power would come up, and nothing did.

Presenter2:48

They'd all come knocking. So do you look back I mean, I have to ask you that question. Do you look back now and you look at Michael Kane, whom you shared a flat with, and other guys you hung out with, and do you think, you know, I I could have been there, I could have done that, that could have been me.

Presenter3:04

I'm asking if you have regret.

Terence Stamp3:05

Regrets. No, no, I um I don't have those kind of regrets.

Terence Stamp3:10

My real regrets, my only regrets, are movies that I passed on.

Terence Stamp3:17

Because I was fearful.

Terence Stamp3:18

They're the things I really regret.

Presenter3:21

So what did you pass on?

Terence Stamp3:22

I passed on Camelot.

Presenter3:25

You passed on Romeo and Juliet with Audrey Hepburn as well, didn't you?

Terence Stamp3:28

Yeah, George Kukoi, yeah.

Terence Stamp3:32

Those kind of things, you know, those kind of movies that now I would like to have them in my canon, you know.

Presenter3:33

Thank you.

Presenter3:38

Yeah, but they're not. We shall talk about those that are in a minute, but let's have your first record. Tell me about this one.

Terence Stamp3:39

We should talk about it.

Terence Stamp3:41

But that's not

Terence Stamp3:43

Turn around.

Terence Stamp3:45

Well, my mother was uh was musical, and I remember this de Bussie because

Terence Stamp3:52

She was wanting me to listen to it and I said, Oh, it's classic, you know, it's like it's so boring and she said, No, no, no, you this is this is the mother load, you know. All people steal from these great classical tunes. And I was able to in that moment I was able to listen to classical music differently somehow. And I've chosen this version because it was recorded in 31 and it might have been you know, the actual record that we listen to on our wireless, you know.

Presenter5:22

De Bussy's Claire de Lune, played by Walter Gieserking, and that was recorded in 1931. The first film you made then, Terence, was Billy Budd. Peter Ustanoff chose you to play the innocent, trusting sailor with the face of an angel, and you were twenty-two, I think, on set and nominated for an Oscar, and it was a great success. Is it true that the first your family knew about your being an actor was when you were booked to play the role?

Terence Stamp5:50

Yes, it really was. Uh my dad had stopped me talking about wanting to be an actor.

Terence Stamp5:58

And um

Presenter5:58

Why? What is that?

Terence Stamp5:59

Well, he's he said, Look, son, you know, people like us don't do things like that and I had tried to protest, and he'd said, Son, I don't want you to talk about it.

Terence Stamp6:11

But this thing, you know, just kept pursuing me, this uh wish to try this, like, life in showbiz and uh

Presenter6:19

But how would you do that? I mean, in those days we're talking, what, the early fifties. I mean, how does how does a young man leave home? I mean, guys in the East End whose fathers worked down the docks like yours did, didn't leave home, did they?

Terence Stamp6:31

No. I mean, if you met a girl, you know, and you got married, you moved into the bedroom upstairs kind of thing. And in order to pursue this I had to leave home. So that was the first big riff.

Presenter6:45

But not only did you leave home, then you went and led a secret life.

Terence Stamp6:48

I absolutely did, and I led a secret life for about two years.

Presenter6:53

Studying acting.

Terence Stamp6:54

So I started acting. I was at the Weber Douglas Academy for like three terms, and not only did the Weber Douglas Academy pay my fees, they gave me a grant, which was eight pounds a month, which wasn't a lot, but it paid the rent.

Terence Stamp7:09

and hence the rumour of Weber Douglas amongst the girls that I was anybody for a bowl of soup and a bowling.

Presenter7:15

Well true.

Terence Stamp7:17

It wasn't exactly true, but but I was pretty I remember hunger attached to those years of studying, you know.

Presenter7:23

Yeah, or going home for Sunday lunch'cause you're gonna be able to do it.

Terence Stamp7:25

Going home for Sunday lunch and I think my mother must have obviously noticed that I was eating for three, you know, on those Sunday lunches, but nobody said anything.

