WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 1208 - Hugh Grant

Episode Date: March 11, 2021

Hugh Grant thinks he's only getting better as an actor now. The work he's done for the past few years feels real to him, as opposed to felling like he was faking it when he made all those romantic comedies. Hugh and Marc talk about that realization and what happened in his life to make him finally feel less insecure as an actor. They also discuss his early comedy troupe, his recent habit of playing scoundrels and villains, and his mission to push back against the violating behavior of the British tabloids. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. It's a night for the whole family. Be a part of Kids Night when the Toronto Rock take on the Colorado Mammoth at a special 5 p.m. start time on Saturday, March 9th at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton. The first 5,000 fans in attendance will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of Backley Construction.

Punch your ticket to Kids Night on Saturday, March 9th at 5 p.m. in Rock City at torontorock.com. Lock the gates! all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fuck nicks what's happening i'm mark maron this is my podcast wtf welcome to it hugh grant is on the show today hugh grant now i'll be honest with you. I didn't know if I liked Hugh Grant. I know Hugh Grant. We all know Hugh Grant. Everybody knows Hugh Grant. He's that cute guy. But lately, he's been a little less cute and a little more intense and a little more interesting to me, frankly. But then I watched him in this new

biddies in, the undoing dark dark shit but I didn't know what to expect you know because I think back about Hugh Grant you remember when he got busted and I thought I thought this at that point he must have been like the biggest star in the world that's what I remember but the truth was he he hadn't even released an American film yet. He was just this guy that was at the tip of the spear of total media hype. And I talked to him about it and he completely knows that. But it was sort of interesting talking to him because I didn't know what to expect. He was in Istanbul. There was a tremendous time difference. The sun was setting there. The sun was setting there and he was having a cocktail, it seemed.

And he was cracking me up. He's a very dark, self-deprecating man. I enjoyed it very much. So that's going to happen in a few minutes. I've been sleeping better and my muscles feel better. I don't know if it's a change in vitamins. I don't know if it's the combination of yoga and meditation. I'm having deep dreams. I don't know what they mean. Had a dream about my second wife.

And in the dream, she wasn't wearing makeup and she was a giant. And I just remember being excited to see her, but not remembering how huge she was. Like my, my head came literally to her crotch level and she was just this giant, powerful woman and i was like were you out was it always was it there was always this big a size difference i don't remember this at all i guess metaphorically we can figure that one out can't we can't we and yesterday i went and did some uh some voice work for the bad guys movie apparently this book is very popular with kids, Bad Guys. And I play the snake. But I was able to watch some of the completed sequences. And it's like fucking amazing.

You know, I'm not a big animation guy, but this stuff is moving. But I think, is everything moving now? What is happening to me? What am I going to do? Jesus Christ. everything moving now what is happening to me what am i gonna do jesus christ do i even want to do anything anymore man i don't know where you're at but geez man i did some planting the other day i planted some plants i've been walking by these beds around my house with these that I hated for over a year because I, you know, I threw some plants in there. I had the gardener throw some plants in there

and I didn't like them. And some of the plants, they never grow. It just looks shitty. And it's right in front of my house. And it was driving me nuts for over a year. And I get it in my mind. Well, I better do some research. I better look at some books. Maybe I can have somebody come in and assess what's happening out there and bring. and then finally it was just sort of like fuck it fuck it and this is how i work all the time i don't know how you work but i get right to the end of my rope and then it's seemingly impulsively seemingly impulsively i just fucking go do what i have to do in a flurry. I know I've got to do it for a long time, but then it just, it almost has to be, it has to be done on impulse. Like I just went to

run an errand somewhere and I went by the nursery after, and I bought about seven or eight plants for less than a hundred dollars. And then I just got on my knees and I got my boots on and I got a little shovel and I planted a bunch of plants and it has taken such a fucking load off my mind. It's such a pleasure to walk into my house. It took like a half an hour. What the fuck is wrong with me? What is wrong with us? I mean, the one thing you learn about stuff that makes you happy in your home and around your home is if you've been forced to stay in that box for a year, whatever you thought was slightly fucked up or slightly driving you crazy or slightly annoying or slightly ugly. It's definitely fucking annoying, ugly, irritating now. And you can just fucking get rid of it.

Now, I'm not talking about children or, or partners. I'm talking about objects. All right. Don't misunderstand this. Do not get rid of your children. Do not get rid of your partner. Well, I mean, look, oddly, you got to keep the kids, but you know, if it's been a year and you've realized something about your relationship, maybe you should make a move. Maybe you should make a decision. Maybe it's time. Okay. So look, Hugh Grant, I had a very good time talking to him and he's nominated for a SAG award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a TV movie or limited series for his role as Jonathan in The Undoing. You can watch that on HBO Max. You can watch all his movies. You know Hugh Grant. You know him. When I spoke to him, he was in Turkey. Yeah,

this is me and Hugh Grant. He's in Turkey. You can get anything you need with Uber Eats. Well, almost, almost anything. So no, you can't get an ice rink on Uber Eats. But iced tea and ice cream? Yes, we can deliver that. Uber Eats. Get almost, almost anything.

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japan alive fx's shogun a new original series streaming February 27th exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. Key. Hello. How's it going, Hugh? That was really natural. I'm very good at this. I've been doing it a long time. You can tell. I think this is the longest stretch of miles between people that we've had.

Where are you? L.A.? I'm in L.A., yeah. You're in Turkey? Yes, sir. Have you been there before? Yeah, I've been on silly holidays here in the 1980s. So people go on holidays to Turkey? Oh, yes.

It's hot and it's cheap. If you're European, it's a good... And if you're Russian, it's a very good destination. Oh, so if you enjoy the nice weather in Russians, you go to Turkey. I love both. I'm very happy here. But isn't, like, the thing I always wonder about Turkey is, like, isn't there, like, an authoritarian regime?

