Happy Birthday: Gary Oldman

Gary Oldman

Born: March 21, 1958 in New Cross, London, England, UK

[2001, on if he was bothered by not getting an Oscar nomination for The Contender (2000), which many thought he would] I cared, yes. An Oscar would have been nice – it would have got me closer to what I want to do, which is make more films. But I didn’t care for very long. The nominations come and if you’re not on the list you go, “Oh well,” like I’ve done a lot of times before.

[2001, on his gift with accents] I can do a rough approximation of virtually any accent. I’ve always done them; as a kid I used to do the Beatles as a party piece. When I was with the Royal Court Theatre we used to piss around and people would say, “I bet you can’t do Zimbabwe,” so I did it. The accent on The Contender (2000) – Illinois – was the hardest I ever had to do, because there’s no melody to catch on to. Most accents have a music to them, but Illinois is a very flat, unimaginative thing.

[1997, on quitting drinking] I did a lot of stupid things. When you’re drunk, you think you can pull any bird in the room and they’ll just love the idea of it. You also think you can say anything you like to anybody without them taking offense. Actually, you need the sauce to fill whatever hole that’s there in yourself. And, believe it or not, I was always a bit shy and retiring really. Honest. But a lot of the time, I wasn’t partying. I was drinking alone, which is worse, it’s often solitary and desperate. I got to the point where I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. I talked on the phone when it wasn’t plugged in, and I was getting out of bed, crawling across the floor on my hands and knees, vomiting in the shower and blaming it on the shampoo. You name it, I’ve probably been there. And back again.

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