Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
An actor, writer and director who wrote and directed his own plays, winning Comedy of the Year for 'Kfetch'.
On the island
Eight records
to acclimatize myself to the environment of of the island and to play something that might be germane to the spirit of the island
naturally it was a number one hit for me
I heard fugue and bop themes which was his version of Bach
Prelude from Cello Suite No. 1 in G major
I've always loved Bach... the rhythms and syncopations of Bach and the fugues are fascinating
I Know a Bank from A Midsummer Night's Dream
I had never heard a counter tenor and I didn't know that a human being, male voice, could sing like this
Koyaanisqatsi (soundtrack excerpt)
one of Glass's most inventive and most moving compositions
Ah, du wolltest mich nicht deinen Mund küssen lassen, Jochanaan! from Salome
so powerful and disturbing and strident and passionate music
capturing some of that quality he had in Othello that night a most daring reading
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:10Did you find true happiness only when you became an actor-manager, beholden to nobody but yourself?
Well, it's true because it was a time when you could really determine your own fate. For many years, I felt that I was a victim of fate. … The only thing one can do really is to become master of your own destiny to a certain extent.
Presenter asks
4:58Do you have a confrontational attitude towards your audience, wanting to provoke and assault them?
My desire with an audience is to enchant them by using all the elements that are within me to do this, and that is a combination of using language, movement, ideas. I want to write down and confess the most naked thoughts that I can.
Presenter asks
5:59Have you been dismissive of Chekhov?
It's possibly that he's used too much to make up for really a lack of exploration in one's own environment … I think basically there is a stultification there and something which is almost a little constipated. And I think that's why he appeals so much to the Brits. They love it.
The keepsakes
The book
The luxury
it would give me a chance really to know spend all the rest of my life there just learning a couple of tunes
Presenter asks
8:06What are your earliest memories of home and its atmosphere?
Well, the family at that time was splitting up … But a large part of the family were living in the East End … There was a kind of great deal of warmth … I remember there were always crowds in the street … and I remember evenings of card playing going on … That worried me a lot.
Presenter asks
25:23Do you like playing villain?
I tell you the truth, I don't much like them. I find they're stereotypical, they're kind of two-dimensional. … But eventually it they're a little bit cardboard cut out.
Presenter asks
29:45What happens next to Stephen Berkhoff? What more is there to do?
One always feels one's just beginning, you know, just scratching the surface of things. And I see the years kind of leaping ahead of me … I don't have a kind of overview. I'm really a character or a creature of obsession.
“My desire with an audience is to enchant them by using all the elements that are within me to do this, and that is a combination of using language, movement, ideas.”
“I think basically there is a stultification there and something which is almost a little constipated. And I think that's why he appeals so much to the Brits. They love it.”
“I would make the theme me, because that would be the most interesting. Because if you really write sincerely and obsessively about yourself, it's the most interesting thing, because we're all professors of our own beings.”
“Oh, um, totally. Um, I was totally a phony because all my values were geared towards self-improvement, making money … I lacked moral and ethical judgments because I didn't have any learning.”
“I'm an actor that is so galvanic and so mesmerizing that he can have an audience spellbound and transfixed. I've only seen this maybe once or twice in my life, and once only really seeing Sir Lawrence at Chichester … playing Othello.”