Lynn Bell: What was it like then to work with Stanley Kubrick?
Malcolm McDowell: Well, I was working with the best director in the world, my
God I should be so lucky. I would have done anything for him. He was an amazing
man in many ways, very complex. A man of many strange and weird sort of
cul-de-sacs and alleyways. But he wasn't a humanist, he was I suppose a
satirist, and he wasn't really interested in the human condition so much or the
human emotions. He was more interested in satirizing the world, which we find
ourselves. Even in 2001: A Space Odyssey the only person that really lives in
that movie is a computer, and that's the only thing that has a sort of soul at
all.
LB: What was it like then to work with him as an actor?
MM: Well, you sit around waiting for lunch basically. What's for lunch? That was
always my first question? And what time is lunch? It's hard to explain to
somebody when you are in the middle of creating something to break it down. We
go in, have a cup of coffee and then we'd look at the scene and I'd say, 'Well
Stan what it says here in the script is a bit wishy washy isn't it, what do you
think?'
He'd go, 'Well I don't know, yeah what else would you do?'
And I go, 'I don't know, what does it say in the book?' 'Oh, let's get the book
out. Ah, ahhh. Wait a minute, this is more interesting, why don't we this?' Well
let's get on our feet and try it. And then he'd try it for the next six hours.
LB: What sets him apart? You are here as part of promotion as a new
exhibition in Melbourne inside the mind of visionary filmmaker.
MM: And it's a great exhibition actually, it's well worth a visit because even
if you don't really know the films, it's a fascinating history of the
development of the equipment, that hit upon a truth about Stanley, because he
was obsessive about the equipment and lenses. He invented the first steady cam
before it was a steady cam. You know, riding around in a wheelchair handholding
a camera...basically the steady cam came out of this. And so his expertise about
the techniques of filmmaking were extraordinary. Really far superior to any
director I've ever worked with. And I can only think of one other director,
perhaps George Lucas, who is sort of into that, to the same extent as Stanley
was.
LB: Now his film embraced philosophy. They were controversial. Clockwork
Orange was described even as a fascist film at one time. How is it to work with
someone...
MM: A fascist? How is it working for him? Of course you got pissed off
occasionally because of the days were like 18 hours. And he never thought of
anyone except just the thing. He was just so driven, but I loved him really. I
just thought that we were making such a great piece of work that I didn't care
really and I would have anything for him.
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Archived 2005-08 Edited by Alex Thrawn