Presenter7:26

Which a nice thing

Presenter7:33

But she would have known about your ambition. I mean, presumably she'd talk to you about it, or you'd talk to her about it.

Terence Stamp7:39

No, I didn't talk to her about it. I didn't talk to her about it.

Presenter7:41

But where had it come from? Who had you seen? What had inspired you?

Terence Stamp7:45

Um when the war started my dad went back into the navy. He'd been a merchant seaman. But when he left I became her surrogate, everything. And so sh when I was about three she took me to see a movie and the movie was Beaugesse with the wonderful Gary Cooper.

Terence Stamp8:08

And I was lost in that moment, you know.

Presenter8:11

And who did you see after that then? I presumably went Saturday mornings down the cinema.

Terence Stamp8:14

Then I saw everybody. That was the escape, you know, from a very black and white East End.

Presenter8:20

Michael number two.

Terence Stamp8:22

Record number two. I always loved the voice of Sarah Vaughan.

Terence Stamp8:27

And then when when I realized how beautiful she was, I had a real crush on her. And I've always loved Cole Porter. I love the fact that he wrote the music and the lyrics, which give it a wonderful

Speaker 48:42

Outcome

Speaker 48:43

The night is young, the skies are clear, and if you want to go walking, dear, it's delightful, it's delicious, it's delove

Speaker 48:58

I understand the reason why you're sentimental cause, so am I. It's delightful, it's delicious, it's delivered

Presenter9:12

Holy Porters, it's De Lovely, sung by Sarah Vaughan. The other thing that happened, uh, Terrence Stamp, in your early life, to help give you a a leg up in in plasto and avoid going down the docks like your father, was you passed the eleven plus.

Terence Stamp9:26

I did.

Presenter9:26

That made a big difference to you, did it?

Terence Stamp9:28

Yeah, it changed my life, but it was so unlikely because I remember it seemed to me that

Terence Stamp9:35

I had only just learned how to read.

Terence Stamp9:39

When this 11 plus was happening and I was getting a lot of emotional blackmail from the family because I was the first grandchild, and I think that all the the clans, the parrots and the stamps were obviously secretly hoping that this next generation would not be kind of galley slaves, you know, like they had been. And so there was all kinds of things, you know, oh, if you pass it, we'll get you a bicycle, and if we pass it, you'll get a satchel and and I just knew that it was out of the question.

Presenter10:10

But that was what was happening then, wasn't it? I mean, that's why, if you like, perhaps the sixties happened, would you agree with that? That there were so many people coming through in the fifties.

Presenter10:20

And education was helping them raise their side.

Terence Stamp10:22

I think it was a bill by th a politician called Rab Butler who started this kind of grammar school thing. And I think the sixties really happened in England as a result of they were the fruits of that. So you had these, you know, Pinto and all these wonderful playwrights who were basically working class but had been educated. I mean, I can't really take credit for that because once I personally got to Plasto Grammar, which was wonderful, and I had the blazer and I had the satchel and I had the bicycle. But during the first term

Speaker 110:43

But

Terence Stamp10:58

I understood it was just more of the same, which was learning by rote, which hurt my head.

Terence Stamp11:04

So I just became a dance again.

Terence Stamp11:06

I wasn't good at anything at grammar school. That was the drag, you know.

Presenter11:09

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But tell me, you know, as you became a teenager and so on, so where are we now? If you're born in thirty nine, we're sort of mid fifties. What do you look like at this stage? You know, are you are were you a teddy boy? Were you into bootlace ties and grape sole shoes?

Terence Stamp11:24

Um I always thought of myself as stylish, you know. I remember I had my Aunt Julie make me um

Terence Stamp11:30

A green corduroy waistcoat and a green bow tie, which I wore with a mole brown double-breasted suit. You know, I used to go to school dances in that, you know. So I was conscious of that.

Terence Stamp11:41

And in a way it was the public face because inside the house was so crappy, lino, you know I mean it was just we were really poor, you know. I don't suppose my dad ever earned more than twelve quid a week, you know.

Terence Stamp11:59

So it was important to my mother, I think, that we look smart outside the house.

