Gary Oldman On Punching Above His Weight In Alan Clarke's The Firm
He's played Dracula, Sirius Black and Lee Harvey Oswald. But for a lot of us, Gary Oldman will always be uber-hooligan Bex Bissell.
These days, if you ask Gary Oldman to name his favourite film role, he might say George Smiley in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy or Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour. But before he played John Le Carre’s espionage ace and Britain’s most celebrated prime minister, New Cross’s favourite son was always quick to say that the part he was proudest to have played was Bex Bissell, estate agent, menace to society and the key figure in Alan Clarke’s football hooliganism expose The Firm.
Already something of a star thanks to Sid And Nancy and Prick Up Your Ears, Leonard Gary Oldman was so determined to play a man who, in his words “says everything about the Thatcher years” that he instructed his agent to bully Clarke into giving him an audition.
As the actor remembers, “I was really keen to work with Alan Clarke. His body of work is tremendous. You see a movie of his like Scum and it’s thrilling. Before I even became an actor, I wanted to work with Alan. And fortunately, we hit it off.”
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