The REG Temple is the official website for actor, author and director Richard E. Grant.
Richard has appeared in over 80 films and television programs, such as Withnail And I, The Scarlet Pinmpernel, Jack & Sarah, L.A. Story, Dracula, The Hound Of The Baskervilles, Gosford Park & The Iron Lady. In 2005 he directed his first major release, Wah-Wah.
This website is unique in that it has been run and maintained by volunteers and fans since 1998. For more information on its origins, please click here.
Richard E Grant talks to Andrew Marr about his new film Dom Hemingway, co-starring Jude Law. REG also revisits his memories of the classic Withnail and I as well as sharing his insights into the painters of the Riviera.
By Henry Fitzherbert
IT is more than 25 years since Richard E. Grant starred in Withnail & I but his character still follows him everywhere, even to the door of the central London hotel where we meet to discuss his new film, Dom Hemingway.
Grant is a self confessed glass three quarters full person Grant is a self-confessed ‘glass three-quarters full’ person [GETTY]
“I’ve just crossed the road now and a truck driver yelled ‘you’ve obviously gone on holiday by mistake’,” chuckles Grant, referencing one of the numerous classic lines in Bruce Robinson’s cult comedy.
It was not his first Withnail quote of the day either. “I walked through St James’s Park this morning and somebody shouted ‘SCRUBBERS!’ to me. Not a day goes by that somebody doesn’t quote something from that film at me.”
Relaxed, tanned and looking a good deal younger than his 56 years, Grant has no problem with the daily reminders of his defining role as a splenetic, unemployed actor: “I’ve never met a Withnail fan that I thought was a complete tosser. If somebody gets that film or the dialogue you know that they’re all right.”
Nor does he chafe at suggestions that Withnail remains his best-loved part despite a CV bulging with memorable films, including The Age Of Innocence, The Player and Gosford Park, the latter pair directed by the late Robert Altman.
“Yes, I have accepted it and embraced all of that!” he says. “I don’t go through my day ruminating on it, it’s not how I live my life, but maybe you’re suggesting that is how I should be in my life?”
He says this with an air of wry amusement whereas Withnail would have had a nervous breakdown if you dared suggest his greatest role was, ahem, some time ago.
In any case, Grant is enjoying one of his best parts in years in writer-director Richard Shepard’s dark comic drama Dom Hemingway as elegantly seedy gangster Dickie Black. With Dickie’s air of dissipation and his arch one-liners we are back in Withnail territory, even if it is Jude Law’s show.
Law plays Hemingway, a verbose ex-con who goes on a booze and brawl spree after 12 years in jail, chaperoned by the faintly despairing Dickie.
“In the past I have been cast as the manic one, so to be the person trying to reign in the completely insane character was a real change and hugely enjoyable as a result,” he says.
He had never worked with Law before and is full of praise: “I absolutely loved working with him. I know that sounds corny. Very often I’ve seen things in the press where people say it was one big happy family and I know it’s all b******s but I really did love working with Jude. He is incredibly open-minded and engaging.”
The script provided little information on their characters’ backgrounds so Grant and Law hunkered down to fill in the blanks themselves: “We decided I’m the black sheep of a well-to-do family and Dom’s from the other side of the tracks in south London.”
The key to Grant’s character was his look: Hunter S. Thompson-style tinted sunglasses and an oily mullet. “I knew I was a seedy old dog,” quips Grant.
He clearly relished the experience as he has two other contrasting projects: a recurring role in the new series of über-hip HBO TV show Girls, created by and starring 27-year-old Lena Dunham, and he stars in Queen And Country, the sequel to Hope and Glory directed by 80-year-old John Boorman.
He describes Dunham as “astonishing”, while working with Boorman (on what is his last film) was a particular privilege. Growing up in Swaziland Grant had posters of the Boorman classics Deliverance and Point Blank on his wall.