Presenter12:07

More music.

Terence Stamp12:09

This is my kind of introduction to jazz really. I was about 15, 16. And I was at a party and somebody played this actual record, this Pedido. And I was just really taken aback. I didn't know anything about jazz. I didn't even know this was jazz.

Terence Stamp12:32

and whenever I had to do something that was very frightening to me,

Terence Stamp12:37

Like leaving home, like

Terence Stamp12:40

Auditioning at drama schools, one of those things that were very intimidating.

Terence Stamp12:45

Immediately prior to leaving the house I would play this Podido, so I had to have it on my discs.

Speaker 413:05

Da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da da.

Presenter13:52

The Dave Brubeck quartet and Perdido from Jazz at Oberlin, and that was recorded in nineteen fifty three. So you went up West, Terence, to share a flat with Michael Kane in in Harley Street. I mean, how flash was that?

Terence Stamp14:04

Oh yeah, I mean I I just thought it's wonderful, you know. I was always thought it was good to have a good address, you know, I thought sixty

Presenter14:12

You have believed that for the rest of your life.

Terence Stamp14:15

From there, I won the scholarship, I went to drama school, I started getting work, and the first job I got was an English tour of long the short on the tour. And in that tour,

Terence Stamp14:27

I met the great Michael Kane, and I was picked up.

Terence Stamp14:31

to be in that. And at the end of the tour

Terence Stamp14:35

I said to Mike Kane, What are you going to do now? and he said, Well, I've got to find a place to live, you know and I said, Well, why don't you come and stay with us? But there were a load of us, there were like six of us to pay to pay the twenty quid a week. There were there was a gang in there, you know, it was like Just William, you know, and uh

Terence Stamp14:51

And Michael came and joined that gang in still 64 Holly Street, but in the top floor.

Presenter14:58

And you ended up sharing clothes, I think. I mean well are we now into kind of polo necks under sports jackets? And I'm trying to get this picture of you.

Terence Stamp15:00

Well we

Terence Stamp15:06

I don't remember, but we did have this audition outfit and it was a jacket.

Terence Stamp15:15

I think it was a reversible corduroy jacket with a shawl collar.

Terence Stamp15:21

And it s he could squeeze into it and I could roll the sleeves up. And so we had this audition suit which neither of us wore. It wasn't well, an outfit, audition outfit.

Presenter15:31

So you couldn't audition for the same party.

Terence Stamp15:32

We couldn't audition for the same part. And that was in the wardrobe. And when any of us were going out for a job, we got to wear that.

Presenter15:38

But you ended up, I mean, dating all sorts of

Presenter15:42

Amazing people, including Julie Christie, of course, who went out with for a while.

Terence Stamp15:45

I did, I did.

Presenter15:46

You starred in far from the madding crowd with her.

Terence Stamp15:50

That's running.

Presenter15:50

Um

Terence Stamp15:51

But I when I was out before

Presenter15:51

Did you take them all home to mum is what I wanted? Did you try to knit your life together again?

Terence Stamp15:56

Yeah, Julie. I'm when I met Julie, she wasn't really known. I think when I met her she was working at the post office, you know, she hadn't had her break. But she still talks about those Sunday lunches and my mum's steak and kidney puddings and stuff. She loved my mother, you know.

Terence Stamp16:12

Yeah, I used to take him all home for Sunday brunch.

Presenter16:14

But that's what I mean really, that a lot of people who moved up in life

Presenter16:18

didn't like to reveal their roots, didn't you know, were were a bit ashamed, but obviously you went out of your way to to join it up, your life, as I say.

Terence Stamp16:26

It never really occurred to me not to involve them, and in fact one of the probably the greatest joy of the fame and all the success that I had

Terence Stamp16:38

was um for my parents to experience it. I mean

Terence Stamp16:43

I was fortunate enough to be able to give them like twenty years of kind of success.

Terence Stamp16:52

And and that was a a real big deal for me.

