The BILL NIGHY Experience

THE OFFICIAL WEBSITE

About guinea pigs and other magic

Editor's note: Not all parts of this interview are to be taken completely serious.

This interview was done by Ulrike, the webmaster, on the phone, July 31, 2009. Thanks for taking your time, Bill.

Q: Bill, it’s the second time you worked with guinea pigs, in Gideons Daughter and in G-Force, and I think you can tell us a little more about the background.

A: This is indeed my second time with guinea pigs. They say never work with children or animals, and I work continuously with both. I remember, the good thing about the guinea pig in Gideon’s Daughter was he actually turned up for shooting. The guinea pigs in G-Force, I assume they stayed in their trailers, because they never came out, and I ended up acting to a green screen. I don’t know what it is about guinea pigs and me, but we seem to get along reasonably well, and I was very happy to be working. The voices of the guinea pigs in G-Force were very illustrously voiced by Sam Rockwell and Penelope Cruz, Nicolas Cage and Tracy Morgan. I was pleased to work with Sam again, cause I worked with him in The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy and I like him enormously and admire him tremendously, and he’s a very nice man. I really didn’t get to meet them too much because I was just hanging out with the human beings. But the human beings are pretty good value, too. Will Arnett and Zach Galifianakis and Kelly Garner were the people I had most dealings with, they were extremely good company and made me laugh all the time.

Q: Would you say the guinea pigs only had those human voice-overs, let’s put it that way, because they can’t speak themselves, which would be the only reason why the world isn’t already dominated by guinea pigs?

A: Yes, I think if guinea pigs could speak, they would probably play a much bigger role in the destiny of the planet, and its quite possible that the roles would be reversed, and we would all live in cages and run on running-wheels and they’d make all the big decisions. I have the suspicion that they’re quite smart, guinea pigs, and I think if they could speak they might do very well. They’re also very escaping from places. I remember when we kept guinea pigs some years ago, they were great escapologists, they seemed to get out of everywhere. They’re pretty slippery creatures.

A message we got from the guinea pigs' secret headquarter.

Could they already rule the world if anybody would understand

what they're trying to say?

Q: I remember that from my guinea pigs. But, lets talk open. You seem to be a friend to the guinea pigs, otherwise they wouldn’t work with you. You already played a rodent, too.

A: I’ve already played a rodent, I played Whitey, is that the one you mean?

Q: Then you even played two rodents, because the one I was thinking of is Dylan.

A: Rabbits aren’t really rodents. They are slightly posher. Yeah, I played Dylan in The Magic Roundabout, I played Whitey, who was an albino ex-laboratory rat, who had brain-damage due to overexposure to hallucinogenic drugs administered during shampoo experiments. So he wasn’t the brightest spark in the pack, but was pretty good looking, I remember, he was quite a handsome rat in my view. I’ve covered the rodent world pretty good, and I was of course also a squid and I’ve recently been a rattle snake as well in an animation directed by Gore Verbinski who directed the Pirates movies. In which Johnny Depp is a lizard, and Harry Dean Stanton and Ned Beatty, the great American actors, we all play reptiles of one sort or the other. So y’know what I mean, I get around the animal kingdom. I’m also quite keen on playing human beings, so I’m gonna work on trying to play some human beings in the near future.

Q: So you’re really doing a good job on playing animals of all kinds.

A: I think that’s a compliment, thank you, yeah. I’m glad somebody noticed .

Q: In the end you said never play with children or animals, and since you can’t play a child for obvious reason you decided to play animals, so you remain the scene stealer.

A: Yeah, it’s probably safer to play an animal than to work with one. If you can’t beat them, join them.

Q: So that brings us back to our topic: Guinea pigs world domination. You can be honest, you do know a little more about that. I think you are a friend to the guinea pigs. Have they promised you a higher state when they achieved world domination? Will you be the king of England or the president of the world then?

A: Oh yes, the guinea pigs have promised me the crown. No disrespect to our present queen, I’ll be allowed to be king, well I don’t know if I’ll be the king of England, cause we already got a queen and a prince, but they will give me a kingdom for being loyal. When they gained world domination, I will be given a small country, probably not England, certainly not Germany, but I will be given my own kingdom and my own crown, and I will be very very happy.

