Scottish actor Alan Cumming

DATE June 8, 2001 ACCOUNT NUMBER N/A
TIME 12:00 Noon-1:00 PM AUDIENCE N/A
NETWORK NPR
PROGRAM Fresh Air

Interview: Author David Sedaris discusses growing up gay, his
family and his latest writing
TERRY GROSS, host:

This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross.

David Sedaris has developed a passionate following for his funny,
autobiographical essays and his terrific readings. Sedaris is now a regular
contributor to the public radio program "This American Life." He's back on
the best-seller list with a new paperback edition of his book "Me Talk Pretty
One Day." Director Wayne Wang is adapting the book into a film with Matthew
Broderick slated to star as Sedaris. "Me Talk Pretty One Day" includes
several pieces about Sedaris' recent move to France, where he's been
struggling to learn the language. The book is dedicated to his father, about
whom David says, `You wouldn't seek him out for advice on a personal problem,
but he'd be the first one you'd call when the dishwasher broke or someone
flushed a hairpiece down your toilet.'

David's father was also a jazz fan, and he encouraged his kids to take music
lessons. Although David's only music ambition was to be a song stylist like
Billie Holiday, he briefly took guitar lessons from a midget named Mr.
Mancini. Here's a reading about that from an interview we recorded last year
when the book was published in hard cover.

Mr. DAVID SEDARIS (Author, "Me Talk Pretty One Day"): (Reading) `My voice
shaking, I told him that I had absolutely no interest in mastering the guitar.
What I really wanted was to sing in the voice of Billie Holiday. Mainly
commercials, but not for banks or car dealerships, because those are usually
choral arrangements. The color ebbed from my teacher's face.'

`I told him I'd been working up an act and could use a little accompaniment.
Did he know the jingle for the new Sara Lee campaign? "You want me to do
what?" He wasn't angry, just confused. I felt certain he was lying when he
denied knowing the tune. Doublemint gum, Ritz crackers, the theme songs for
Alka-Seltzer and Kenmore appliances. He claimed ignorance on all counts.'

`I knew that it was queer to sing in front of someone, but greater than my
discomfort was the hope that he might recognize what I thought of as my great
talent; the one musical trick I was able to pull off. I started in on an a
cappella of the latest Oscar Mayer commercial, hoping he might join in once
his spirit moved him. It looked bad, I knew, but in order to sustain the
proper mood, I needed to disregard his company and sing the way I did at home,
alone in my bedroom, my eyes shut tight and my hands dangling like pointless,
empty gloves.

`I sang that my bologna had a first name. I added that my bologna had a
second name. And concluded with (Singing) Oh, I love to eat it every day, and
if you ask my why I'll say that Oscar Mayer has a way with B-O-L-O-G-N-A.'

`I reached the end of my tune thinking he might take this as an opportunity to
applaud or maybe even apologize for underestimating me. Mild amusement might
have been an appropriate response. But instead he held up his hands as if to
stop an advancing car.'

`"Hey, guy," he said, "you can hold it right there. I'm not into that scene."
A scene? What scene? I thought I was being original. "There were plenty of
screwballs like you back in Atlanta," he said. "But me, I don't swing that
way, you got it? This might be your thing or whatever, but you can definitely
count me out." He reached for his conk shell and stubbed out his cigarette.
"I mean, come on now. For God sakes, kid, pull yourself together."'

`I knew then why I'd never sung in front of anyone, and why I shouldn't have
done it in front of Mr. Mancini. He'd used the word screwball, but I knew
what he really meant. He meant I should have named my guitar Doug or Brian,
or better yet taken up the flute. He meant that if we're defined by our
desires, I was in for a lifetime of trouble.'

GROSS: And that's David Sedaris reading from his new collection "Me Talk
Pretty One Day."

David, you know, I love that story, and I had to have you read it so that you
could do your Billie Holiday thing. You know, reading that made me wonder if
there was a lot you had to hide as a kid because you were gay and it wasn't a
good thing to let people know that.

Mr. SEDARIS: Well, it was pretty much the last thing that you wanted to be
if you were, you know, growing up at that time in North Carolina, or maybe
it's still that way for kids growing up today, is that you just think, `It'll
change tomorrow. I'm just this way today, but tomorrow it will change,' and
then it has to be your secret. What's so funny is, I mean, you look back and,
I mean, you see in family photographs, or--I should have just had the word
`queen' tattooed on my forehead. I wasn't fooling anybody--anybody. You
don't wear your mother's pantyhose and think that your parents are going to
mistake you for a heterosexual. But at that time you think, `Oh, I'm clever'
and that `They'll never know.'