Presenter16:55

But in any case, for for your mother to have seen you, her golden boy, become so famous and and

Presenter17:03

You know, to be one of the beautiful people of the sixties and to be bringing these beautiful girls home, she must have brimmed with pride.

Terence Stamp17:12

It was thrilling for her. I mean, when my parents died, I did her experience enormous grief.

Terence Stamp17:20

But I could honestly say that like not a day of my life had gone by when I hadn't thought of something I could do for them.

Presenter17:29

Number four.

Terence Stamp17:32

I always uh was crazy about D Martin and um

Terence Stamp17:35

I love his voice. I think if I had to come back in another body.

Terence Stamp17:41

Well

Terence Stamp17:42

If it was a male body, it would have a voice like Dean.

Speaker 417:46

Don't swing sweet.

Speaker 417:48

Forget a small meeting Fold in lightly with a dream

Speaker 117:54

Yeah.

Speaker 417:59

The memories you gain.

Speaker 418:01

I also lips that am mine.

Speaker 418:05

Two sips of wine mixed Morienta. Made of this

Presenter18:13

Dean Martin and memories are made of this. I mentioned earlier, Terrence Stamp, that you had a a long affair with the model Jean Shrimpton. She's the first of the supermodels, really, wasn't she? Oh, I think so. Of course you do. But she was beautiful, stunning. You've been painfully honest about that relationship over the years, and I don't want to rake all through it, but it it certainly seems that it was a relationship that defined your life, really, because everything changed when it ended. She ended it.

Terence Stamp18:23

Oh, I think

Speaker 118:26

But she was born.

Terence Stamp18:44

Yeah, I th I think so. I mean, uh I s I certainly uh made me kind of uh review my life really in the light of that.

Speaker 118:50

Right.

Terence Stamp18:53

And it exactly coincided with my success ending.

Terence Stamp19:01

So, you know, I'd lost this uh

Terence Stamp19:04

young love of my life.

Terence Stamp19:07

I had no work to distract me.

Terence Stamp19:11

I was just there.

Terence Stamp19:14

I was thrown back on myself.

Presenter19:15

Hm. Turned inward, right?

Terence Stamp19:17

I was really throwing back on myself.

Presenter19:19

But it's obviously, I mean, infected the rest of your life. I mean, it it it's almost I mean, you you got married recently. I know we spent decades not being married. It's almost as if you lived in fear of having your heart broken again.

Terence Stamp19:33

No, I really don't think that was the case. I my feeling was that I was wanting to be okay with myself before I embarked on a big relationship with another person. And it took a bit longer than I thought.

Presenter19:53

Yeah.

Presenter19:56

I just must get this picture of you, though, walking away from it all. It's as when you go off, you decided, you know, as you say, everything had ended and you're going to go off.

Presenter20:04

To Afghanistan or India and all these places that you went to. And I read that as you were driven to the airport, you could hear the Beatles playing.

Terence Stamp20:12

Not as I was driven, as I came out of my back door.

Terence Stamp20:16

They were giving their last concert on the roof.

Terence Stamp20:19

Of apple.

Terence Stamp20:21

And uh I went up there to sort of say hello to them, you know.

Terence Stamp20:25

and listen to.

Terence Stamp20:26

let it be and you know and then came down and got in the car and went off to Heathrow and go to to go to Bombay.

Presenter20:33

Number five.

Terence Stamp20:35

Uh Jeff Buckley's somebody that I kind of learned about from my kind of Muso friends. He's a very sort of a.

Terence Stamp20:43

esoteric musician really, he's a wonderful guitarist, wonderful lyricist.

Terence Stamp20:49

And he died very young.

Terence Stamp20:51

He died, uh he drowned. Uh

Terence Stamp20:54

after making only one record, and it's a record called Grace, which I love, and this is not one of Jeff's own compositions, but it's the composition that he sings of the great Leonard.

Speaker 421:07

Well it goes like this, the fourth, the fifth, The minor fall, and the major lift, The baffled King composing Hallelujah

Speaker 421:21

Hallelujah.

Speaker 421:25

Alleluia.

Speaker 421:28

Hallelujah.

