Test Match Special - #40from40: Peter O'Toole

Episode Date: April 9, 2020

Actor Peter O'Toole, star of Lawrence of Arabia, takes a 'View from the Boundary' with Brian Johnston in 1991.

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On BBC Sounds. Hello, Jonathan Agnew here for another classic view from the boundary. The date is August 10th, 1991, and West Indies are playing England at the Oval. The tourists are still a great force, but perhaps the likes of Richard and Haynes are just past their best. This is a game that lives long in the memory for many reasons. Phil Tuffnell's six wickets in the first innings, Robin Smith's 100, and yes, a certain broadcasting mishap involving me and Brian Johnston. More on that in due course.

On the Saturday of the test, we had a real treat as Lawrence of Arabia star Peter O'Toole paid a visit for one of the most memorable views we've had. With wickets tumbling in the West Indies's first innings, O'Toole had to rush to South London to get to the ground. Brian Johnston was asking the questions, but first his Peter O'Toole on the special place that our game holds in his heart.

I'm often asked why cricket means so much to me. And apart from the reasons that it appeals to multitudes of people and has appealed to multitudes of people over the hundreds of years, it's this high drama. Toughness comes on, takes a wicket. Botham returns. Takes a wicket. Catches.

Viv Richards, a great king, delays his entrance. Delays and delays and delays. Finally comes on with a couple of balls to play before lunch to a standing ovation. And, of course, could have been out. first ball. Have you ever had an ovation as good as that? No, no. No. No. I'm sure you have when you've taken a curtain call, but that one lasted at length the time he took the wicket about two minutes or so. And I believe he was deeply moved, and who wouldn't be? Well, Bradman said he wouldn't be, because when I asked him whether he had tears

in his eyes when there were three chairs when he went out, he said, no, no, no, no, I love him, but I bet he was, really. I saw Bradman play at Heddingley in 48, and I think he's called 30, 32, 33 or something, having promised to score a century in the evening before. And he was out quite early to a bowler whose name I forgot. And as he walked back to the pavilion, there were no tears. He looked extraordinarily grumpy, very, very thoughtful with that huge cap and walking very, very slowly. That baggy green cap. This was a Bramillane, presumably.

No, it was a heading. It's headingly, was it, yeah. Before we go on talking about cricket, I've got to ask you two calls. questions. Have you brought your bagpipes? Because sometimes we have a little musical interlude on the... We've had all sorts of things. David Essex and I have sung underneath the artist. And the other thing, I'm colourblind, but I gather those are green socks. They are green socks. Now, why do you always wear green socks? Because my daddy was very, very superstitious, and he wouldn't allow me to wear anything green on a race track. So my way

of being disobedient was to wear something green, which he couldn't see, which were under my tracks. He was not unconnected with the bookmaking business. Is that? He was not unconnected with the bookmaking business. He was plugged in. He was a bookie. I mean, were you a runner for him and all that? I was a runner, but not exactly an official. Let's get back to cricket, which is the object of the exercise.

I mean, when did you first start playing? Did you play in Ireland as a boy? No, no, I was brought up in England. Despite my Irish name and nationality, I was reared in England. And reared in the north of England. So cricket for me began in Yorkshire. Good place to stay out. And I remember again, memories.

The first real turn-on for cricket for me was being taken to the new cinema over and over and over again to watch Huttons 3-64 here. I'm in, what, 38 years? 1990-38. I was six. And the great joy and the cheers

in the cinema when he popped it in, very clear to me and then towards the end of the war do you know Roundhay Park or of Roundhead? I do I went there when it was a test match last year

they had a sort of fate there I went I was there last Sunday just have a little wander round it's a marvelous place and towards the end of the war Salieri Constantine and Arthur Wood right great weekkeeper

they put together Sunday sides and in those days it was the Australian overseas touring team something as complicated as that. And we little boys could be chosen as ball boys to stand on the boundary. And one of my