GROSS: So did cover-ups and lying become necessary and commonplace in your
life when you were young?

Mr. SEDARIS: Yes. Oh, yes. I mean, you had to hide what it was that you
were really doing and what you were really thinking. But the thing is in my
family, I probably didn't need to hide it at all. I think that my--because I
wasn't fooling anybody. I don't think that they would have really had any
sort of a problem with it.

GROSS: But the outside world might of.

Mr. SEDARIS: The outside world, yeah. But my mother was kind of those
people--one of those people that if you could buy a kit in how to make your
child a homosexual, she would have bought that kit, because it means your
child's not going to be a juvenile delinquent and that they're going to wind
up, you know, probably, you know, spending some money on your Mother's Day
present and be a good--I mean, if your son is gay, you don't really worry
about him--oh, you certainly don't worry about him, like, marrying a woman who
you're not going to like, but you don't worry about him getting into trouble.

GROSS: One of the stories in your new collection "Me Talk Pretty One Day" is
about your earlier life before you were a writer as a conceptual artist and
performance artist. And I'd like you to read an excerpt of that story.

Mr. SEDARIS: Sure. The story is called Twelve Moments in the Life of the
Artist, and it's split into 12 different chapters, and this is the fifth
chapter.

(Reading) `Five. My sister Gretchen was leaving for the Rhode Island School
of Design just as I was settling back into Raleigh. After a few months in my
parents' basement, I took an apartment near the state university where I
discovered both crystal meth amphetamines and conceptual art. Either one of
these things is dangerous, but in combination they have the potential to
destroy entire civilizations.'

`The moment I took my first burning snootful, I understood this was a drug for
me. Speed eliminates all doubt: Am I smart enough? Will people like me? Do
I really look all right in this plastic jumpsuit? These are questions for
insecure potheads. A speed enthusiast knows that everything he says or does
is brilliant. The upswing is that having eliminated the need for both eating
and sleeping, you have a full 24 hours a day to spread your charm and talent.'

`"For God sakes," my father would say, "it's 2:00 in the morning. What are
you calling for?"' I was calling because the rest of my friends had taken to
unplugging their phones after 10 PM. These were people I'd known in high
school, and it disappointed me to see how little we now had in common. They
were still talking about pen and ink portraits and couldn't understand my
desire to drag a heavy cash register through the forest. I hadn't actually
done it, but it sounded like a good idea to me.'

`These people were all stuck in the past, setting up their booths in the art
fair and thinking themselves successful because they'd sold a silk screen of a
footprint in the sand. It was sad in a way. Here they were struggling to
make art while without the least bit of effort I was living art. My socks
balled up on the hardwood floor made a greater statement than any of their
hookey claptrap with the carefully matted frames and big, curly signatures in
the lower left-hand corners. Didn't they read any of the magazines?'

`The new breed of artists wanted nothing to do with my sister's idea of
beauty. Here were people who made a living pitching tents or lying in a fetal
position before our national monuments. One fellow had made a name for
himself by allowing a friend to shoot him in the shoulder. This was the art
world I'd been dreaming of, where God-given talent was considered an unfair
advantage and a cold-blooded stare merited more praise than the ability to
render human flesh. Everything around me was art, from the stains in my
bathtub to the razor blade and short length of drinking straw I used to ingest
and cut my speed. I was back in the world with a clear head and a keen vision
of just how talented I really was.'

GROSS: David, is there a piece that you did during that period that you could
describe for us?

Mr. SEDARIS: You know, the thing is my performance art was just so vacant and
just so formulaic. Like if I talk about plays that I've done, I can recall
them because the plays had a story. But this was like the worst sort of
performance art because it told no story whatsoever. It was all prop-driven.
It was that sort of thing where you bring out like 15 objects and the audience
just sits there and waits while you go through the rubber boot, and you while
you go through the inflatable shark, and while you go through the aspirin
bottle filled with BBs. And the part of it what made it so horrible was this
notion that it was the audience's job to figure out the meaning. It wasn't
your job. Your job was to just get up there with a sort of slack expression
on your face and, I don't know, cut your hair with garden sheers. That was
all you really needed to do. I did that for a couple of years, and I look
back, and `Gee, I am so embarrassed over some of the things that I did.' And,
of course, I was just as high as I could be the entire time, which convinced
me that what I was doing was actually brilliant.