Does that in any way hamper your good times? Well, I'm here doing a job. I'm making a film. I know, yeah. So I've had to i you know what actors are like i when we act we park our all our morality and our grandstanding well i i don't i don't think it's a moral thing but even if you're vacationing because i know people live in those countries and they seem to have a life i mean i assume they're you know web designers and massage therapists that

are very pleasant and happy but i mean i just want just wondering if you feel it a little bit oh yeah like are you nervous now they're extremely nice to me i have to say yeah the turks are completely charming i love them so that way so now we're we're good if there's any uh down erdogan road yeah if there's any monitors in the room, you've done your bit. What is the movie, man? Can you say? Yeah, it's another Guy Ritchie film. I've made two already. This is another one.

It stars Jason Statham. It's like a spy thing. And I'm a billionaire arms dealer. It talks like that. A billionaire arms dealer that talks like that. Which accent is that, would you call it? Well, that's sort of North London. So a lot of the time he's saying, no, no, Mark, shush, I'm talking, shush.

How long does it take you to get hold of that accent? I kind of know it. I grew up around a lot of London accents. I'm stealing from a few sources, but I'm too frightened to say who they are. Yeah. Characters from your past. Well, no. Some of them are quite well known.

But you're on the Coke. I'm on the whiskey. That's good. That's right. Good for you. It's actually black coffee. I like to drink it out of a glass. It's 7.30 a.m. here. You're winding down. I'm doing, it's actually black coffee. I like to drink it out of a glass. It's 7.30 a.m. here.

You're winding down. I'm gearing up. I'm sorry you're doing it at 7.30, but think of me doing Jimmy Kimmel this morning at 3.35 a.m. You did? Yeah. How'd that go? Well, as you can imagine, it was a catastrophe.

I couldn't help but barely speak. I like the fact that we're all on a level playing field production value wise. Like this might as well be the tonight show. I can do the tonight show from my backyard. Whoever thought that would fucking happen? Like national television from my porch. Yeah. So these characters like in the last guy, Richie, too, you did another sort of guy.

Yeah. It seems like you've become like a different manifestation of yourself in terms of acting it seems like you enjoy it more yes yeah yeah well the funny thing is i i started out in my 20s yeah doing i made a living from doing silly characters silly voices well yeah i mean what was the background of that that? I noticed that there was some comedy and some other stuff. What part of London did you grow up in? I grew up in West London. And yeah, that's what I did. I did it as a child. I did it at school. I made people laugh doing imitations of people. And then in my early 20s, that's how I made my living doing silly voices on radio commercials,

which I produced and wrote with friends. And then suddenly one day I got cast in a film and I went off on a 30 year detour. It wasn't really the plan. It just got swept up. Well, I was so bad in my early films. I thought if I do one more, I'll just approve. I well i was so bad in my early films i thought if i do one more

yeah i'll just prove i wasn't quite that bad and then you're never satisfied right anyway now i'm back to doing silly voices yeah do you have actors in your family i mean what what what drove you initially how many kids are there of your siblings a lot oh i have one brother who is a banker in New York. And there's no acting whatsoever in my family. In fact, they were all horrified when I ended up going on that detour. Now, what kind of like do you come from? Like, I don't understand how Britain works, but do you have a long lineage? Are you from a prestigious heritage of sorts?

No. There's no titles, sadly. I would love a title. I think you can get one now, can't you? I mean, you're Hugh Grant. Can't you just get a title? Well, the government really hate me. So I don't think so.

But, yeah. My family was just nice. they were like gentle folk I suppose penniless gentle folk oh really you grew up uh economically compromised my dad was in the army and he he decided to come out and make his fortune in business and uh it turned out that that plan didn't work out and it was the 70s. And it was the 70s, and everyone was unemployed, and the lights went out all the time because we had power cuts and strikes. Do you remember all this in the 70s in Britain? It was really hardcore.

The dead were unburied in the street. The rubbish wasn't taken away by the rubbish men. Wait a minute. Really? Yeah, the country was ruled by the unions, especially miners union yeah and that's why and then maggie thatcher came along and changed everything the dead were unburied in the street i may have exaggerated slightly but yeah they were is that like one story or was that just something like you're going to school and there's some dead people

well i do love a dead person in the street i once made a film in calcutta and uh i don't know if you've been to india but it's pretty great if you're stuck in a traffic jam yeah past your window goes cars cyclists motorbike people coppers and then a cow yeah and then a dead body just being carried on a stretcher. And they might get stuck, and you're just sitting looking at the dead body for a bit. I guess there's an honesty to that, that we try to avoid at all costs. And it's probably, you know, it's part of life, right?

Of course it is. Of course it is. Yeah, I don't know why we're so spooked by it. Yeah, well, yeah, I don't know if I'm spooked by it, but I just want it to happen quickly. I understand. Yeah. How can I help? You're too far away.

I'm quite good at murder now. You're probably helping somehow now. Whatever stress I'm experiencing. But India, yeah, I've wanted to go to India, but I don't know anything about India other than I like the food. And that doesn't seem to be a great reason to go because you probably can't eat too much without being careful. You get poisoned on day three. Is that no matter what? On that film, I was there for three months and I didn't leave the lavatory except to shoot my scenes. And then i had to go straight back continue with my

explosive diarrhea what what movie was that now that we know the subtext it was a very um pretentious french film this was again back in the 80s i i went through a phase of doing um sort of euro cinema and it was a film called la nuit bengali do you speak french well i pretend i do yeah i pretend that i have a house in france i'm a massive francophile i i love the place i love the people so you can you can speak enough french to get by yeah yeah but i but when i i always say that i'm doing a sort of publicity tour for film and we get to France and they say, could you do, you know, live radio interview in French? And I say, of course. And then I go on the live radio. I can't understand a word anyone would say. Not one word. And they think you're just being an asshole or what happens? Well, it's difficult when it's a phone in and you're under pressure and they've got accents from strange regions of France.