“So to fast forward 30 years and say ‘you’re going to be in a sequel to Hope And Glory’ seemed so unlikely.”
Another hero of his was the late Robert Altman for whom he worked three times. Does he miss him? “Absolutely! I see his widow (Kathryn) regularly. I had lunch with her in New York last month. He was the youngest octogenarian you could ever hope to meet.” I wonder what Altman would make of Downton Abbey. It was Altman’s collaboration with Julian Fellowes on Gosford Park, after all, which gave birth to the beast of Sunday night television. “You can’t lure me into that trap,” says Grant with a twinkle. Hmm. Clearly Altman would not be tuning in.
It is not hard to see why Grant became a favourite of directors like Altman, who combine erudition and wit with a colossal appetite for living.
Grant is a life-enhancer, a doer and wry observer of life’s follies and absurdities as anyone who has read his two volumes of published diaries knows.
What a joy it would be to listen in on Grant’s chinwags with Bruce Robinson with whom he has remained great friends. The pair meet frequently at Robinson’s farm in Herefordshire even though their last collaboration, How To Get Ahead In Advertising, was more than 20 years ago. Given that Robinson is teetotal after years of heavy drinking and Grant is allergic to the stuff I wonder what they drink together?
“A cup of bile!” replies Grant. “He’s fantastically, biliously funny and jaundiced about the world and that always cheers me up. The fact that I’m so ‘glass three quarters full’ probably annoys him and winds him up even more into a cynical, splenetic state of thrombotic carbunculosis.”
I suggest the pair should collaborate again. “I agree. Get him out of that farm!” says Grant who lives in Richmond upon Thames with his wife Joan Washington, a dialect coach (they have two children, Olivia and Tom, her son from a previous relationship).
Grant is an acclaimed writer-director thanks to the success of his 2005 film Wah-Wah, based on his turbulent childhood in Swaziland. He was raised by his alcoholic father after his mother had an affair with his father’s best friend, as witnessed by the young Grant hiding in the family motor.
Other projects have come near to fruition but collapsed, including an adaptation of Some Hope, the trilogy by Edward St Aubyn: “It proved impossible to cast a bankable British actor who would play somebody who had incest with his son,” reveals Grant.
What about that other Grant, Hugh, I venture? “He’d be perfect. He would be, but I think he’d prefer to play golf.”
Somehow I can’t imagine Richard E Grant anywhere near a golf course.
• Dom Hemingway is in cinemas now
A brewery has paid homage to a cult classic by naming a new range of beers after its props, characters and events.
Eden Brewery owners Jason Hill and Stephen Mitchell both have a long-standing love affair with 1980s cult flick Withnail and I.
The pair’s passion has inspired them to release a new range of brews which all have names linked to the film, starring Richard E Grant.
The Penrith-based brewery’s latest offerings, Antifreeze, RLF (Ronson Lighter Fluid), Revenge, and Here Hare Beer, will all be available this month.
All four tipples promise to pack a punch with strengths ranging from 5.3 per cent to a hefty 9.1 per cent.
They contain a range of flavours using some of the finest hops around, and also include fresh raspberries to give RLF its unique fruity flavour.
Each beer’s label also features an apposite line from the film’s script, which centres on the ragged adventures of a pair of ‘resting’ actors who travel from 60s London to the Lake District.
Mr Hill explained: “It is such a classic and probably one of the most famous, and in my opinion, the best films made in the Lakes.
“We have both loved the film since we were young and couldn’t think of a better way to pay homage than naming some delicious beers after some of the props, characters and events that feature in it.
“Obviously we are not trying to encourage anyone to actually drink lighter fuel or antifreeze. The names are just a light-hearted reference to a well-loved classic and I think people will appreciate that.”
Eden Brewery, one of Cumbria’s newest independent breweries, was founded in October 2011 and production began in March last year.