GROSS: But as embarrassed as you are about the pieces that you did then, I
bet there was something really liberating in a good way about your conceptual
art and performance art periods.

Mr. SEDARIS: No, there was nothing, really. It was just torment, and I just
tortured everybody around me--everybody around me in forcing my family to come
and watch me in these horrible, horrible spectacles. And it wasn't really
until I went to--I had dropped out of college and I was living in Raleigh when
I discovered speed and conceptual art. And then I went back to school when I
was 27, and I was in art school and I would watch people do these
performances, and then I was able to really sort of clearly see, for the first
time, just how unfun it is to sit in the audience. Because it's all just
about you being a performer. You don't really think about people in the
audience. With a play you think about people in the audience and you think,
`Are they going to get this story? Are they going to be bored? Are they
going to walk out?' And you sort of tailor what you're doing to those
concerns. Whereas with the performance art you can just convince yourself
that if people didn't get it, they were stupid. And you would think, `Well,
who wouldn't want to watch me take a nap? Who wouldn't want to see that?'

GROSS: So what was the actual turning point when you decided to give up your
performance art?

Mr. SEDARIS: When I ran out--my drug dealer moved to another state, and I did
not have any speed left, and it was all I could do just to, really, get out of
bed. I'd never--I mean, I've always been fond of drugs, but I had never--I
don't think I'd ever been really hooked on anything before. And you don't
really know you're hooked until you don't get your drugs anymore and then you
go through a withdrawal. And it was, I think, coming through the withdrawal
from that, I thought, `Well, that part of my life is over--it's completely
over--and it's time to try something new.'

GROSS: Is that when you started writing, or were you already writing?

Mr. SEDARIS: I was already writing, and then I just sort of moved into that,
more or less full time--into the writing, rather than into the--well, I went
on to go to art school, but when I was in art school, it was mainly for
painting and for sculpture, and I didn't do any performance art while I was in
school.

GROSS: How much talent did you have, for, say, representational painting and
sculpture?

Mr. SEDARIS: I have no talent whatsoever. No talent whatsoever. If I was a
courtroom sketch artist, it would look like drawings of a five-year-old. All
the characters would have really big heads and they would either smile or
frown. It would be like those drawings that children do after they've been
abused or whatever with the angry mommy or the happy mommy. They would be
drawings like that. I can't draw--no, I can't draw anything.

GROSS: My guest is David Sedaris. His book "Me Talk Pretty One Day" has just
come out in paperback. More after a break. This is FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite of music)

GROSS: My guest is humorist David Sedaris. His book "Me Talk Pretty One Day"
has just come out in paperback.

Why did you want to be an artist if you felt you had so little talent for it?

Mr. SEDARIS: I wanted to be an artist just from when I was young and reading
books and biographies, and I had the idea that you would be an artist and it
would just be very romantic, and you would live in a garret and you would have
a closet full of berets. And it was enough to keep me going until the age of
28, this romantic notion.

GROSS: So what you wanted was the artist's life, maybe more so than the art
itself?

Mr. SEDARIS: I wanted the artist's life, and I wanted to live in a studio
and--filled with naked men, you know, who would be posing for me while I would
chisel them out of marble. And then I saw myself, like, wearing long scarves
and going to museum openings, but I just could never see the work itself.
That was a problem.

GROSS: So when you took writing more seriously and gave up painting and
sculpture and performance art, did you fashion a kind of artist's life for
yourself as a writer? Did you see the possibilities for that?

Mr. SEDARIS: No, strangely, I never did. But with writing, I would just
notice just how--when I was doing artwork--how I could look at something and
walk away from it and just forget it, whereas, there would be certain stories
that I would read that I would be haunted by, and I would read them over and
over and over again until I memorized them. And I just noticed that the words
had power over me, whereas visual art didn't--generally didn't. So, no, I
never--that's not why I got into it. I think I just got into it because
nothing else worked. I tried being an actor; I was horrible. I tried
performance art; I stunk. I tried visual art; I was terrible. I'm just lucky
I found writing before I went through a dance phase.

GROSS: The funny thing is, though, that there is a whole romance around
writing, just as there is a whole romance around the life of the visual
artist, and I'm surprised, kind of, that you didn't hook into that
romanticized vision of the writer.

Mr. SEDARIS: No, I guess because I would--I've always read a lot of
biographies and you always just read about writers wind up--you know, they
wind up being really drunk and calling their friends until their friends don't
answer the phone, like Jean Stafford. She was one of those writers who wound
up just a mess and her last project--she had an idea for a book called
"Cooking for One While Drunk(ph)." So I never thought of a rosy ending...

