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  before West End previews of the revival of John Osborne's ontroversial 1960s play "A Patriot for Me," which transferred from the Chichester Festival in August,1983, and toured to Los Angeles in October, 1984. JOHN DUNN: John Osborne's play, "A Patriot for Me," controversial from the word go, transfers from Chichester to the Theatre Royal, Haymarket from Monday the 8th of August [1983], and they're previewing from next Monday; it stars as Colonel Alfred Redl my guest this evening, Alan Bates. Good evening, Alan. ALAN BATES: Good evening. JD: It was always a controversial play, wasn't it; and this time there was controversy about it being included...
JD: But what is so shocking... AB: And the audiences, of course, came and really were held by it. It was a terrific experience to do, and they really liked having it there. JD: But what is so shocking about it, Alan? Is it what is said, or what is done, to put it bluntly, on stage? AB: No, I think it's just the subject of espionage and the subject of homosexuality, I suppose, are two things that make people bridle, and wonder what on earth they're going to see. But John confronts these issues completely; it isn't what is seen, nor what is done; there are extraordinary emotional scenes on the stage, and scenes of relationships between men and women, and men and men, and his whole pattern of life, and the excess that his life took in the end. He became completely corrupt -- I don't mean just morally, sexually; I mean in his treachery. JD: It does have the famous drag ball, doesn't it? AB: Yes, it does... JD: That caused even more of a furore at the opening.
JD: So you all dress up in drag, I suppose? AB: Yes -- not Redl; I take someone to this drag ball; and we don't. We are looked down upon because we weren't; everyone else is in drag. JD: It's based on historical fact. There really was a Colonel Redl. AB: This is the fascination of the play to me, and I think, to most people, and the power of it. It's an epic play, and, I think, a complete picture of a whole society, not just one man and his particular problems; but of a whole society, the empire and the corruption of it, and the treachery within it; and the disintegration of it. He is the symbol of that disintegration, really. JD: But what sort of a man is he / was he? AB: He was a brilliant, ambitious young officer. He was determined to be an officer, that was his talent. He went into the army; he was from nowhere, and that mattered a lot in those days. They think that one side of his family was Jewish, but everyone lied about their religion; they lied about their race; they lied about their sexuality. They lied about everything to conform, totally conform. JD: Do we feel sympathetic to him, then, in the play? AB: I think only because... he isn't, in the end, someone you can really like; but he is absolutely the victim of his society. JD: He's not an honourable unfortunate, as he could be, in a position like that?
JD: What happens to him in the end? AB: Well, he's forced to do away with himself. The old code of honour: they were so horrified, because he was their most brilliant espionage man, like Philby. He was the last person who could ever have been thought to be doing what he was doing. JD: Caught him by chance, I think? AB: They caught him in the most extraordinary way, by absolute chance. He went to pick up his money from the Russians, having laid his plans very carefully. He was followed, and he picked up his money, and the people following him just missed him. They just saw the taxi disappearing. By the time they caught up to it he had just got out of it, but he'd left a glove in it. They went back to the hotel and asked the concierge: "would you ask all your guests if anyone lost this glove?" He came in and they said, "it this yours?" And the minute he said "that's mine," he knew he'd made the great mistake.
AB: Yes, I did. JD: Who was Redl then? AB: Maximilian Schell. JD: Ah, yes. Were you impressed? AB: I was impressed with the whole thing. I have very strong images of it. I didn't remember it in detail, and because it was so long ago, I've come to it as a fresh new thing. I'm amazed that it hasn't been done before, and I'm amazed and very glad that no one else has done it, because it's very terrific to do. JD: The Royal Court was really the starting place for you, because, as I was saying earlier, you were in "Look Back in Anger," John Osborne's meteoric play. Were you aware when you were doing that, that you were actually involved in something rather special? AB: Yes. That was the Royal Court's function, in a way. To bring a new force, new thinking, a new provocation, if you like, into the theatre. So that was it's function. "Look Back In Anger" had a very odd beginning, because it opened, and was almost dismissed the following day. It was the two Sunday papers that picked it up and said "this is an absolutely extraordinary new piece of work." JD: You weren't Jimmy Porter, you were Cliff... AB: Mmm... JD: Did it lead directly to lots of other offers? AB: Yes. I've noticed in the last ten years that similar young actors in plays can have that kind of opportunity, and it doesn't necessarily follow them through. In those days it did. If you found yourself in something like that, were lucky enough to do so, then you'd follow through and your career was able to build. It's much more difficult for people today. JD: Was it lots of similar things? You've always tried to avoid typecasting. AB: Yes, I have. I found that happened particularly in television. I did a play called "The Thug," my first play, by Jane Arden, which was a huge success. I was sent a script the next day called "The Brute." [Both laugh.] I said "No, I want something different." That did tend to happen; but I don't think it happens in the theatre.
