He's the nasty villain, soaring into the skies with the hit chopper adventure. There's only one problem - he is afraid of flying. By Randy and Jean-Marc Lofficier
In the summer blockbuster Blue Thunder, Malcolm McDowell isn't a particularly
nice guy. He plays the part of Roy Schneider's nemesis, the evil Colonel
Cochrane, one of the leaders of a secret para-governmental group which is
attempting to establish a police regime based upon electronic spying. "Blue
Thunder does have something serious to say," McDowell remarks, "like,
'Big Brother is always around, watch out for him'. But, basically, it's not a
message picture. Let's call a spade a spade: this film is primarily
entertainment."
According to the actor, his first reaction upon being
offered the role was deadpan honesty and a confession to his agent. "I said
to him," remembers McDowell, " 'Look, I'm terrified of flying, I can't
fly, and I will not fly!' My agent answered, 'I told them that, Mal, and he said
it's OK. They're doing it on the studio backlot.' "
The truth, unfortunately for McDowell, proved to be
somewhat different. The majority of Blue Thunder's spectacular aerial action
sequences were actually lensed in the air. Director John Badham (Starlog #70)
and other cast members have already commented, with a goodly dose of humor, on
the actor's understandable horror during the flying stunts. McDowell concurs,
"I was terrified. We started out filming it on the gimbel thing [a rig
designed for the purpose] with the crew moving it around. Then, it was easy to
look macho and all that, but it's all very different when you're really up there
in the air! They had to retake my stuff several times because I was so scared.
It gave them a good laugh. Going under those bridges in the helicopter was
simply terrifying. I didn't think we were going to make it. I asked the pilot,
'We are not going to go under it, are we? We don't have enough room under the
bridge. I don't know how wide this thing is, and there is just not enough - oh
my god! He scraped the paint!' I still get the old pollywoggles in my stomach
when I watch that scene. In fact, I'll tell you, I still can't even look
at some parts of this movie.
"It wasn't so much that I was scared for my life
at any point, but it was just very uncomfortable all the time. It was all being
turned upside down and thrown around. The first time we did a stunt, the G-force
was unbelievable. We were following the big helicopter, so we were very close.
The air was buffeting this tiny little Hughes craft all over the place. At the
scene's end, I got out of the helicopter, ran to my trailer and threw up!"
Career Villainy
Fortunately, McDowell's contribution to Blue
Thunder isn't limited to looking macho while manning a helicopter. Cochrane
is yet another of the memorable villains created by the British-born actor. Some
critics have, however, remarked on the oddness of a British Colonel working for
the U.S. Government. McDowell discards the objection. "I think audiences
accept it," he says. "I get away with it because Cochrane is really
just a specialist. Besides, it all comes out on the computer screen, 'Born in
Luton, England, etc.' I was surprised that they offered me the part, because it
was inherently American. But I added a few of my own little numbers, like
'Follow my leader,' 'Catch you later.' "
Despite a long record of career villainy on the silver
screen, McDowell doesn't feel that he has been typecast. "I did five films
in the past 18 months, and Blue Thunder is the only one where I am
really playing a villain, " he maintains, smiling villainously.
The 40-year-old actor's first job was not on stage, or
in front of a camera, but in his father's pub in Leeds, England, serving drinks.
He then became a traveling salesman for a coffee company. (McDowell later drew
on this time in his life for creative inspiration in O Lucky Man!) Struck by
acting bug, McDowell took classes and, after months of hard work, was accepted
by the Isle of Wight Repertory Company.
The following year, the young actor became a member of
the famed Royal Shakespeare Company, and began appearing on British television.
His first movie role was in 1967's Poor Cow, starring Terence Stamp (he
wasn't in this movie - Alex). Director Lindsay Anderson noticed McDowell's
abrasive charisma and chose him to play Mick, the lead in if...(1968), a
bizarre tale of the students' revolt in the British public school system. The
association between actor and director has since been developed in two further
sequels in what is sometimes termed the "Mick Trilogy": O Lucky
Man! (1973) and the more recent Britannia Hospital.
The latter film, which also features a cameo by Mark
Hamill, is a wild satire of the British medical system in particular, and
British society in general. "I wanted Malcolm McDowell for Britannia
Hospital," director Lindsay Anderson had noted recently," because he
is part of what I would call my 'cinematic family.' A major star does not
necessarily need to play in major roles. If Malcolm appears for a relatively
short time, he does it with panache. Then, too, even if Britannia Hospital is
in no way a sequel to if... and O Lucky Man!, it is necessary to
have seen them to understand it. Britannia Hospital is actually in the same
tradition as the previous two films. In some ways, it is their successor."
McDowell agrees, "Britannia Hospital is
really Lindsay's vision. There was no central character in the root form as it
was written, but I still love the movie. To me, Lindsay can do no wrong. They
didn't have enough money to pay me, so I did it as a freebie for him. I wouldn't
have missed it for the world."