great moments, in fact my greatest moment still in cricket was, even though I wasn't playing, I was standing at, was Constantine left-handed? No, right-handed. Right-handed. Standing at Long Mid-Off. Yeah. And he whacked the ball. He scored 50 and 18

deliveries. He whacked the ball over the ropes, and it fell into my hands. Oh, lovely. And I remember this huge man just beaming and waving his bat it was a lovely moment you sound just like the bearded one you knew how many deliveries he had I mean we were that keen did you keep

a score in those days yes of course did you now what about the playing talent you see if you go to lords in the winter in the indoor school you can be seen there true well I like I love to turn up and play I love to be with cricketers I'm not any good anymore

my hope wish nowadays is to be involved in a stand if I can plug up one end and let somebody else do the scoring and occasionally pop in a little single and charge up and down the wicked

have you got the Trevor Bailey forward defences yes I've got no much the amusement of all my chums when you say play it is an overstatement what I do is creak out to the square and hope to plunk a little timber on the ball I hope to turn my own arm over and get a maiden

or perhaps the wicked What, leg tweakers or anything? Well, I have a delivery which is really, really special. It does absolutely nothing. Well, that's very good, usually. From leaving the hand to pitching, nothing at all. This confuses many batsmen. But you do go into the indoor, I mean, who do you go and play with there?

You go once a week, roughly. Well, I usually go with young chums who's delighted it to try and knock my head off. There's one sitting exactly behind me right now. They love it, and they love to fling down leather and try to take my head off. But I saw someone who I know, who was a member, I think a bronze brain, he says that every Friday you go and coach the boys there, is that right? Well, that's a delight for me. I like, again, I'm with my standard under nines.

I love to less coach and encourage young boys. I mean, do you give them a demonstration of your strokes? No, I'm the bowling machine and the umpire. This is great, isn't it? Because we've got to get at the young, haven't we? Well, this is why Bronsbury is such an extraordinary club. If you go there Friday night, it's one of those delightful sites in cricket. The entire pitch is filled with little boys, the nets are filled,

there are something like a hundred little things in white there. And it's a lovely sight. It's great credit to the club that they get them there. They're doing very well, aren't they, Bronsbury, do that? Very well, indeed. And my job is not to coach. I don't want to say, look, get your foot to the door, get over it. I don't want to...

I'd like just to cheer them up and encourage them and run and keep your eye on the ball, all those things. I'm sure you know. For cricket is in the hands of the young. Do you play with odd sort of actors and people still? Do you turn out for Lord's Taverners or... Well, I play for a club called Lazarusian. Ah, I don't really know that one.

Well, you may. You may. We're not doing too badly. What sort of people do play? Well, we've played some high-class stuff. We played Northamptonshire professional coaches, and we drew with them. Have we won anything, yeah? Yeah, we've won against Sandbatch.

One against who? Sandbatch. And where does tool bat, though? He opened. You go in first? Yes. Against all the hostile fast bowling? And what do you look like in a helmet?

Well, we were playing in Northamptonshire, and a distinguished pro was in the other side, and he insisted that we all wear a helmet because the pitch was bouncing and taking spin. Good gracious. So I went to the pavilion and I was given a helmet and I couldn't find my way out of the pavilion. I stumbled around

and I couldn't see where the door was and I felt and I'm sure I looked like a Dalek. So I took it off. Yeah, I mean how people look through their visa No, I know. It's extraordinary, isn't it? And you can't hear either? You can't hear the chap.

for a run or anything. Like... And what about the bowling then? Do you get any wickets? Sometimes I get a wicket or two. I get a few maidens. For me, one run now is what six runs meant when I was at war. One wicket now means a five wicket haul.

If I do a piece of decent feeling, I'm very happy. If I take a catch, I'm delirious. And as long as I don't become a passenger with the team, I'll keep on playing. playing. Are you good at sprinting around the boundary? Oh, that's a great sight. I'm greatly encouraged by my team and say, go on, go on, off he goes, off he goes, and I puff and pound.