Presenter21:36

Jeff Buckley with Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah from his album Grace. So off you went, Terence Stamp, um, out to the East in search of heaven knows what, all of everything that's out there.

Terence Stamp21:48

You always think it's miles away, don't you?

Presenter21:50

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And didn't cut your hair for seven years, I mean.

Terence Stamp21:53

Uh no.

Terence Stamp21:56

It was just a kind of fleeting conversation I had with John Lennon, you know, was like growing his hair and I said, That don't you think it's a bit camp, John? and he said, No, all of it's Sampson, you know, Sampson.

Presenter22:05

How long did it get them?

Terence Stamp22:07

Well, it got long enough. It got to be down to yeah, down yeah, middle of my back.

Presenter22:10

Maybe a bad thing.

Presenter22:13

But all of the other stuff as well. I mean, you're into Tai Chi and you've got a guru and you

Terence Stamp22:16

I was a whirling dervish. There wasn't anything I wouldn't didn't try, you know.

Presenter22:21

And when you came back and you did come back from time to time, I mean you did bits in between, but really it was practically a decade you were gone and eventually in the eighties you were back and you were General Zod in Superman and and you were a villain in Oliver Stone's Wall Street and so on. Was it when you came back was that'cause you just'cause you needed the money? I mean

Terence Stamp22:39

No, no, no, not at all. I was actually in an ashram.

Terence Stamp22:42

And I had this long hair.

Terence Stamp22:44

And I was in robes. But when I had got to Pune, I had checked into a hotel called the Blue Diamond.

Terence Stamp22:53

And some of myself and the other English Sannyasins would go to the Blue Diamond and have what they laughingly called full English breakfast. You can imagine what that was like. And on one morning after I'd been there a year,

Speaker 123:00

They laugh.

Terence Stamp23:07

As I went in, the Metrolis said, Oh, mister Terence, got a cable for you, sir.

Terence Stamp23:12

Uh

Terence Stamp23:13

Yes, sir, cable, this is a cable.

Terence Stamp23:16

And I opened it, and it was from my long-suffering agent, Jimmy Fraser.

Terence Stamp23:21

And the funny thing was that the telegram was addressed to Clarence Stamp.

Terence Stamp23:28

The rough diamond Poona India. So it was like a miracle that it was in my hand, you know.

Speaker 123:34

Um

Terence Stamp23:35

And when I opened it it said, you know, could you come to London to talk to Dick Donner about Superman One and Two with Marlon Brando? And could you stop en route in Paris and talk to Peter Brooke about Gurgie's meetings with remarkable men? And I got both parts. So I came back through like quite a big door really.

Terence Stamp23:53

albeit ten years later.

Presenter23:55

Number six.

Terence Stamp23:56

Number six is a wonderful, wonderful singer, composer who I love called Tim Hardin. Not a lot of people know him. Every one of his songs is a little gem, and um I really relate to this, and um so does Bill Clinton. We both love this song.

Presenter24:14

He said name-dropping heavily.

Presenter24:17

Uh

Terence Stamp24:17

You can cut that out.

Terence Stamp24:18

I thought I'd give you the option.

Speaker 424:23

Save my love for sorrow.

Speaker 424:26

Save my love for lonely

Speaker 424:30

I've given you my tomorrow, and I'll be on the way.

Speaker 424:43

I work my hands in wood

Speaker 424:47

Would you still love me? You answered it quickly. Tim I could, I'll put you above me.

Speaker 124:52

Uh

Speaker 424:58

Thou were miller.

Speaker 425:01

Adam wheel grinding, and would you miss your covered blocks?

Speaker 425:07

The soft shoes are shining

Presenter25:13

Tim Hardin and If I Were a Carpenter. It was when you were making um legal eagles, I think, with Robert Redford and Deborah Winger in the mid eighties that you heard your mum had died.

Presenter25:23

That was that was tough, wasn't it?

Terence Stamp25:26

Yeah, I think the toughest moment in my life really was when my mother died.

Terence Stamp25:31

And she'd had this stroke or whatever it was, and she was getting better.