Although McDowell feels that Britannia Hospital
is an outstanding example of film-making - a view shared by many American
critics - the British critical response was less than favorable. "Nothing
surprised me about England," the actor says. "It is what I would
expect from an island race. The English were out fighting the Falklands War,
being very brave, and here comes an anti-British movie. Strangely enough, it's
one made by someone who has not been seduced by Hollywood at all, but who has
stayed and worked in his own country.
"People went to see if... because, at the time,
everyone wanted to knock the public schools. They didn't go to see O Lucky
Man!; we got roundly roasted about being anti-this and anti-that. Britannia
Hospital was a combination of everything, they hated it. Except the London
Times critic, who said it was a piece of great British filmmaking. I think it
will eventually be accepted and loved - probably when Lindsay is dead. Then,
everyone will say what a great artist he was!"
Between if... and O Lucky Man!, McDowell
appeared with Robert Shaw in Figures in a Landscape, The Raging Moon, and
eventually in 1971, in Stanley Kubrick's classic adaptation of Anthony Burgess'
A Clockwork Orange. The character of young, amoral, ultraviolent Alex brought
worldwide fame to McDowell, and turned him almost overnight into one of the
leading stars of the British cinema. Other films followed: Richard Lester's
Royal Flash (adapted from the George MacDonald Fraser novel) in 1975, Voyage of
the Damned and Aces High in 1976, and the infamous Caligula in 1977. Two years
later, McDowell etched a memorable portrait of Nazism in The Passage. "That
movie contains some of the best work I've ever done," he announces. "I
managed to pack into a dozen scenes with the whole period of Nazi tyranny in a
convincingly evil way."
Career Heroics
In 1979, Malcolm McDowell became a hero again. As
inventor/author H. G. Wells, he trailed Jack the Ripper through 20th century San
Francisco for Nicholas Meyer's delightful fantasy, Time After Time (Starlog
#27). While on the set, McDowell met his co-star and wife-to-be, Oscar-winning
actress Mary (Ragtime) Steenburgen.
As the gentle and bemused Victorian Wells, McDowell's
refined, upper class accent was perfect. "I used to talk like the
Beatles," says the actor, demonstrating his abilities by repeatedly
changing accents in mid-conversation. "But now I'm like a chameleon. I
drive down the M1 [British motorway] and my accent changes depending on where I
am. If I'm in London, I'll speak cockney. In Cross Creek, I played the great
editor, Maxwell Perkins with an American accent. The point is to make people
believe you. How you do that is up to you."
Now living in the United States, the British actor
starred in Paul Schrader's Cat People as Nastassia Kinski's feline brother, Paul
Gallier (Starlog #57, Fangoria #19). Although the film was not a commercial
success, McDowell's performance, as usual, was applauded by critics. McDowell
has also teamed with Lindsay Anderson for the director's off-Broadway restaging
of John Osborne's Look Back in Anger. "It was a kind of crossroads
for me as an actor," McDowell explains. "At the end of the play, the
whole audience was in tears. I could hear them sobbing, and that gave me an
unbelievable thrill!"
After confronting his tears of flying in Blue
Thunder, McDowell completed a rock-n-roll flick, Get Crazy, once
again co-starring with Daniel Stern and directed by Allan (Heartbeeps)
Arkush (Starlog #53). As a change of pace, the actor took up Excalibur, to
portray Arthur the King. The three-hour telefilm, featuring Candice
Bergen and Dyan Cannon, will premiere on CBS later this fall and play
theatrically overseas. McDowell's latest role is as a rock performer dealing
with a 13-year-old paternity suit son in Tin Soldiers.
Colonel Cochrane. H. G. Wells. Mick. King Arthur.
Flashman. Though McDowell has played dozens of heroes and villains throughout
his career, he doesn't have a specific favorite role. "Every time you do a
film, you have the capability to believe it's the greatest thing you've ever
done," he says. "But, in fact, every film has its little reasons why
you love it, even dumb films. And I've done some real clunkers. But I don't
regret anything I've done. I never regret anything, because having the capacity
to fail is very important. That's how you grow, it keeps your feet on the
ground.
"I've got a long way to go. I've got 30 more years
and I haven't done my best work yet, by far. I've always tried to base my career
on longevity, rather than on a flash in the pan, because, at the beginning,
that's what happened to me. I was a big success in three films in a row, and
then the British film industry collapsed overnight!"
Malcolm McDowell pauses to consider Blue Thunder and
critical reaction. Although the chopper adventure collected both smash box
office
receipts and some negative reviews, the actor states he won't be affected.
"I've done my work the best I could, and if you don't like it, tough,"
Malcolm McDowell says. "I made up my mind not to read reviews. Ever since I
did that, I've had some great reviews, and I can't read them, which is
unfortunate! But I felt great, because I don't get emotionally involved in a
picture anymore. I'm an actor - and what I do is up on the stage or on the
screen - and it's the best work I can do for now."
© Starlog #74 September 9/83
Visit the authors at www.lofficier.com
Archived by permission 2001-08 Alex D. Thrawn for www.MalcolmMcDowell.net