It's tough. How do you handle that? You just go like, what? What? Yeah, you say, pardon, j'ai pas compris. I'm sorry, I didn't understand.

You can say that once, maybe twice, but when you've said it for the eighth time, they just cut you off with jingles and say, well, who is this idiot?

So you're carrying from the beginning, it seems, okay, so you do one movie, you didn't think you were good in it, and then it just starts rolling? I mean, did you train to be an actor in any way other than, like I read in some of the material that you had an actual comedy troupe. Is that true?

Yes, yes, yes. That was back when I was doing Silly Voices. But was comedy something you appreciated? Were you like a Python fan? Did you see a future yes of course of course yeah python was the highlight of the week for us growing up and who are these guys in your troop were you in college at the time no i i oh it's a complicated it's a complicated story they were just guys i met yeah we have time i mean yeah and we ended up um we did a little show and

then it you know it was popular and then we did another one and we did a little show and then it, you know, it was popular and then we did another one and we did another one and it got a bit bigger. Yeah. We ended up at the Edinburgh Festival on the fringe, you know, there. Yeah, for a month. Our manager had booked us this theatre. Yeah.

And he was an idiot. He was an idiot. And he booked a theatre that held 1,500 people. And our average audience in London was, you know, 50. And our first night's audience in Edinburgh was three. Yeah. So three people in a 1500 seat theatre is depressing. Oh, yeah.

And every day we went out and gave out leaflets. We got our audience up to about 20. And then one day there was a guy from the BBC doing a show about The Fringe and he saw our show and he really liked it. So he said, come and come and do it on the BBC tonight. So we did. We did one sketch.

The next day we went into the theater ready to give out leaflets and played an empty house. And there was a queue three times around the block. And we completely jammed. It was so exciting that we gave the worst performance of our life because every time 1,500 people laughed, we laughed too with excitement. So you were still green, weren't ready for the big crowd. We weren't ready for those huge laughs, no. And was it a disaster or did you get away with it? No, it actually went quite well there.

And then we got given a TV show show and that really was a disaster. We got that completely wrong. I, you know, I've had that, uh, Edinburgh fringe, um, uh, experience and I'll never go back there. I have a, you know, a trauma from doing that. From what did you do? I did stand up there for a month, but I was on a double bill and I wasn't a known quantity. So we were just struggling with audiences of nine to 15 for a fucking month.

And it's like beats you down, man. Yeah. Awful. I also did. I did a Hamlet there when I was at university. We did Hamlet in Star Trek costumes. We didn't have big audiences for that either. I just will

never go back like you couldn't pay me to go back there it's like you know to compete with 900 acts you know who are doing other things a 900 aspirant middle class 20 year olds right right with with different varying degrees of costume and uh self-importance. Yeah. I know what you mean. But so was the TV show, the comedy show, where you started launching? I mean, it went badly, but you seem to have done all right. Yeah, but we had other work. As I say, we were making all these commercials. Right.

And we were writing sketches for other people on TV, and we were still doing stuff in the theater. Yeah, and then one day I still had an agent agent for acting but I never really returned their call and then they left a message saying um this guy James Ivory wants to see you for a film uh and I said I don't think I really want to go I'm not interested in acting I've got my show and I won't get it anyway and my brother the banker happened to be home that then and he was living with me or rather i was camping on his floor yeah and he said don't be an asshole this is money you need money you're not paying any rent go to the audition he made me

put on a suit and i went and i got the job and uh and that that began this uh detour yeah this did but i mean you just keep saying detour what would you think you were going to be doing otherwise i mean did you have a plan that you've got no but who does have a plan in their 20s no i liked i was very very happy doing that show doing our show i felt like a man at the end of the day you know when you write your own material it's a lot you feel a lot um oh yeah you have a you have a hairier chest than if you're just saying someone else's words so you enjoy doing the comedy the sketch show even though it wasn't popular you felt that it didn't go well it was popular it was very popular in the theater it just was not good on television oh and so while you had

the television show you were also doing live performances yeah and that was satisfying yes well it was it was very frightening i mean we that was satisfying yes well it was it was very frightening i mean we on the whole it was it was it was always a quite a big success but we we then started putting in some new material which was much more controversial oh yeah and would either go brilliantly or play to sepulchral silence like what what were the hot topics comedian you'll know, is not desirable. Yeah, it's a powerful silence, that one. It is powerful.

It's got a little vacuum to it. It's not just silence, it takes something from you. Yes. Forever. Yeah, you fill that hole with resentment. It's great. It's a great business. But I mean, what kind of buttons were you pushing?

Well, we did some very, very blue material. Yeah, that's good. Just filthy. Yeah, you had to get the right audience. Sometimes friends of my mother would come out of loyalty. Right. The report back was not great well they they just looked ashen faced at the end of it they didn't know how to be kind and it was difficult it was a bit that was difficult they couldn't hide the what happened to you face why how did they they were they're such lovely people my mother only had lovely, loving, supportive, liberal friends.

Yeah. But it was very strong meat, what we were doing. I don't know why. Yeah. And I could see they were horrified. I mean, these were ladies who were brought up in the 1950s. Yeah, of course. Right.

Of course they were horrified. But on some level, didn't you set out to horrify exactly those people? Wasn't that the intent? God knows what our intent was. God knows what our intent was. God knows. So you were nostalgic about that period of self-generating material? Yes, yes, yes, yes. Well, how come you didn't – have you done any of that since?