Terence Stamp25:37

When this film came up.

Terence Stamp25:39

And I

Terence Stamp25:40

thought I should clear it with her first, really. And I went to her and I said, I've been off this movie with Bob and Deborah.

Terence Stamp25:50

But I'm can stay here with you. It's like not a big deal. It's just a job and it's not a particularly good part.

Terence Stamp25:56

And she always loved the fact that I was up there, you know. She said, No, no, no, you must go and do it. I'll be fine. I'll be fine. You really, really, really go and do it.

Terence Stamp26:04

And I got to there and I started the movie in New York and then I got woken up three o'clock in the morning and they said, Your mums died and um it was a

Terence Stamp26:16

I think it was yeah, it was like the toughest moment of my whole life, really. And um I called a woman I knew who was a kind of witch she's called Alisan Parker, who knew my mother.

Terence Stamp26:29

And Alis Anne said, Listen, you should write her a letter, and you should say everything that you ever wanted to say to her.

Terence Stamp26:36

and then take the letter somewhere nice and just set fire to it.

Terence Stamp26:41

And because I was just in a bad way, I did it.

Terence Stamp26:45

It was surprisingly short, this letter to my mum, but it was very obviously heartfelt. And there was a kind of an ease. It's hard to explain. There was a kind of release somehow.

Terence Stamp26:57

as though she'd read it, you know. And as I was walking back I was assailed by this write it down, write it down, write it down.

Terence Stamp27:06

And of course I was experiencing this barrage of sort of memories of all our life together, you know, everything all at once kind of thing that was giving me a headache.

Terence Stamp27:17

And I got back to my room and I turned my legal legal script over and I took out my pentel pen and I s and I started.

Terence Stamp27:26

And then I couldn't stop.

Presenter27:27

Writing your autobiography.

Terence Stamp27:29

Yeah, but it was about her, really.

Presenter27:30

Yeah.

Terence Stamp27:31

But that was the first volume. And when the film finished, the writing stopped. It just stopped. So it wasn't a beginning, a middle, and end. It was just this sort of outpouring, you know.

Presenter27:40

Next record, number seven.

Terence Stamp27:43

Yeah, this is uh the great Jimi Hendrix, and I think this is probably one of the few times that it's a Dylan song has ever been sung better than Dylan, because Jimi does it just so, so beautifully. And I've chosen this one because Jimi Hendrix sings it. But of course, you know, I'd have the whole Dylan canon on this programme if I could.

Speaker 428:19

There must be some kinda way outta here Say that you the thief There's too much confusion

Speaker 428:33

I can give no relief.

Presenter28:37

Jimi Hendrix and All Along the Watch Tower, which was written by Bob Dylan. So really, Terrence Stampa, after the those initial years of blinding success, you've led quite a solitary life and then a handful of years ago you met and married a young woman called Elizabeth, a woman more than thirty, more than thirty-five years your junior?

Terence Stamp28:56

Yeah, I guess. I yes. It was like a miracle, really, when I met Elizabeth. And I just thought I'm never going to meet anybody that I am totally mad about and I feel cosy with.

Terence Stamp29:08

And uh

Terence Stamp29:09

I was nervous because I thought.

Terence Stamp29:12

If I propose to her and if she accepts.

Terence Stamp29:15

It might spoil it.

Presenter29:18

I mean, you just met her in a chemist's shop, haven't you? She was she was a student doing a

Terence Stamp29:20

Yeah.

Terence Stamp29:22

Uh she was she was um it was a few months before she became a full pharmacist and sh they have to do like actual experience. So she was working in a pharmacy

Terence Stamp29:33

in on Bondi Beach. And she didn't serve me, but she sort of noticed me and um

Terence Stamp29:40

She said to me, Uh You're that Dracula fellow.

Terence Stamp29:45

And I thought, well

Terence Stamp29:47

I was, but you wouldn't know that,'cause it was a flop, and it was only on in the theatre for a month.