GROSS: Yeah.

Mr. SEDARIS: ...to a writing life.

GROSS: Uh-huh. Now you say that crystal methamphetamine was your drug of
choice because it was so good at eliminating doubts and make you feeling
really confident and good about yourself and your work. What were some of the
doubts you needed to eliminate that were very inhibiting for you?

Mr. SEDARIS: That I had no talent whatsoever and that what I was doing was
absolutely meaningless and that everybody was laughing at me instead of
admiring me because I came up with these great things that they couldn't
understand. The speed pretty much eliminates any doubt that you would have.
You know, you take it, you look like a million bucks. You're incredibly
bright. I look back at my diary during that time and I would easily write 10
pages a night. It is just awful, just awful. There's not a single sentence
in there worth salvaging. And that's what I wrote down. When I think what
came out of my mouth was probably even worse.

GROSS: When you stopped taking speed, did the old doubts come back, the
doubts that you were suppressing with the speed?

Mr. SEDARIS: Oh, yes, they came back. Oh, they came immediately, only
stronger.

GROSS: Well, how did you deal with those doubts in your writing?

Mr. SEDARIS: With the writing, it's OK--it seems much easier to deal with
those doubts because you can confront them honestly. And, also, you're
telling a story. I don't know. There was something about that whole period
where narrative was bad, narrative was a bad thing. And to tell people a
story was cheap and easy.

GROSS: So...

Mr. SEDARIS: It was just...

GROSS: Like, when you started writing, was there kind of experimental fiction
that was the equivalent of performance art?

Mr. SEDARIS: Yes. But I noticed I never read those things.

GROSS: Right.

Mr. SEDARIS: And I didn't feel any--you know, like sometimes you're young and
you go through a certain phase and you pretend to like these things that you
can't bear. You pretend to like these movies that are just--in fact, are just
a bore, but you think that if you would--if you say that they're boring, then
everyone's gonna think you're stupid. But I noticed that I would never
subject myself to reading things that didn't have the story, that didn't
satisfy me. And I felt OK in saying, `That's not for me.' And so, luckily, I
never went through that phase.

GROSS: So the doubts that came back after you stopped the crystal meth and
started writing, it sounds like those are doubts that you were able to
incorporate into the writing; that you were, in part, writing about the doubts
so you could describe them instead of suppressing them?

Mr. SEDARIS: Yes. And they were very helpful that way. Because, really,
that's basically all I have to talk about is my doubts and deny that, gee, you
just pour Styrofoam pellets into a rubber boot and empty them into a pail and
call it a night.

GROSS: You're living in France. How long have you been there?

Mr. SEDARIS: I've been there for--it's almost two years.

GROSS: And what brought you to France? Why did you leave New York?

Mr. SEDARIS: Smoking. You can smoke wherever you want to in France, and it's
heaven that way. All those European countries, they should just represent
them on maps with big ashtrays. I recorded a book on tape in New York--my
last book--I recorded it on tape here and you had to leave the building. You
had to go down eight floors in order to have a cigarette. And I recorded the
new book on tape in Paris and there were two standing ashtrays right in the
recording booth, which was the size of a closet.

GROSS: What's it like for you, who is so verbal and so defined by your
language, to function in a country where you can't do what most defines you,
which is speak? I mean, I think your French is probably still fairly
rudimentary. And so it's hard, I'm sure, for you to communicate with a lot of
the people there.

Mr. SEDARIS: That's what--that's my incentive, though, to learn. Because,
you know, it drives me crazy to sit there and have to keep my mouth shut;
drives me absolutely out of my mind. So that's been my biggest incentive to
learn. But it's hard. We'll go to dinner sometimes and Hugh--he speaks
French perfectly and he's got a lot of French friends, and we'll go to dinner
at their house. And at one end of the table, everybody is laughing and
engaging in sparkling conservation, and I just see the guests at my end of the
table saying, `I had to sit next to him the last time.' And everyone on the
other side of the table, they're having a ball. And on my end of the table,
it's me saying, `I saw a rabbit in the road yesterday and he was happy.'
That's what I have to bring to the table.

I talk like Yoda, basically. Now my verbs are--I'm getting my verbs down and
that makes it a lot easier because you can't--some exhaust people a little bit
less than I did before. I just try to be the most cheerful person in the
country, that's how I go about it.

GROSS: David Sedaris, I want to thank you so much for talking with us.

Mr. SEDARIS: Thank you.