Not enough. Although I do, it has to be said, embellish the script or the parts that I play in films always it depends how good the original script is if it's absolutely brilliant there's less embellishment to be done if it's a bit of a dog then there's a lot do directors enjoy you doing that they they are rightfully nervous of it because i've heard a lot of actors do it unbelievably badly and you don't know where to look especially if they're quite powerful actors. Yeah.

And they say, wouldn't it be great if I said X? And everyone's thinking, no, that would be absolutely awful. Right. But it's difficult. But I do the scripted version as well. And then on take three or four, without saying anything, I just do something different. And sometimes you hear a laugh

from the monitor and you think okay well that's good yeah and i must say they do quite often end up in the film partly because just because they're fresh sure uh and and and the camera loves fresh anything that's not pre-rehearsed seems to uh go down very well and end up in the edit did you do any formal like training no sir no i i had an inferiority complex about it at one stage i ended up it's a long story but i ended up doing some theater at one point early on right i know nothing about theater yeah and i had these young friends who'd all been to the royal academy of dramatic art in london and knew how to protect their voices and move properly. I knew nothing.

So I bought a book. There was one called Voice and the Actor. The other was called Movement for Actors. And I went and practiced these ludicrous exercises in the park. And I remember, for instance, running backwards with my arms outstretched going, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim, nim. Yeah? Scrunchy nut. Scrunchy nut.

They seem to have stuck. I mean, you can still do it. Well, I mean, I sort of loved all that stuff. I got quite enamored of actors and the way they prepared. In the theatre in those days, there were still some real old-timers. Yeah. Old-fashioned grease paint and did all that stuff. Long warm-ups.

Yeah. Yes. And then they would come into your dressing room and they would say, Hello, Hugh. Hello, Christopher. I notice you're in your underwear. Christopher, do you have an erection?

But you see, all that was fine in those days. Yeah. Are you just bulgy? It was fine. Pre-Me Too, you just took it on the chin, as it were. It seems like those exercises were effective, though. It seems like, you know, as ridiculous as they were, they gave you some sense of...

No, no, no, no. I was really bad on the stage in those days. My God. There was one exercise about how to stand up properly on stage. And it's quite important you don't slump. But I apparently, unbeknownst to me i really overdid it and i went through a whole week of lady windermere's fan walking onto stage literally leaning backwards like uh like i was arched backwards and it was other members of the cast had to come up to me

and said could you stop doing that because it's putting i thought i was just being my own you thought you're doing it correctly. Yeah, I did, yeah. This is what actors do. So how did you become better at it? Just by doing it? Just by working with directors? Yeah. Because you're really good at it.

I mean, you put the work in. I've definitely got better in the last few years, yeah. Oh, just in the last few years, you think? I was all right. I had some talent, but my problem was self last few years, yeah. Oh, just in the last few years, you think? I was all right. I had some talent, but my problem was self-consciousness, really. And part of the answer, there's many answers, but the main answer for me has been don't do parts which are like me. You know, the further away from me I get,

the more of a mask I put on, the less self-conscious I am. Oh, so do you think that the self-consciousness, how did that kind of manifest? You never thought you were good? Well, it's just if you get the average person off the street and say, right, I'm now going to push a camera into your face very slowly. Right. While a hundred people watch. Right. And millions of people around the world watch.

They get self-conscious. Or if you say to the average person on the street, just walk towards normally yeah they can't do it and no one can it's you get a very strange bouncy self-conscious walk yeah you go from doing something which is completely instinctive in your right brain to using your left brain which starts to think why walk you know and suddenly you can't do it so this So this is the nightmare of self-consciousness. And anyway, my way out is to not be me, to just be captured by someone else. But it seems like when you look back on the past and the early roles,

that you have a certain amount of contempt for that guy who did those for you doing those. Well, yeah, I mean, I was ludicrous doing proper theater then. But like even. That is where I met. That is where I met my friend Chris, who was equally bored. The one who had the bulgy underpants. Yeah.

And that's when we started writing a silly show to do in the bar of the theater late at night. And that was the beginning of our show. And then when you get this call, at what stage are you sleeping on your brother's couch? How far after the theater? Well, during that time when I wasn't working. Right. I lived on my brother's floor. Yeah.

He had a nice flat because he was a banker yeah and i always thought he liked having me there but he recently revealed to me that he had been trying for four years to get me out four years is a long time to have your brother sleeping on the floor yeah yeah so so when did it all turn around i mean was it really had how many movies did it take what was the ivory movie that he made you go audition for well it was called morris okay as it's known in america maurice yeah and uh it was it did well as uh you know critically and prizes were won at the venice film festival and stuff like that and uh and, at least the other two actors, there were three main boys in it.

And the other two actors then had a very good phase of their career. I had a fairly good phase, but it went downhill quite fast. And then I was rescued many years later by four weddings and a funeral. So that was your beginning. And then you felt like it was so Rupert Graves was in that one. Is that who? Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

And you just, you feel like you did okay, but then there was a lot of expectation and it didn't quite happen. No, not really. I just, I got offered some crap and I did all the crap because I thought, well,

how lovely he is money and he is foreign location and pretty girls. And I accepted everything. Where does the, the layer of the white worm fall in i'm very fond of that film that's great yeah of course it's fucking trip yeah well people who take a lot of drugs do love it well ken russell's a wild man how about it must have been great he was he was a wild man and he was i mean he was very talented but he by that stage he was also very fond of a good lunch let's just say yeah it was already a fairly wild film in the mornings.