By Brett Leppard
The “finest wines available to humanity” are conspicuous in their absence – but Richard E. Grant is still remarkably chipper. Sitting in London’s Soho Hotel after a long day promoting his new black comedy, the man who will for some always be Withnail is keen to discuss his new starring role alongside a resurgent Jude Law. To mark the release of Dom Hemingway here he discusses his new GQ fragrance column, working with Lena Dunham and the art of foul language.
GQ: What was key for you in getting the costume right?
Richard E. Grant: Julian Day, the costume designer, and Richard Shepard, the writer/director, were very specific on wanting these tinted Hunter S. Thompson-style glasses. Once those were on my face – and I have a very long head – they said, “Don’t cut your hair”, it’s a mullet hairdo from the Seventies. Then they kitted me out with all this retro Seventies stuff as though my character Dickie Black had had the bloom of his life in the Seventies. I thought, “I’m not going to mess with that, I’m going to stick with that look”. People have asked when they’ve seen the poster or trailer if the movie is set in the Seventies, but because the Dom Hemingway character has been in prison for 12 years, so he’s in a time warp as well. These two fish out of water characters get together in this odd double act of friendship, their look is of another era.
What’s the best bit of style advice you’ve ever received?
Don’t over-coordinate whatever you’re doing and don’t be afraid to just do what you feel is right for yourself. I suppose that Robert Altman, the late great director I worked with three times said, “You have to trust your instincts and finally do what is right for you, otherwise you will try and copy other people and that way madness lies.” Or you’ll be a fashionista, cloned victim of your own doing.
As a true connoisseur of swearing on screen, what’s the key to delivering profanity successfully?
The best swearer that I’ve ever learned from, apart from late father, is Bruce Robinson – who wrote and directed How to Get Ahead in Advertising and Withnail & I. He swears with such conviction and ingenuity that you can’t help but feel that you’re in a sort of poetic zone, in the same what that Dom Hemingway swears with an almost Shakespearean/Steven Berkoff style language which he speaks. You can’t help but be amazed and charmed by it.
As you get quotes shouted out to every day by fans, which Don Hemingway line do you think will get quoted back at you the most?
I’m chasing Jude, who’s stark naked, down an olive grove and I say, “I’m not burying your body out here! I’m too old and I didn’t bring the right shoes.”
You’re writing a fragrance diary for GQ and you’ve got a fragrance coming out next year – what can we expect?
Britishness in a bottle, that’s what it’s going to be. It’s called Jack, and it’s unisex. It’s coming out at Liberty exclusively in April next year.
When were you last star struck?
I’ve just done three episodes of Lena Dunham’s Girls, and she is a multi-talented, multi-hyphenate, extraordinary human being. I was completely gobsmacked to meet her.
Who is your best-dressed British man? Jude perhaps?
I’ll say Jude Law, go on!
Dom Hemingway is out now.
The Brit actors on their darkly funny gangster caper
By Matt Maytum
Dom Hemingway is hitting UK cinemas imminently, and it features a virtually unrecognisable Jude Law as the titular criminal.
Law piled on pounds, grew out some Wolverine-esque mutton-chop sideburns, and wore facial prosthetics to play safecracker Dom. Fresh out of prison after more than a decade at her majesty’s pleasure, the sweary, swaggering Londoner is looking to get even.
Having served his time quietly, he reconnects with his partner-in-crime and best mate Dickie (played by Richard E. Grant), and he travels to the south of France in order to collect the bounty he’s owed for his time. As you might guess, not everything goes quite according to plan…
Law and Grant have cracking double-act chemistry in the movie, and in our video below they talk about the funniest moments in the making of the movie, as well as Law’s ‘liberating’ transformation.
Co-starring Game Of Thrones’ Emilia Clarke as Dom’s estranged daughter, Dom Hemingway opens in UK cinemas on 15 November 2013.
Richard E. Grant's Official
Twitter / X Page.
Richard E. Grant's Official
Instagram Page.
Richard E. Grant's Official
Facebook Page.