GROSS: David Sedaris recorded last year. His book "Me Talk Pretty One Day"
has just come out in paperback. The book is being adapted into a film by
director Wayne Wang. I'm Terry Gross and this is FRESH AIR.

(Credits)

GROSS: Coming up, actor Alan Cumming. He co-wrote and co-directed the new
film "The Anniversary Party" with his co-star Jennifer Jason Leigh. And Henry
Sheehan reviews the new film "Swordfish" starring John Travolta.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Interview: Alan Cumming discusses his new film "Urbania," and
past performances in the musicals "Cabaret" and "Annie"
TERRY GROSS, host:

This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross.

Even when he's in a small role, I find it impossible to take my eyes off Alan
Cumming when he's on the screen. He's not handsome in the typical pumped-up,
movie-star kind of way. But he has a very expressive face that can be goofy
or menacing, attractive or geeky. In the film "Eyes Wide Shut," he stole the
scene as a hotel clerk flirting with Tom Cruise. In the Bond film
"GoldenEye," he was an evil computer nerd. His other films include "Urbania,"
"Get Carter," "Viva Rock Vegas," "Circle of Friends" and "Emma."

Cumming wrote and directed the new film "The Anniversary Party" with his
co-star Jennifer Jason Leigh. Cumming plays a British writer who's moved to
Hollywood where his novel, inspired by his troubled marriage, is being made
into a film. He and his wife Sally, played by Leigh, are throwing a party to
celebrate their sixth anniversary. Here's a scene from the party in which
Cumming is talking to a neighbor he's invited in the hopes of smoothing over a
feud about his and Sally's barking dog.

(Soundbite from "The Anniversary Party")

Mr. ALAN CUMMING: (As Joe Therrian) I see you've moved up from the soft
stuff.

Ms. MINA BADIE: (As Monica Rose) Oh, yeah. You know, Ryan's been sober for
eight years, so it's difficult if I--it's better if I don't.

Mr. CUMMING: Mm-hmm.

Ms. BADIE: I am a little nervous, so...

Mr. CUMMING: Oh?

Ms. BADIE: Yeah, a little out of my element, yeah.

Mr. CUMMING: No, you're not.

Ms. BADIE: Oh, well, yes, yes, in fact, I am, a little on the outside, yeah.
And there's been all of this friction.

Mr. CUMMING: Hmm.

Ms. BADIE: These misunderstandings have a way of escalating.

Mr. CUMMING: Very well put.

Ms. BADIE: You know, I think a lot of this could have been avoided if Sally
had made more of an effort.

Mr. CUMMING: What?

Ms. BADIE: But you're very private people. You know, there's a sort
of--there's a kind of elitism that...

Mr. CUMMING: Elitism?

Ms. BADIE: Wrong word maybe? Delete that. And you know, the dog barks
incessantly.

Mr. CUMMING: No, he really does not.

Ms. BADIE: And Ryan works at home...

Mr. CUMMING: And your phone calls are nasty and abusive and I've come this
close to suing you for harassment, and the only reason you are here is because
we're supposed to be sucking up to you.

GROSS: On screen and stage, Alan Cumming has a very expressive body which he
used to great effect dancing in the Broadway revival of "Cabaret." He played
the emcee, the role originated by Joel Grey. Cumming created a more sexed-up
version of the character and it was a sensation on Broadway. We spoke last
year.

(Soundbite of Alan Cumming singing "Willkommen")

GROSS: That's Alan Cumming in the cast recording of the revival of "Cabaret."
Now this production of "Cabaret" was directed by Sam Mendes, who also directed
the movie "American Beauty." Your version of this character, the emcee, was
much more sexual than the Joel Grey version, which was--he did the original on
Broadway. He did the movie. Whose idea was it to make the character that
sexual?

Mr. ALAN CUMMING: It was kind of a combination. When we did it in London,
first of all, Sam directed it there. And then when we came to New York, Sam
and Rob Marshall directed it together. And so it was--kind of grew in this
journey from London. But really, I remember saying to my--you know, I wasn't
really mad about doing the show at all. I didn't think it was really my bag.
And if I was going to do it, I wanted to do it sort of properly and kind of
like make the character a real person from that time. You know, I was really
fascinated by that time. And I had read ...(unintelligible) books and
everything, and so I knew that there was much more kind of debauched and
decadent--truly decadent than actually has ever really been portrayed.