Yeah. By the time he'd had a lunch with two bottles of wine, it was really a different story. And, you know, his style of directing became ever more eccentric. So he would say, I remember there's a scene in that film where I have to pick up a big sword and cut a lady snake monster

in half. It didn't feel quite right. And I said, this shot doesn't feel quite comfortable to me. And his immortal words to me were, well, fuck how it fucking feels. Do it how I fucking showed you, you you cunt and that is not

out of the classic directorial handbook yeah you got to be at it for a few years to have that kind of insight yeah that must have been was that close to his last movie i wonder uh yeah close to close to and i i'm never really sure what he intended with that film because it's possible it was meant to be a serious horror film. And then we had a read-through the night before we started shooting, and the cast laughed so hard with tears streaming down our face. But I think at that point we thought we might ham it up a bit. And he didn't stop you, so what are you going to do?

But it's kind of amazing that you did like it looks like almost 10 movies before 44 weddings and a funeral yeah yeah yeah well and lots of miniseries really dodgy miniseries it was it was the on bbc no they were i don't know there was some american ones there was judith kranz's till we meet, yeah. I don't know. I was always, for some reason, a champagne baron, an evil one. Yeah. Who stole the family champagne and sold it to the Nazis and raped Courtney Cox, my half-sister, and got whipped out of the house by Michael York.

I always had a little mustache. You got to work with Michael York. I mean, that's not nothing. That's not nothing. That's not nothing. I just watched Accident, the Accident, that Joseph Lozzi movie with the Pinter script. Yeah, yeah.

It's amazing how long that guy was around, and he was always sort of in movies. Yeah, and a lovely man. Is he? And very, very good as Basil Exposition in the Austin Powers. Yeah, yeah, Austin Powers. Well, so you got cast as the evil, barren, rich guy thing, and you were pretty young.

And then all of a sudden it just shifts, and you're this romantic kind of. Well, things started, even the miniseries were fizzling out by 1993. Really? I think they were a bit. You weren't even 30 yet, right? Well, things were started, even the miniseries were fizzling out by 1993. Really? I think they were a bit. You weren't even 30 yet, right? I was 30.

I was 30. There were little bits that were all right, but it was fizzling. And then suddenly the script arrives. Yeah. And I've told this story many times, but I'll tell you this again, just in case anyone hasn't heard it. It was so surprising to read a good script from my agent that I called up and I said I think there's been a mistake you've sent me a good script the reason I did that is because about a year previously they'd sent me Jerry McGuire and I'd said I think it's a mistake here you've sent me a good script and they said yes

I'm sorry that is a mistake that was made Four Weddings was, yeah, it was an audition. And I went. And the man who wrote it, Richard Curtis, hated me on sight and didn't want me to do the film. And the producer didn't want me to do the film. But the man who was directing it, Mike Newell, thought there was something there. Yeah.

And I got cast. And I was off on another detour. But have you written a memoir yet? No, sir. When's that going to happen? Well, I don't know, because half of me wants to do it, but half of me thinks they're a bit up one's own ass, aren't they? I mean, it's a bit grand. they're a bit up one's own ass, aren't they?

I mean, it's a bit grand. I guess, but it really seems that, you know, given your tone and the way you would approach the stories, it would be pretty entertaining. It'd probably be fun to write. Well, I try and go that way. Did you ever read David Niven's autobiography? No, no. Is it great?

It's great. The Moon's a Balloon. In fact, there's two. The Moon's a Balloon and then there's another one called Bring on the Empty Horses. And those are great. And he's not up his ass. Yeah, no, I think there's probably a way to do it. So after four weddings, like I didn't realize because my memory,

like you've just sort of always been around, you know, in my life. I'm sorry. No, no, it's great. I mean, you know, I watched uh you know the undoing and and there's part of me you know seeing you in that and watching all of it where i'm like uh finally now we really see him but um well did you ever did you not see i've because i i've done a few other really evil characters yeah yeah yeah yeah i, yeah, yeah. I know that that's where you're going. But, like, I was sort of, my point is that I didn't realize that after Four Weddings and a Funeral that, you know, you had only done that movie and you'd become this, like, almost major presence in the world of celebrity and attention, you know?

presence in the world of celebrity and attention you know like i remember like i had to be kind of put it into context that when all that shit went down with you out here that uh what you were you were you were new like it wasn't like you'd done a million movies i was about to launch my first hollywood film my timing was impeccable. How deeply have you investigated the timing of that, you know, in terms of why you do certain things? Do you do that kind of self-exploration? Yeah, I mean, I've said this before. My problem

was, that was my first Hollywood film, and I'd just been to see it. The film was about to come out in a week or two after that, and I had a bad feeling about it. And I went to see a screening. And everyone in it was brilliant. But I was so atrocious that I was not in a good frame of mind. And I had a Ken Russell kind of lunch.

Yeah. And one thing led to another. So you're like, you know, know i'm gonna make a mess of this well no i know deliberately god no not deliberately at all no i just was uh disappointed in myself and yeah and you wanted to make it worse i don't know i don't know what was going on i certainly did but but you know you sort of weathered the storm which movie were you talking about that you thought you're so bad in sirens well no no no i wasn't bad in size it was called nine months oh yeah yeah

yeah yeah and yeah but you weathered the storm you kept going was it i mean did you think it was over after that or what no because the the film did all right at the box office in fact i think it did quite well and that's all hollywood really cares about they don't care what you get up to as long as you make them money not then they didn't now it seems like yeah you know well yes yes i think things are a bit different now yeah i mean yeah and also like i i don't know i think the premium put on uh who the hell knows what's happening with show business it's a fucking disaster disaster. Why, why, what do you, why, in what way is it a disaster? Well, it just feels like, you know, the, the pressure of being a public person, even a minor public person, you know, is, is daunting. And it's, you know,

at some point, especially now you've got to wonder like, you know, is this worth it? You know? And it seems like you've fought that fight before, you know, valiantly against, you know, people who are, you know, the boundaryless, abusive press. But it's just like you can't hide anymore from anybody can get through to you. Well, yeah. There's that. Yeah. Everyone's got a phone.