Well, this encouragement, you see, it's spread to County Creek now. Everybody claps the whole time. You've noticed, they clap before the chap bowls, they clap if it misses the stumps by 10 feet, and it's a great thing. It'd say it inspires people. Does inspire you if

everybody claps you? Yes. Well, yes, it wouldn't deter me. It wouldn't put me off. I think we last met in the box watching, was it the test match? Was, at the Lords. Do you go quite a bit? Well, this summer, I'm

watching as much cricket as I possibly can. And I always do watch as much cricket as I possibly can. Wherever I go in the world, it would be the West Indies or Australia. I was in Australia with Christmas watching. Yeah. Which brings me to David Gower. Right. We've, um, I've had long

discussions with lots of interested people about David Gar and we've decided on a solution. David will go to live in the West Indies until he qualifies as a resident

and then he will play for the West Indies and come back here at the age of 37 and tonk everybody all round the park. I think he has to live there a bit longer about after you played for one country you probably have to live for about 10 years but you'd be alright at 50 wouldn't you? Maybe they can alter the rules a little in the West, is it?

37, he could count back. I mean, he's obviously a hero of yours. We'd have loved to have seen him playing here. Who are the past heroes you've had? I mean, in the past, when you were a boy, you've mentioned Hutton and things? Well, Hutton was my god until along came

a tall, handsome man called Flying Officer Miller. Ah, K.R. Miller. And to this day, he's my god, my cricketing god. He's probably still over here. He plays most of the summer. Have you seen him this summer? No, I've not, but I met him in Sydney about a decade ago,

and we had a long, long chat about the old days. He's a marvellous telephoner. If he knew your birthday, he'd ring you wherever it was from Sydney. Marvelous cricketer. I remember watching him play a long innings. I don't know where I went. I remember his back foot, like a stonion. Straight and like a stonion, moving out to everything.

And he was everything I wanted to be when I was a little boy. Great, poor. Funny enough who mentioned that, because when he played slow bowling, sometimes he nearly did the splits, because his back leg was static in the creek, and he stretched forward with his first, and sometimes he looks he was about to do the splits. Very painful. Well, it is, isn't it? I've never done the splits, not intentionally.

Can we talk a little bit about yourself? You didn't, as a start, appear to be sort of in an acting family or anything. How did you get into acting? Oh, looking back on it now, there seems to be an inevitable logic to it all, but it wasn't. I really stumbled into it, from one thing to another. Somebody got ill, and I took it over in an amateur production, and then someone said, you ought to do it professionally, and I thought, well, shall I try this? And then I got a scholarship to the RADA, and it went from there.

Yeah, and you got the scholarship by just barging in and making a nuisance to yourself, so I'm told. So, Kenneth Barnes heard you, and... You're very well informed. Well, I know people at that, Rada, and they say you were making so much noise, he came out and said, what's going on, and said, well, give the chap a test, and having given you the test,

he gave you a scholarship. Is that right? It's too good to be true. It's not quite true, but what is true is that I'd spent the night in Stratford on Avon, watching Michael Regrae play King Lear, and looking for somewhere to sleep,

I had no money. I had slept in a field with a chum, and we'd covered ourselves with what we thought was straw, and it was indeed merely the cosy to a dung pile and so when we'd thumbed our lift into London we weren't exactly fragrant

but the lorry driver dropped us at Houston Station. Pretty quickly I should think was very quickly and even that was a bit terrifying it was a lorry carrying beer barrels and we were standing on the beer barrels

rattling around got off at Houston aiming for a man Hens hostel where we had indeed had booked a bed. And I passed the RADA. And I thought, oh, Royal Academy from Batigarch, yes. And I popped in and I began a conversation with the sergeant, the commissioner of the door. And we were looking at a bust of Bernard Shaw. And the sergeant and I were telling stories about Bernard Shaw. And Sir Kenneth Barnes did come along and joined in the storytelling.