And so the character in that kind of club, which is, basically, you know, a
sort of glorified sex club, I just felt would have more of a kind of--would
have more of the gutter about him. And, in a way, he's--the club saved him.
If it weren't for the fact that he got this job in the club, he would be, you
know, on the streets and would--or, you know, would be dead by now, so--which
is much more kind of realistic for that time and for that area of Berlin in
that time.

So that's why this whole sort of sex thing came about because I wanted to make
it more realistic. And then, of course, when we started to work on it in both
London and New York--more so in New York, I think, the sort of sexuality and
the kind of mischievousness of the sexuality became part of the whole--his act
to the audience. And so--and then it kind of went from there, really.

GROSS: What did you wear?

Mr. CUMMING: Not very much; a variety of very slinky things. I wore--sort
of the thing that everyone saw and sort of balked at was kind of like
little--if you imagine little trousers that are cut off at the knee and then
kind of big boots and then that was the--that was basically it. And then kind
of--I sort of--it was like, you know, suspenders that men wear on their
trousers to hold them up; kind of a selection of those in--kind of around my
crotch and up my back and around my tummy--no, around my chest. But it was
kind of weird to describe, but--and basically a lot of body makeup with track
marks and glitzy nipples and--so, basically, nothing on my body apart from a
pair of trousers and a little bit of suspender, which kind of--there was this
kind of joke about--like I had the Wonderbra for the crotch because of the
suspender thing. It kind of--everything was left--because I had to dance,
everything was kind of lifted up and forwards into a very pleasing, you know,
array downstairs, if you see what I mean.

GROSS: Now did you get a lot of reaction from men and women?

Mr. CUMMING: Yeah, it was pretty across the board. I think it's really
fascinating because a lot of people who weren't, like, your normal sort of fan
or your normal kind of person who would get all wobbly-kneed start--did get
wobbly-kneed because this character was so--sort of kind of got under their
skin and it was so--it was like a little boy thing, in a way. It was like,
you know, you knew--it was like a little devil, a little kind of devil, but
you knew you'd have a great time. And it kind of stirred people up in some
very primal way that they were--they're not used to being stirred up in.

And I also think, you know, that I'm not like, you know, the conventional view
of sexy--of a sexy man is not my--is not me. It's not--of what we're sold and
told to be thought of as sexy is not me, so I think there was something about
that as well. There was kind of, it seems, in a way, more safe and yet at the
same time more dangerous to have some sort of skinny boy who is, you know,
stirring you in your loins in some way. And so people would--you know, it's
really fascinating; I mean, also extremely scary for me, but fascinating that
people would say, `You know, I've never'--like a married man would say, `I've
never had any sexual feelings for a man before, but I was very stirred up by
you and it made me really think weird things.' And then, you know, women who
would say things in front of their husbands. And, you know, it was really
quite extraordinary.

GROSS: Well, how do you respond? Like if a man comes up to you and says,
`I've never felt sexually aroused by a man before, but watching you dance,'
etc. What do you say? `Thank you very much,' and move on to the next fan?
Or...

Mr. CUMMING: Yeah, you sort of go, `Oh, that's lovely. Good for you,' or,
you know, `Maybe you should get out more.' Things like that.

GROSS: Now one of the roles that you brought--I mean, of all things, a role
that you brought this sexually insinuating energy into was "Annie"--the TV
production of "Annie." And there's a great number, "Easy Street." It's a
duet you did with Kathy Bates in this production.

Mr. CUMMING: And Kristin Chenoweth is in it, too.

GROSS: Right. OK.

Mr. CUMMING: It's a trio, yeah.

GROSS: Yes. And you're doing this kind of bump-and-grind thing to this.

Mr. CUMMING: Yeah.

GROSS: Your dancing and singing was terrific in it. So why don't you talk
about this number a little bit, and then we'll hear it.

Mr. CUMMING: Well, this was--Rob Marshall, he choreographed "Cabaret," and
he co-directed it with Sam. He directed this. And I'd never seen "Annie." I
didn't know the story or anything, and so I just did it because of him. I
just thought I would have a good time. I just thought he is great. And
so--and the best thing about him is that he makes you feel confident about
things that you're not actually very good at, which is a great skill as a
director. And Kathy said that--the same thing, you know. I don't think she'd
done a musical before, and I'd never done a musical like this before, like
playing an American person and, you know, doing all that kind of like proper
musical sort of thing.

So this was--and also, there's, like, a 12-page dance break in it, and none of
us--Kristin had danced more than Kathy and I, but it was one of these things
that's actually such fun to do, and I'm so glad I took part in it. And this
song is like when she runs the orphanage, Kathy, and I'm called Rooster, and
my and my girlfriend--I have a skit from prison and we come and we're trying
to sort out some scheme to make money and we realize that Annie could be the
key to this scheme.