Everyone's a pap. Yeah. Everyone's tweeting about where you are, what you're doing. It's crazy. Yeah. So you couldn't misbehave. I don't want to misbehave anymore. I'm too old and, you know, married and children. But thank God, because now it would be completely impossible,

misbehavior of any kind. Well, what sparked it? I have no understanding. Apparently, the British tabloid press, I don't know it. I think it's bad here, but apparently it's like horrendous there. Yes, but it's, yes, that's correct. And, um, funnily enough, I've just been sent a whole lot of information about how, uh, it wasn't just my cell phone that messages that were being accessed. It was also my landline was It was my home line. For years and years, they were listening. And my medical records and my car had bugs put in it so that they knew where I was.

You just found this out? Yeah. I knew some of it, but I didn't know it for sure. But a lot of the guys who did this work, private investigators hired by tabloid newspapers, are coming over to our side you know i've got a sort of campaign group or a part of it yeah and uh they now they're so pissed off that the editors senior executives and the owners of these newspapers have got away scot-free while some of them have gone to some of these foot soldiers have gone to jail that they're now coming over to our side and spilling the beans. Really?

And apart from it being sort of fascinating and horrific, it's also quite heartwarming and weird in a way. I have a party every year with my campaign group for my birthday, and they love to invite these people who've previously done really terrible things to me you know bugged my car stolen my medical records or yeah in one case broken into my apartment uh just took the door off the hinges while i was out and had a good sniff around and so they love to say at these parties they say now hugh i don't think you've met knobby he broke into your flat in 1999 and I have to go, oh, hi Nob, yeah, well, welcome.

Make yourself at home, I think you know where everything is, you know. But you know, it's like you're sitting here saying this list of things and you're actually in, you know, a relatively authoritarian country, but those all sound like authoritarian actions. Yes. Well, that's almost true in the sense that they were allowed to do all this because government was so scared and remains so scared of those newspapers because they have the power to

make or break politicians' careers that no one ever went after them so the police were instructed to look the other way while all this was going on and that is why my group campaigned for a big public inquiry led by a judge to really uncover all the dirt and that we did get it and it was done and he made recommendations and then the the government under pressure from these newspapers, said, they found a way not to put it into law. So really, we're sort of back to square one. It's just- The country, Britain is run by four or five newspaper owners. People often say, you know,

Americans I meet, they say, so what do you think of the present prime minister? It's kind of irrelevant. They are just puppets chosen by rupert murdoch and the barclay brothers and really a couple of them yeah yeah these are the people it's it's an oligarchy it's four very very powerful newspaper owners runs britain and and none of them like you well no i would be one of their first public enemies because I've spoken up against them. Well, I mean, you've had some success, right, in making them pay. Yes, I've won court cases because in our authoritarian regime or our murdocracy or whatever you want to call it, one of the things that's still free is the courts.

They haven't got to the judges yet. So you can win cases against them, but they will punish you for that. And how did they punish you? Well, appalling editorial treatment. You know, you will be taken to pieces, shredded. As a warning, not just a warning to you not to do it again, but a warning to anyone else do not ever uh criticize us or point out that we're our widespread illegalities and law-breaking holy shit it's fucking terrifying you know i don't

even have that you know like i i here you know just dealing dealing what we've been through presidentially and and what's going on here i i mean, I know there's, you know, outlets and propaganda, but like, it seems so cut and dry, you know, what's going on there in terms of their control of things. We don't have that here. I mean, they're separate stations, but it's not everybody's brain addled and terrified. Well, it has changed a little here because of social media now. Before social media really took off, they really had a stranglehold of public opinion. And if you have a stranglehold on public opinion and can control it,

then you can control politicians, you can control everything. But now, people have the capability to push back a little via social media. You know, being untruth can be put right on social media if you have a loud enough voice on that.

Well, that's good, I guess. Yes, I guess. Do you live in England still? Yeah. You do? Yeah. You never thought to leave? Because, I mean, I talked to Kate Winslet recently, and I mean, she basically left.

Did she? Where's she living now? She was in New York for a while. I guess she's back there, but I think think after Titanic she went to New York for years. She got that type of attention very young and it didn't seem as abusive or intrusive as yours but I mean she knew that it was something that she didn't necessarily want to live with. Yeah well I don't blame her. When did you like you, you've got a bunch of kids, right? Yes. Hundreds.

When did that start happening? Remarkably late in life. I had my first child at 51. Really? No, I'm 60 and I have children going down from nine to three. And when did you get married? About three years ago. You just got married three years ago? Like, look, I'm 57. Yeah, I guess I was 57 when I got married.

Are you married? No, I'm not married anymore. I don't have any kids either, but I've been married a couple of times. So wait, you had kids before you were married or were two different people? I had most of my kids before I was married, and I've had, I think, one since. And what was the big life change? Did you not want to have kids originally, or you just never found the time or the person? Yeah, I don't know, really.

I think most men have a fear of what having a child will do to their lifestyle. Sure. And then other men will give them a lecture and say no you don't understand it's so wonderful it completes you as a man and and you think i'll piss off but actually uh it turns out those smug people are not entirely wrong it has been absolutely lovely and and and it's been lovely being married too which i really never expected well i mean you know you're you're older so i mean you know after a certain point all those things that were important when we were younger really start to lose their meaning there's that but i but also if you just happen to get lucky and find the right person i you know i'm married to an amazing

person who's my best friend and and i mean i. I can't believe the clichés that are pouring from my lips, but it's nice. We have dinner together every night, and I look forward to it, which is just bizarre. But it's bizarre in a good way, right? This is not a detour. This is where you landed in the good life. Exactly.