[Break while Bette Midler sings "Midnight in Memphis."] JD: Bette Midler in a song called "Midnight in Memphis," from a film she starred in called "The Rose," along with my guest this evening, Alan Bates, who played her manager. Did you enjoy making the film? AB: I did love it, yes. It was a world I haven't been in as a performer myself, or even as an onlooker -- really, as any kind of participant at all. But I've always listened to popular music... JD: What was she like to work with? AB: She was very exciting to work with. She'd never attempted really to play a part before. Her great genius is in her one woman show, her songs, her patter, her comedy. She's a great clown, and an extraordinary entertainer. She was quite nervous, but charged with it, and she really gave a rather terrific performance.. JD: It's about, of course, the sort of Janis Joplin syndrome, the pop star that destroys themselves. I know that you're not in the pop world, obviously, but do you understand that feeling, do you get a feeling of how people can destroy themselves? AB: Yes, I do. Not particularly personally; I think we're much more fortunate in our culture than the American one, which drives people to a point that you're not meant to go beyond, unless you're very, very tough. And the music world is an equivalent to that, because it's so quick, so fast, and they're so young when they're thrown into this fame and work and money and wheeler dealing, and people exploiting them all the time. I just think it's bound to drive an awful lot of people to the edge, and a lot of them have to go over it. JD: Did you always want to b e in show business, to be an actor, to be out there in front of an audience, performing? AB: Yes, from quite an early age. JD: You never considered any other ambition? AB: Not really, no. I sort of played with the idea of doing other things. JD: Like what? AB: Well, like gardening, or farming, or teaching, or something; things that for a moment had vague elements that attracted me. But I was never seriously going to do anything else. JD: But from the very early times, did you also anticipate that you would make it? AB: I told myself that from the start; I made myself believe that, yes. I felt that I had to make everyone else believe it, so I made myself believe it first. Obviously you've got to be prepared for things NOT to work, you've got to know somewhere in your head that anything you aim for might not happen. JD: But your career has not followed what one might call a conventional pattern, really, because from the films you made a few years ago, I would have thought that you could make nothing but films, and made yourself an absolute fortune; yet you obviously chose not to. AB: Yes; I'm not objecting to making money, and I don't blame anyone who does get obsessed with it. But I feel that there's a point in there where you forget why you did it, and everything about it, and if you want to go on doing it properly, you have to keep pulling yourself back, and not making that the reason to work. JD: So is the reason to work, for you, that the next part to come along will be as different as you can possibly make it? AB: As different, as good, and as challenging; and to be something I really want to do, rather than just doing it. JD: You can tell that, when you pick up a script? AB: Yes, something comes out of it. Occasionally you read a very good script and though you see nothing wrong with it, you don't want to do it. There's no reason not to do it, in one way, because it's obviously excellent, but there's nothing in it that you respond to, so therefore you really mustn't do it, unless you're desperate for the work.
AB: Well yes, because it's about everything. It's really about almost every experience of life that we have, and he really is terrific to play, and just get up and say, and try to deal with it. I don't think that anyone every quite feels that they've dealt with it. JD: So you'ld like to do it again, would you? AB: Well, yes, I would like to do it again -- of course I would! Maybe the moment's gone to do it again... [Both laugh.] JD: But do you feel that about many parts, when you've finished a play or film...and you go, "oh, I'd like to start this all over again!"
JD: You haven't done many classics, apart from "Hamlet." AB: Over the whole of my acting time I've done about six, I think, Shakespeare, and two Chekhovs. Not enough, actually. JD: Oh, you'd like to do more! AB: Mmm... JD: You're going to be in the West End for a limited time, I think; ten weeks? AB: Yes, there's a possible extension; depends what happens to it. But we're in for ten weeks, yes. JD: When it finishes, "A Patriot for Me," what happens then? Back to films? AB: Possibly, but I don't honestly know. JD: Really. AB: No, I don't like to... I never... I like to NOT know. But sometimes you know -- but actually I don't know. [laughs.] Sounds a b it garbled!
AB: "Separate Tables," which has been shown in America, but its due to be shown here, I don't know when. JD: With Julie Christie. AB: Yes. JD: Anything else?
JD: Another spy! A modern one. AB: Another spy. JD: I'd like to explore the parallels, but we ain't got time. Thank you so very much; it's smashing to see you... AB: All right... JD: ... and I hope that the play goes well in London, as well as it did in Chichester. AB: Thank you very much. JD: Alan Bates, who is in "A Patriot for Me," at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket, opening properly Monday the 8th of August, but starting to preview from next Monday.
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AB: Yes, there certainly was
at the beginning. The Royal Court was turned into a club in order
to get it on at all, and the Lord Chamberlain didn't want it,
and asked for so many scenes to be deleted that it really wouldn't
have been half the play that it is. So there was no question
of anyone conceding to that. But anyway, that doesn't exist anymore.
But it still came up, and was presented as a rather provocative
play. And Patrick Garland, with terrific courage, I think, pushed
it through quite a lot of resistance. Because the stage and the
theatre at Chichester was absolutely born to take it -- was built
to take it -- and it seems so ironic to me that they wouldn't
put on, or at least, there was some resistance to a play that,
in fact, had found its place to be done. But it wasn't carried
through, that resistance, and I sometimes think maybe the press
made more of it than really was.
AB: Yes, it did. That's really
John [Osborne]; he's decided to write a play that deals with
this subject, so he takes it to its most extreme form, [both
laugh] and puts on the stage a marvelous scene, which is very
funny, and very wicked, and very dangerous I hope. We're trying
to get a lot of darkness into that scene; I think we did, in
Chichester.
AB: He's unfortunate. I don't
think he can quite claim to be honourable. [both laugh]
JD: Did you see the original
production in 1965?
JD: Well: Alan Bates is a man
who slides easily from films to television to the stage. Let's
take you back to film. A film that we saw on television the other
night was "The Rose," which you starred in with Bette
Midler. Before we talk about it, let's hear a slice from it.
JD: You did a "Hamlet,"
of course, which was in the West End; did you find that as difficult
as everybody says it is?
AB: What, because you haven't
done it well, or because you've enjoyed it? Because both reasons
can make you want that. You can think, "that was terrible"
and I'd either like to forget it, or to have another go at it.
And there are parts which you relish; like "The Mayor of
Casterbridge" was something I did which I really loved.
I loved that man, and at the end I felt I could just go on playing
him, you know?
JD: But there's quite a lot
coming up from you that we've yet to see. For example, there's
"Separate Tables."
AB: A play by Alan Bennett,
about Guy Burgess, called "An Englishman Abroad," for
the BBC.