Interview

Philip York

by Phil Willmott
15/12/2005

Actor Philip York is about to play the controversial businessman/crook Robert Maxwell in the one-man play "Lies Have Been Told" at the Trafalgar Studios in the West End after a successful run on the fringe. When I spoke to him he was brimming over with enthusiasm for the project and playing the disgraced tycoon.

On November 5th 1991, Robert Maxwell, who had used hundreds of millions of pounds from his companies and their pension funds to prop up his ailing empire, disappeared overboard from his yacht in the Canary Islands. His body was later found floating in the ocean. The official verdict was accidental drowning, but others suggested he had committed suicide or been murdered by secret agents or Russian mafia hit men.

The play by TV writer Rob Beacham asks if Maxwell really was a monster or the victim of racism and snobbery. York promises his Maxwell will try to persuade you of his point of view... "if you can believe a word he says!"

Q: How did this show come about?

A: I was at drama school with Anna Maxwell, Maxwell's daughter; we got on rather well so I got the opportunity to meet her father on a couple of occasions. He made the most extraordinary impression. Of course he was a big fat bastard but when he walked into a room you really noticed. He stuck in my mind as a most extraordinary figure. This was in the days before there was any suspicion of wrong doing, of course.

Q: Was the play your idea?

A: Yes, I was looking around for a subject for a one-man play. I wanted it to be something controversial and wanted a larger then life character to play so Maxwell seemed a good subject although my wife questioned whether anyone would still remember the scandal.

Q: You must have also thought you could look like him - not a nice idea I imagine.

A: People have said I look like him; I hastened to add I'm not a big fat bastard though. I wear a fat suit.

Q: It's unusual for a play to start with an actor rather then a writer.

A: Well, I thought about writing it myself but I've always admired Rob Beachum's work so I was delighted when I was able to interest him in the project. Then once he'd written the piece we had to go through the rather unusual step of having a lawyer check it out in case we could be sued. We actually consulted a lawyer who had worked for Maxwell.

Q: So he checked it to see if you were saying anything libellous about your subject?

A: Actually no, that wasn't a problem because you can't libel the dead. You can say what you like but we needed to be sure that we weren't saying anything defamatory about his children, especially the twins.

Q: Did the lawyer make you cut much?

A: Fortunately not a thing. Most of our source material was already in the public domain - newspaper articles, that sort of thing. I'm anxious to make it clear though, that the show is completely independent of the Maxwell family. Sometimes people think they might have commissioned it but that's not the case.

Q: Have his children been to see it?

A: Oh yes, and his wife Betty. In fact one of Maxwell's sons Philip came up to me at the end and told me he thought we were right in our conclusions about the mysterious death.

Q: So what form does the evening take? Is it a chronological look at Maxwell's life.

A: No we really tried to avoid that approach. Rob and I agreed that we wanted to avoid taking a TV news/documentary approach. I asked him to consider why great people of such promise fuck up, what tips them over the edge.

Q: That's a very epic theme. Quite Jacobean.

A: It's Macbeth, isn't it? So basically the show is our take on his point of view. Like he's saying ok I messed up but this is why. Then it's up to the audience to decide whether they believe him or whether they're being conned as he conned so many people.

Q: You've recently been performing the show at the New End Theatre in Hampstead.

A: Yes, until ten days ago, when the people from Trafalgar studios saw it and arranged this transfer but I first performed it in Edinburgh last year and I've been doing one of dates around the country ever since. It's extraordinary the reaction I've got. I've met so many people who knew Maxwell, all over the place and been told so many stories.

Q: He stole a lot of money from his company's pension scheme bringing hardship to a lot of vulnerable people. He must be pretty disliked?

A: That's true but so many people who came into contact with him also admired him, he was a very charismatic figure, he couldn't have got away with it all for so long without enormous charm. A guy called Terry Patterson came to see the show who wrote for one of Maxwell's newspapers as Industrial Editor. I think he could have told me stories all night but in the end I asked him to sum up how he felt about his old boss. He paused for a while then told me "Actually I rather liked him."

Q: The last time West End audiences saw you was in Nick Moran's play about Joe Meek, "Telstar". It was a tremendous piece of writing and acting and it got some wonderful reviews but people just didn't go and see it. Any theories as to why it failed?

A: It really was mystifying. Perhaps it was the title. Maybe not enough people knew what Telstar meant. Since then I've been working with Pam Ferris and Felicity Kendal on an episode of Rosemary and Thyme in which I played a retired Tennis Champion.

Q: How did you get into acting?

A: I was in a School play, playing Macbeth and I really liked the business of pretending to be someone else. After School I worked backstage at the Birmingham Rep Theatre and then went to Central Drama School. My brother's an actor too. And my wife, Jan Waters, has appeared in lots of West End musicals.

Q: How is it living with another actor?

A: We only argue about the important things. We have different tastes and ideas - but that's married life.

Q: And when you go to the theatre what sort of things do you like to see?

A: I love the plays Sam Waters directs at the Orange Tree, He finds so many interesting lost Victorian and Edwardian scripts.

Q: What was the last thing you saw?

A: My daughter got us some tickets to see Mary Poppins. I didn't want to go, I'm not a fan of musicals but I was completely enchanted. When a theatre gets it so right it can be such a joyful and liberating experience. I became a child again.