What does she do? Is she in the business? She's had many jobs. She was in ESPN. Oh, yeah. Sports promos and things. And now she's just swamped by children. And how do you think it changed your approach to life?

More cliches are about to pour from my mouth. But it's very nice suddenly when you're not the most important person anymore. It's actually strangely soothing and relaxing. A relief? You feel better about yourself to genuinely care about someone else.

You properly love your children and you want to look after them. I think it makes you feel... I talked earlier about hairy chests. It gives you a hairier chest you you you think yeah well i took care of my kids today and i loved them and and of course it's absolutely delightful being loved back so it does uh so it does complete you as a man i mean i'm looking i'm making myself vomit, but it sort of does a bit. Vulnerability is difficult, isn't it? So, but in terms of what you were saying earlier about avoiding yourself, it was always a relief in terms of the roles you chose.

Now, it seems like you're fairly comfortable with yourself despite you know being cliches uh around fatherhood but how is it uh do you feel it's made a difference in how you work yes i i i'm i think it has made me better at acting yeah because um i'm just less of a shrill narcissist golf addict which i was when I was a bachelor. What addict? Golf addict. I was a really serious golf addict for about 12 years to the point of insanity. And now I, I,

I can access all kinds of things in my acting, you know, real proper love. And that's very useful. Oh man. I never thought about it like that. So you, yeah,

because you can, I guess you can't really fake that. Can you? Well, I faked it for years that. So, yeah, because I guess you can't really fake that, can you? Well, I faked it for years in all those romantic comedies. Right, right. Now I feel it. And whereas in the old days, if the scene required, say, crying, I just said, well, that's a question. Forget it.

Now, you can't stop me crying. They have to ask me not to. I do a scene where I have to say to the waitress, could I have a cappuccino? I burst into tears and they say, well, maybe not. Not in this scene, Hugh. One of the things that's made me sad with the undoing was that there's two or three occasions where I genuinely cried and in the right kind of scene. Yeah.

And the reaction of Twitter, which I was reading while this was being broadcast, was, ah, he's terrible at crying. That's rubbish. That's not real crying. And it bloody was. Maybe I've just got a really unattractive cry face. Anyway, I'll never cry again. You will.

But, I mean, I think people have built up, you know, expectations or judgments or some sort of relationship with you over, you know, the last 30 years. Yeah, I think you're right. You know what I mean? So they that's I mean, I think that's the weirdest part about being, you know, a movie star or somebody as big as you in the cultural mind is that, you know, people have a relationship with you. That's got nothing to do with who you are. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's a bit late to be attempting to be a serious character actor.

No. Because I bring all this vast baggage with me. That is not the point I was making. All right. Okay. No. Never mind. Put the fault on the people that think they know you, but don't.

All right. All right. You're doing good work. All right. Put the fault on the people that think they know you, but don't. All right. You're doing good work. All right. So, like, yeah, and I did like the undoing. And I've interviewed Nicole. She's, like, much different than I thought she was. And I found her to be very entertaining and candid and charming and funny. Was be was it good to work with her yes and I've always liked her you know Brits get on very

well with Australians yeah we invented them really yeah by throwing them out yeah yeah we throw them so I've always I you know I've known her socially for decades and I've always, you know, I've known her socially for decades, and I've always liked her. Yeah. As you said, she's a good egg. Yeah, when you act with people, I mean, do you, because as you get older and you have this new vulnerability, do you connect better when you're doing a scene and all that stuff? Do you find that you're able to kind of show up for them better? Yeah, maybe, maybe, maybe.

I mean, nothing can ever be as frightening as Meryl Streep, who I had to work with in Florence Foster Jenkins. So although Nicole was intimidating, she's got Oscars and stuff and does very serious acting. Nothing can ever frighten me as much as that. But you held your own? Well, I did my best. I had my emotion tape or my emotion playlist, which really helps. Oh, that's good.

So now this one, you're playing a bad guy. Is there a plan? Do you ever see yourself doing something like that's directly relatable to the life you're living right now? Like a father, a warm sort of deep. Well, the undoing was sinisterly close to the life I live. Oh, my God. He was an upper east side dad with a kid in a private school and who goes to fundraisers and all that uh and that's me in london boy that turn in that movie like i knew it was coming but when

it came i was like holy shit yeah Well, I had to warn my wife. I said, look, I did have a plan to play this as a character. But in the end, the director wanted me to play it closer to me. So I've done that. In fact, it's sinisterly close to me. And I, you know, don't be alarmed. And how'd she take that? She loves the film.

She does. The more evil I am, the more I arouse her. So that's partly why I'm doing all these villains, to keep her entertained. Yeah, to know how the role-playing goes later. She is utterly revolted by the characters I played in those romantic comedies. She's a Swedish girl from the northern woods

where men are men. So the idea of some blinking, stuttery man who's in love, utterly repellent to her, man, you found the right person. Yeah. She's taking you to the next step. Hugh.

Yeah. I'm still, I'm in, look, I'm still nothing like manly enough for her. Her brothers. Yeah. Are these huge,

good looking beasts who never speak. It's uncool to speak if you're from the north part of Sweden. I never shut up. And, you know, my wife has caught me, especially during lockdown, watching The Sound of Music by myself and really enjoying it and singing along. These were difficult moments for a northern Swede. That's hilarious. That's what you have to be ashamed of being caught doing in your house yeah but i really love the sound of music i was in it once

i was brigitte von trapp one of the daughters because i went to an old boys school and so when we did the sound of music you know boys had to play girls roles in fact from for many years i played nothing but girls roles so i've've always been very sympathetic towards actresses. I know what the life's like. And do you like other musicals, or is that the one? I do like musicals. I can't beat about the bush. I like them.