And I think one of my stories may have intrigued him or something. I think you'll smell him. Were you still ponging then? Well, my companion said you would be removed from there, O'Too, by a person with a clothes peg on his nose. I shall have to ask you about lawns of Arabia. Before that, though, they tell me your bagpipes played a big part in the first film part you've got.

Is that so? Kidnapped. That's correct. Did you have to actually play them in the film? I did. I did. It was my friend Peter Finch, another cricket fan. And Peter was playing in Stevenson's Kidnapped, and there was a part for Rob Roy McGregor's son,

who had a bagpipe competition with the part that Peter was playing. And Finchie had said, there's only one actor I know who plays the bagpipes. Well, this is useful for promising young people and want on the stage, go and learn the bagpipes. You'll never know you might get a part from it. Use them as a wicked, of course. Have you ever taken them out and played out of the pitch?

It might put off a few batsmen. Lawrence of Arabia, one or two others turned the part down. Did they not? Weren't you told? They said Finney turned it down. I'm delighted that they did. You snapped it up as soon as it was off. As soon as it came my way, I felt I was in the slips and the bottle came my way.

I thought I'll have that one. You were not a pretty sandy wicket, though, for a long time, weren't you? Mary, and Omar Sharif, another good cricketer. Did you ever have any games in the desert? In the middle of the desert, and not 20 degrees, yes, we played cricket to the astonishment of the bedouin. We haven't the foggiest idea what was going on. Did they feel for you? No, they didn't, but they looked at the ball with great suspicion, and one of them picked it up and thought,

oh, this is a wonderful weapon, and they were flinging at each other. Well, it did it take an awful long time to do. I mean, it was a long film. It took a couple of years. Did it? Out of your life? In my life, it became my life. It was more than just a film.

It was a huge adventure. I mean, it was everything that a young 28-year-old man could wish, or I could wish, at least, to be out into the desert, into the Holy Land, to be working with a genius, David Lean, with a first-class script by Robert Bolt with a company of superb actors. Quite a few in the company, to say the least thousands. I mean, I need to be.

a score sheeter. I'll leave somebody out, but it really was. And I was like a young Matador. Another bull would come in, I'd play with the, who's this morning, Anthony Quinn, who's today, Alec Guinness, who's today, Anthony Quayle, who's today, Donald Wulfit, who's today, Claude Rains, who's today, Arthur Kennedy, who's today, Jose Ferrer. It was astonishing. Not a bad 11, that. Not a bad.

Isn't it extraordinary how many, you see a lot of them, you mentioned Peter Finch being mad, Trevor Hart, so many of them love playing cricket? Yes, there is an affinity between this game and cripple think of C. Aubrey Smith, who captained his country. Only one test match he played and he captained England. There we go, and he was an actor. Did you ever play in Hollywood?

No, but I've watched that Hollywood, as you know, has a cricket team. But lots and lots of West Indians are now going to live in California. And down in the valley, they're setting up cricket matches. So it may take on. They call it in America, you know, they call cricket baseball on Valley. I don't know quite what that means. I don't know. Because the great David Niven, he played.

I mean, he needs quite a lot of valium against Kirtley Ambrose, I imagine. I saw him walking across the thing today, the grass towards me. What a super bowler. I mean, if he doesn't break down, that's going to be one of the greatest bowlers we've ever seen. You heard that Jonathan Agnew and I disgraced ourselves yesterday by corpse. He knew exactly all was going to happen. He tried to step over the stumps and just flicked a bail with his right hand. He tried to try to do the split.

It's over it and unfortunately the inner part of his side must have just removed the bail. He just didn't quite go his leg over. Anyhow, he did very well indeed, batting 131 minutes and hit three-fours. And then we had Lewis playing extremely well for his 47 knot out. Agus do stop it. And he was joined by De Freitas, who was in for 40 minutes, a useful little partnership there. They put on 35 in 40 minutes, and then he was caught by Dueshaunf Walsh. Lawrence, always entertaining, badly for 35.