Q: Maybe you’ll even reign Hogwarts?

A: I don’t think so, other people have that covered, but I have been a visitor to hogwarts, where I’ve been playing a wizard which is very cool obviously.

Q: Are you already working on Harry Potter?

A: Yes, I started this week, and its been very nice to join the company, and everybody has welome me very happily. It’s a huge operation and it’s quite strange to join it after they’ve been together for so long. But I know most of the cast, from various throughout my life, so I was proud to join up. I worked with the director David Yates 3 times before, he directed The Girl in the Cafe, State of Play and a thing I did with Jim Broadbent called The Young Visiters. So im very happy to work with David, I like him enormously, he’s a very gifted director, its really been nice.

Q: That really does sound promising. I hope it’ll be a huge success, well I doubt it would’nt be one. You mentioned in an interview that after you’re done with Harry Potter you won’t be playing theatre, but you’ll be doing some independent films.

A: I don’t have plans to be in the theatre, but I’m always on the lookout for a play. It’s two years since I did a play in New York, I find doing plays very hard. I like for everything to be perfect in terms of the play and every other element of the production. Therefore I wait for the ideal conditions, because I find them quite difficult to do. But I hope there will be another play, I always want to do plays, I never want to not do plays. Last year I did two independent British films, one called Wild Target with Emily Blunt and Rupert Grint. And I had also done a thing called Glorious 39 with Stephen Poliakoff who I worked with on Gideons Daughter and The Lost Prince. I also like working with him enormously. And Glorious 39 has been chosen for the world premiere slot at the Toronto Film Festival. It has a great cast. The lead is played by Romola Garai, and the adorable and very talented Juno Temple, she plays my daughter in this, and she played my daughter in Notes on a Scandal, when she was much younger. So she plays my daughter again, wich is very nice. And Eddie Redmayne, a gifted young British actor who plays my son. Julie Christie is in it, Jenny Agutter playing my wife, Charlie Cox who’s another very good young actor. Its a good cast, I haven’t seen it yet, it’s a thriller and people seem to be very excited about it, it’s got that very good opening at the Toronto, which is a very big deal. I’m very excited. I will probably go to the Toronto Film Festival and see it there. I’m also gonna be doing some radio work. I’m doing another Charles Paris series in September for bbc radio 4. Charles Paris mysteries and another couple of things. I’m gonna do Privates Lifes by Noel Coward, so its a good time.

Q: I can tell you that some of your fans will be very enthusiastic about the Charles Paris news, because there are several the Charles Paris fans on BillBoard, and probably somewhere else too.

A: That’s good. This is called ‘’Cast in Order of Disappearance’’, it’ll be a four part series.

Ive been in New York and Los Angeles promoting G-Force, and I hope to go to Tokyo in october for the opening of Astroboy.

Q: Yes, your character is called Dr. Elefun. Is that the small and fat one I’ve seen on the pictures?

A: Small and fat and bald, a miracle. Nicolas Cage is also in it, and Donald Sutherland and Freddie Highmore who plays Astroboy. Its a rather charming one, I think it’ll be a good animation. Astroboy is very very famous in Japan, there are statues to Astroboy and whole stores devoted to Astroboy. I hope to get there for the premiere. This is sort of a western version and they’re taking it to Tokyo for the premiere, which should be a big event. I love going to Tokyo.

Q: You were at premieres before in Tokyo.

A: Yes, I went to the Pirates of The Caribbean premiere, which was insane, where they played Budokan centre, where the Beatles played and the Rolling Stones played, there were 6,000 people mostly dressed as pirates. It was really quite something. And I also went to Tokyo on behalf of the charity Oxfam to kind of lobby the G8 leaders at the summit before. So I’ve been to Tokyo twice and I love it. Beautiful city. It’s quite an extraordinary place, quite lovely, with beautiful parks. It’s an exciting city. And the Japanese are very gracious and welcoming, and I love the way of their courtesy and their elegance, their culture is really beautiful in every department, and the food is incredible.

Q: The Japanese fans seem to be even a little more enthusiastic than the fans in the western world.

A: They certainly made us welcome with Pirates which was magnificent. We had such an event. They built a big ship in the middle of the Budokan and they were all dressed up as pirates and they were all shouting welcome, it was lovely.

Recorded 31-07-09

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