GROSS: Let's hear "Easy Street."

Mr. CUMMING: OK.

(Soundbite of "Easy Street")

Mr. CUMMING: (Singing) I remember the way our sainted mother would sit and
croon us a lullaby.

Ms. KATHY BATES: (Singing) She'd say, `Kids, there's a place that's like no
other, you gotta get there before you die.

Mr. CUMMING: (Singing) You don't get there by playing from the rule book.

Ms. BATES: Uh-uh. You stack the aces...

Mr. CUMMING: Mm-hmm. You load the dice.

Ms. BATES and Mr. CUMMING: (Singing) Mother dear, though we know you're down
there listening, how can we follow your sweet advice to...

Mr. CUMMING: (Singing) ...Easy Street? Easy Street, where you sleep till
noon?

Ms. BATES: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Mr. CUMMING: (Singing) She'd repeat, `Easy Street.'

Ms. BATES and Mr. CUMMING: (Singing) Better get there soon.

Mr. CUMMING: So, sis, who was the hot tomato...

GROSS: That's from the TV production of "Annie," my guest is Alan Cumming.
So I found it interesting that you hadn't really sung and danced before
"Cabaret" and "Annie." What did you have to learn in order to pull these
roles off?

Mr. CUMMING: Well, you know, it's kind of--I mean, I'm not a proper singer.
I'm not like a big, proper--well, you know, how you imagine a Broadway, or
that type of singer. I'm not that, and I'm never going to be that. I don't
want to be that. So I actually didn't really--you know, things like breathing
and blah, blah, blah, you have to kind of get better at, and I hadn't actually
done much theater for a while--I'd done a lot of films in between doing
"Cabaret" in London and "Cabaret" in New York. So I had to get in shape
again. But really, it's the same--I just think of it as the same thing. You
know, you're just sort of acting, but you're just like singing--the singing,
in a way, in "Cabaret" was easier, because my character, part of his job in
the role was that he sang songs in a club. So that was fine.

And in "Annie," that was the first time I'd done that thing where you, like,
are talking and then you burst into song, which I've always had a problem
with. But it seemed easier because it was more sort of fun, and the style of
it--I'd go into the sort of height and style of--it's about understanding the
style, and about understanding your role within the thing; basically the same
sort of rules that you would hope you would use for any part, whether you had
to sing or not.

But the dancing was hard. I mean, I hurt myself doing "Annie," actually.

GROSS: What happened?

Mr. CUMMING: Well, there was this bit where we danced on the street and then
I did a thing where I jumped up and down and it was concrete I was jumping up
and down on, and there was a big crane shot, so we had to do a lot of turns,
and I injured my groin, if you must know, but it's better now.

GROSS: This is penance for your role in "Cabaret."

Mr. CUMMING: Yeah, I know. I know. I did all that and didn't get any
injuries, really. But, yeah, there was a lot of--that must be the groin
karma.

GROSS: My guest is Alan Cumming. He and Jennifer Jason Leigh wrote, directed
and star in the new film "The Anniversary Party." More after a break. This
is FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite of music)

GROSS: My guest is actor Alan Cumming.

Now you studied at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. What kind
of roles were you given as a student? What kind of type were you perceived
as?

Mr. CUMMING: Well, it's always weird when you're a student because, you know,
you have to play--you do play grown-up plays that are for people who are like
40 and stuff, and you're like 19. So it's kind of a misconception of--you're
normally misconceived because you're actually, you know, like decades too
young. But I think I was sort of, you know, the young juve sort of person,
and that's not really happened since I've left. I think I was--yeah, I was
thought of as young and spunky and nice. I was a nice boy. That was the sort
of kind of roles I got.

And, actually, when I left drama school, for a while I was--because I looked
very young for my age, and so that, you know, affected the parts I got. And
when I started to do things, like, professionally, I would always be playing
like, you know--on TV shows, like the little boy who's running away from the
police and stuff like that. He was being wrongly done to and getting, you
know, drowned. I was always being drowned for a while. And then I started to
get to play more nasty people. I don't know, something happened to me.

GROSS: Did something happen to you or just...

Mr. CUMMING: I don't know. Must have star--I don't know, but I think--I
mean, there was a sort of transition phase where I'd get these kind of like
baby-face, nasty people. I remember I did this soap opera in Scotland, and I
played like this evil woodcutter for a while. And then--so I was like a nice
boy, ostensibly, but I always had, you know, a heart of darkness.