35 minutes, hit a fall over the week, he was. Bag us from the sake, Bobby. Yes, Lawrence, Lawrence, seemed me well. before over the week he was head, and he was out from the eye, and Tuffle came. Badly for 12 minutes, Rememers caught by Haynes off, Patterson for two, and there were 54 extras, and he was all out for 419. I've stopped laughing now. I mean, have you had any experiences on the stage or on the film where you simply couldn't go on? Oh, yes. I mean, I've had, twice I've been in productions where the curtain have been pulled down, slowly down.

Can you give us, what gave you the... Certainly, one of my favourite moments was in Brighton, in a play which was not very successful and was not going to have a long life. And it was a complicated play and set on a strand with the corner of a little beachside cottage and the back of the set was the sea, lots and lots of gauzes and lights

and complicated things to make it look like the sea. And indeed, I entered from the sea with Sylvia Sims in our bathing costumes. And a lovely man called Nicholas Meredith, no longer with us. A great giggler. And he, his first line was, Good Morning Roger. I was Roger. And then he had to erect a deck chair, which is never, ever easy. It's a tricky over.

Your fingers get trapped. And we've all tried to do deck chairs. And I remember the line very clearly, because I heard it for seven or eight weeks. Good morning, Roger. There's something about a deck chair. Austerity, poise, and comfort. The austerity is an illusion.

The comfort is achieved only with a difficulty and the poise we leave to Pamela. Well, he would do that line erecting a deck chair. But not once did he ever get the deck chair up. Not once. And Nick had a habit of twisting his hair into little spikes. This meant I am not giggling.

Then when he coughed, this meant I am certainly not giggling. So there was Nick, twisting the huge spikes on his head and, ho, ho, coughing away. It was talking about a deck chair. And after an agonizing long time of not getting the lines out or not getting the deck chair up, he left behind this crumpled mass of timber and canvas

and said, I'm going to post a letter. Was that in the script? No. And walked into the sea. And he was... I thought, now, the only thing I could really think was, no, I did not do this.

This is not me. This is perhaps the first time in my life. This is not me. I am not responsible. So I hid behind a palm tree. Nick was floundering around amongst the gauze. Looking for a letterbox in the sea. Looking for a letterbox in the sea.

floundering about amongst the gauzes and electricity, at which point everything went spotty, sparks and flashes, and then onto the beach came a fireman in a brass helmet with an axe. And, of course, the curtain came very, very slowly down. The producer immediately looked at me and began wagging his finger, but it wasn't me. What about on films? Lawrence, do you have a corpse of Lawrence? Oh, yes, many times, many times.

Retakes, the whole thing. Retakes, yes, but you can't see our... Who are the people, it's when you catch people's eye. Who was the worst giggler than with you in Lawrence? I think Anthony Quare. Very, a very austere. Yes, an actor, a marvellous actor, a very nice man. Yes.

Unfortunately, died two years ago, didn't he? He did. Lucky enough to interview him. So, a great corpse, sir, you are then. Which is half the fun of the game, isn't it? Well, you'll find yourself if you're playing anything at all. on this edge of not only being yourself, but watching yourself. I mean, you've done a Shakespeare, Hamlet you did a famous hamlet.

What about your... That was funny, too. Why? I came on stage at the Old Vic to play Hamlet. And I've been down below with the stage hand trying to pick a winner. And walked onto the stage and began to... And I knew that Noel Coward was out front. was sitting in the front row

with his friends Joyce and co and I said to be or not to be that is the question I heard I thought whether it is noble in the mind to solve

slings and arrows I thought what am I doing and I had a quick glance down to see if the fly was open which the cod piece was open or whatever and on and on and finally there was real proper laughter

throughout the entire audience and I didn't know why. At which point Rosemary Harris came on as Ophelia and I put my hand to my forehead and realised I was wearing 20th century horn-rimmed spectacles. You forgot to take my specs off. And how do I get rid of them?