Have you ever wanted to do one as an adult? Well, I do a musical number at the end of Paddington 2, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I'm not sure it's the most butch moment in cinema history, but it's a good moment. Do you want to do

any stage work as this character actor that you are now? Well, I would certainly do a short run. Yeah. But also, I would have to wrestle

with that problem I mentioned earlier of when the audience laughs, I'm so thrilled I laughed too. You think you still got that? Did you ever meet Christopher Plummer? No, I wish I had. I thought you might have. I figure like in England, everybody meets everybody eventually.

Yes. I never met him. I don't know where he was hiding. Maybe he didn't live in England. I don't know. Well, this has been a very fun fun talk have you had a nice time yes mark thank you very much did you work today by the way no today was a day well i prepared an actor prepared today yeah what'd you do to prepare don't want just to go over the script ridiculous detail i go into

i i write these long biographies of character and do you why is he doing this why is he saying that and really well and then of course a lot of and what else might he say and i write all these alternative lines in the margin really yeah so you you create a backstory for all the people? Yeah, huge, huge backstory. Mushrooms. So everything. If it says he combs his hair, you think, well, why does he comb his hair? Why doesn't he use a brush? And how long has he used a comb?

And was it his mother? And let's talk about his mother. What was his mother like? And how much did he love her and did she drink and all that and i don't know i don't know if it makes any difference to the final uh performance but i feel like it might do and it certainly helps my nerves because the waiting to act is absolutely miserable and tormenting uh and i feel that if i fill it with activity and rehearsal and study,

I'm a bit less nervous. And do you, like when you are in scenes, what do you do with all that information? Do you just assume that it's in there and you let it go? Yeah, let it go, let it go, let it go. Although occasionally, you know, and I always think this is a good test of whether you've really captured your character or not. Yeah. When the scene has finished or when there's a silence, of whether you've really captured your character or not.

Yeah. When the scene has finished or when there's a silence, I believe one should know what to say next, that you would improvise completely instinctively the next line because you know your character so well, how they speak, how they think. And I like to try and get myself to that point. Huh. Well, that's helpful for me. I mean, that's helpful for me. I mean, I like,

I, that's impressive. I, I never like, cause I noticed when I talked to actors, everyone's got their own way of, of making it work for them, their own set of habits and tools.

Yeah. But this stuff, like outside of just making you, you know, by the time better, it kind of, it makes you go a lot deeper with the possibilities of those moments right so because you like to improvise so it turns out it turns out that this is stanislavski

you know um in fact he did write an act of repairs didn't he yeah i think so yeah and it's all that it's it's it's uh and the method and it's just endless combing through and through and through and through and through. More detail, more detail, more detail. Who are they? Where do they come from? All that. Man, now I've got to. But what do you have to do at the same time?

I think. That's quite serious act of prep. But I think it's very, very important. I think. I may be wrong. To simultaneously keep an eye on what's entertaining. And will this actually interest people and entertain them or make them laugh or move them? Because if you just, if it's just a sort of religious process where you're just trying to be true to your character, it can be a bit boring. Interesting. So you're just trying to be true to your character it can be a bit boring interesting so you're aware of that that you know that you want to be engaging and entertaining yeah and

that if you do a scene where you don't feel that that's in there you'll want to redo it yeah yeah huh but if you have to choose one the entertaining uh instinct or the truth instinct, on film, you're better to go with the truth one always because they can make it entertaining by editing, music, lighting, all those kinds of things. They can make it entertaining. And there's no coming back from something which is false. You might think, oh, I was terribly entertaining in that scene. But if you were false, the audience knows it, they don't like it, and it dies. But if you're real, it's surprising

even if you're not hitting any of the comedy beats in the classic sort of way. And I often watch actors and think, oh, you're killing the jokes with your serious bloody acting. But actually in film, very often the joke survives their serious acting better than it survives me, my perfect timing.

Right. And do you, like, how aware of your face are you? Well, if you're aware of your face, you're dead meat. Oh, yeah. Because I talked to Jeff Daniels once. He's like, you've got to learn how to work your face, because all film acting is like 70% of it is face. He's like, you've got to learn how to work your face because all film acting is like 70% of it is face.

It's true. It's true. It's awful. The things I dread when they say we're just going to push in slowly on your face for this reaction shot, you know, in courtroom scenes. And this pushing could last two bloody minutes. And within the first 15 seconds, you think, this is

okay. I'm in character here and I'm thinking thoughts and I'm emoting. And then within 25 seconds, he's all I think, but my jaw has gone funny. It's gone funny. It's sticking out. Now it's sticking out more. My eyes are bulging. And then you're gone. That's it.

There goes that close up. Yeah. Well, I enjoy your work and I appreciate you talking to me. All right. Well, thanks, Mark. Take care of yourself, man. Yeah, yeah. All the best.

That was Hugh Grant. The show that he's nominated for the SAG Award is In the Undoing. As Jonathan in the undoing. You can watch that on HBO Max. Go to ParamountPlus.com slash WTF and try it for free. So you can watch Star Trek, Picard. I'm going to let you in on something, folks, here at the end. If you're still listening.

For my entire life, I've been saying Star Trek. Star Trek. And every time I've recorded this ad in the past, Brendan has had to tell me that I need to do it again because I did it again. I've said Star Trek my entire life. Not Star Trek. Star Trek.

It's been Star Trek my entire life. So saying Star Trek is new to me. There you go there's a little secret am I ashamed? yeah am I going to be okay? yup

I am I'm going to play some guitar right now Thank you. Thank you. BOOMER LIVES and Monkey and LaFonda and the cat angels are coming down. They're coming down. They're coming down. We'll see you next time. So, no, you can't get snowballs on Uber Eats. But meatballs, mozzarella balls, and arancini balls? Yes, we deliver those. Moose? No. But moose head? Yes. Because that's alcohol, and we deliver that too.

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