Terence Stamp29:53

So I said, No, I'm not. Yes, you are I said, I'm not. Well, you're somebody I said, Well, somebody I am, but dracula I ain't And that was the beginning, you know, it was a kind of a confrontery sort of a

Presenter30:07

Huge decision for her as well though, to marry a man so much older. I mean, that's big stuff, isn't it? Took her some years to agree, didn't it?

Terence Stamp30:09

To marry a man so much older. I mean, that's big stuff, isn't it?

Terence Stamp30:15

Well, we were we we were going out for about seven years, I think, before, you know, I decided I'd give her the option of formalizing it.

Presenter30:19

Yeah.

Presenter30:24

I see. And um I'm but can I ask the question when do you think you might have children?

Terence Stamp30:29

I'm not really against it at all. As a matter of fact, are you for it?

Presenter30:33

Are you for it?

Terence Stamp30:34

Well, I think, yeah, I could really. I've thought about it a lot. I mean, I've thought always thought about it a lot, having kids. I mean, I think it's a lot of fun.

Presenter30:40

But but you want and you used the phrase just now, you want to be cosy.

Terence Stamp30:45

Yeah, yeah. And I think uh I guess if she really wanted

Terence Stamp30:50

I'd be more than happy to have children.

Presenter30:53

But you're feeling cosy.

Terence Stamp30:54

I'm feeling cosy, but I'm not feeling clucky.

Presenter30:58

All right, one last question. You know, you you said

Presenter31:03

That you spent all of that time when you were away, when you were kind of into yourself. And I mean, you know, you had amazing times. You lived with a geisha at one point and young amazing stuff. Um you said that all of that taught you to prepare for death. Now I don't know how literally you mean that, but you know, we're sending you to a desert island.

Presenter31:23

Are you happy to sort of disappear into dust on your island?

Terence Stamp31:29

Well

Terence Stamp31:31

Sue, I think I'm going to live forever.

Presenter31:39

Or you intend to?

Terence Stamp31:40

Well, so far so good.

Presenter31:41

Yeah.

Terence Stamp31:42

I'm going to explain that when we talk about my book.

Presenter31:45

All right. Well, let's have your last record and and then you can explain after

Terence Stamp31:47

Okay.

Terence Stamp31:48

This is um when I was in those moments of uh stress, I I felt that I was kind of um febrile, you know, I was too kind of

Terence Stamp32:01

I had layers of my skin missing and I just really was only happy with my own company and during those moments I'd play Chopin. And I've chosen this one because I thought that this is something on the desert island where I could contemplate the sunset.

Presenter33:17

That was part of Chopin's Impromptu number four in C Sharp Minor, p played by Claudio Arrow. Now, if you could only take one of those eight records, Terence, which one would you take?

Terence Stamp33:29

I think probably, yeah, probably the impromptu.

Terence Stamp33:32

Light the fire, watch the sunset.

Presenter33:35

Okay. Okay, this this book. What's this book you want to take?

Terence Stamp33:38

Well, when I first got to grammar school, the only wonderful moment for me in that first year was the last term. And our teacher, it was called, Miss Barron, Katie Barron.

Terence Stamp33:52

Red Us: Wind in the Willows.

Terence Stamp33:56

And in those moments I started getting these feelings of.

Terence Stamp34:04

Being completely at ease.

Terence Stamp34:06

Being completely relaxed.

Terence Stamp34:10

And I was thrown back onto that part of me which is just looking and just listening.

Terence Stamp34:19

and which hasn't seemed to have aged.

Terence Stamp34:23

I was just feeling that if I just read a few chapters of Wind and the Willows it would kind of throw me back onto that which I truly am.

Terence Stamp34:32

So, Kenneth Graham's Wind of the Willows.

Speaker 134:35

And your luxury.

Terence Stamp34:37

Well, I think probably one of my own stamp collections, loafs.

Terence Stamp34:41

weedless organic loaf so I could have a few bits of toast on the fur for the first week.

Presenter34:48

Terrence Stamp, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear what your desert island is.

Terence Stamp34:50

Yeah.

Terence Stamp34:52

It's my pleasure.

Speaker 135:00

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.