So I said to Rosa there shall be no more marriages and I flung the specks at her. It's great. And your Macbeth got a few laughs. Was it meant to, or not? Would it meant to? Yes. No.

I think you were pulling everybody's leg. Not really. The chief cause, again, this awful sense of giggle and the ridiculous, is that as Banquo appeared, drenched from head to foot in blood, down the Waterloo Road came an ambulance. You could hear it on the table. And I caught Brian Blessed's eye. And I played we were both giggling.

It's absolutely what we needed. It's absolutely tremendous. The great thing is you've had fun all the time. All the time. And I hope it continues. Well, I hope you enjoyed that interview. Wonderful stories. And a little treat in there as well.

As we heard the leg over incident again, it still makes me laugh nearly 30 years on. Peter, of course, is not the only film star we've had in the comedy box over the years. Let's have a taster of the interview with Daniel Radcliffe, the Harry Potter star, that we recorded on his 18th birthday. Everyone, I think, the tabloids especially, expecting me to have some massive extravagant bash with lots of other celebrities. And that's not my thing. So just to come here for a day was a bit of a dream really, because I've never been to a cricket match before.

Not bad, you've been following cricket, haven't you? Yeah, absolutely. No, I've been, I got into it, actually. Most people got into it with the ashes we won. I got into it with the ashes we were whitewashed because simply because of Paul Collingwood's double hundred at Adelaide, which is also the reason he is my favourite player as well. So what about the game then is doing

it for you, Daniel? What's you, okay, Collingwood's batting, but what is about the game itself? I love the fact that I love the fact that it's a very specific sport. It's not every, it's not like football where everybody seems to be into it. It's also the fact that there are so many rules and complications and some of them aren't really necessary, but I just

enjoy them. I enjoy the sort of pedantry of cricket as much as this play. Because your game is Quidditch, isn't it? Oh yes. That seems quite complicated. It is. I don't know the rules fully. I was asked the other day on television

some technicality and I didn't know and I got laughed out by the presenter. It was horrible. Sort of football and hockey on broomsticks, is it? It's a combination of that and basketball and lots of... Apparently in a sort of Harry Potter convention they had in America, they worked out a way of doing a sort of grounded version of Quidditch. Which I would not pay to see.

But I just don't know how it could possibly work. How'd you film it? Oh, I couldn't possibly reveal that information. No, it's very, very, very clever computer-generated stuff, and they put me on a pole, on a broom. To be honest, it's incredibly painful to film. If anybody who's ever sat on a bicycle and had their sort of legs, had feet taken off the pedals and leant forward, it's quite...

Very nasty. Yeah, it is quite, yes. And it probably happens quite often, does it? Not so much anymore, because he stopped writing it. I think I'm probably the only child in the whole... of the UK who is pleased not to have quidditch in the Harry Potter books. Hey, you're 18 now, you can't stop saying child. I can, you're absolutely right.

Yes, I forgot I was 18 when I woke up this morning and then I opened the presents, which was great. Now, are you kind of an obsessive sort of fella? I mean, to got so quickly into cricket, are you someone who, I don't know, who Googles a lot, and will you be interested in the history of cricket things? Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean, that's the other great thing about cricket. It's a pretty old sport and there is so much history to it and so much long-standing rival and the history between the various players, let alone the teams.

And so, no, that's another thing that attracts me to, I suppose, yeah. The interview with Daniel and so many more from the TMS Archive are waiting on BBC Sounds. Just subscribe to make sure you don't miss a thing. The TMS podcast, classic view from the boundary. Alan Shear and Ian Wright are in my kitchen. What's going on here? The all-new Match of the Day Top Ten podcast.

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