And then, shortly after that, I started to--I don't know. I suppose it's kind
of--I suppose if you're being told you're a nice boy, you're a little sweet,
cutie boy for so long, you kind of want to bring some other edge to it so that
people--I remember actually thinking--oh, I've not thought about this before,
but I remember thinking, `Oh, I wish I was more interesting. I wish I wasn't
just like--you know, look like such a baby' when I first started acting. And
so maybe I tried to bring other colors into my work so that I wouldn't have to
play boring people all the time.

GROSS: Huh. Well, you know, I think a more contemporary version of that kind
of nice and mean mixture is in the James Bond movie that you did, "GoldenEye,"
because...

Mr. CUMMING: Yeah.

GROSS: ...on the one hand, you're playing like a computer nerd, but you're
pretty evil.

Mr. CUMMING: Yeah, I know. I got people killed and everything, and I'm
involved in this plot to take over the world.

GROSS: Right, right.

Mr. CUMMING: Yeah.

GROSS: But you're not--it's not like you're a physically...

Mr. CUMMING: But I'm nice.

GROSS: ...menacing person.

Mr. CUMMING: Yes. No. No. He, like, wears little shorts, and he's got
specs, and speccy people are never too scary.

GROSS: Well, now I think one of your first breaks was in a Lee jeans
commercial. Is that right?

Mr. CUMMING: I did do a Lee jeans commercial. I went because it was one of
my first breaks, but, sadly, it was a financial break. Yeah, it was when I
was doing a lot of theater in London and I got this bizarre Lee--I can't
remember how it came about, but all of a sudden I was the Lee jeans boy in
America for a while and then did this commercial for them. You know, shot it
in London and never saw it, except someone once sent me a tape of it, and it's
on TV in America. And it was one that I was like the Lee jeans relaxed-fit
boy. So, I mean, I thought it kind of sounds sexy when you're the Lee jeans
bean. When you say you're the relaxed-fit boy, it's like saying you're the
cardigan-wearing Lee jeans boy or the comfy, cozy one that Mom will like.
But, actually, I was. Yeah, I did that. That was funny.

GROSS: How were you posed in it?

Mr. CUMMING: Well, it was a TV commercial, so I was driving in my car; it's
sort of a '50s kind of feel. And there was a girl who was in the house, and
she was, like, struggling to get her tight jeans on. And there was a
mannequin in the car. And I come out, and I've got flowers for her, and I'm
doing my hair in the mirror. And I look up to the window and I see her.
She's bumped into the mannequin trying to put her jeans on, and I think she's,
like, falling on the bed with another boy, and I look at the camera and the
little thing of flowers all kind of deflates and flops. And it's sad.

GROSS: That's funny.

Mr. CUMMING: And, of course, then there's a shot of my bum with the Lee jeans
relaxed fit on. If only she had been like me and worn the relaxed-fit jeans,
we'd still be together.

GROSS: Now you went from Scotland to England and worked on the London stage.

Mr. CUMMING: Yes.

GROSS: Was your Scottish accent considered a problem?

Mr. CUMMING: I think it was, you know. I still find it weird--like today I
was just talking--the Royal Scotch Academy, where I went, has this mentoring
program, and I was just talking to the little student who I am mentoring
today. And he's from Glasgow, and we were talking about accents and stuff,
and he said, `Oh, you haven't lost your accent.' And I went, `Well, I would
hope not because, you know, I think you lose your accent, you lose your
personality.' It's really important for me that I sound like the sum of my
life. Do you know what I mean?

GROSS: Mm-hmm.

Mr. CUMMING: And it's less--and now, obviously, that I get to do films in
America and English accents are funny Irish ones, it's not a problem, but
that's because I'm more well known and people let you. But when I first
started, yeah, it was definitely things--people would ask me to go to
auditions and pretend not to be Scottish because they said, `You know you can
do it.' And I would go, `Yes, I know I can do it, but I won't be me,' in the
meeting, and surely--I mean, I've always thought the most important thing
about any actor is the person. And the more you can let of the person
through, the more successful you are about--and the more interesting you'll be
to people. That is more interesting than technique.

GROSS: Alan Cumming recorded last year. He and Jennifer Jason Leigh wrote,
directed and star in the new film "The Anniversary Party."

Coming up, Henry Sheehan reviews the new movie "Swordfish" starring John
Travolta. This is FRESH AIR.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Review: New film "Swordfish"
TERRY GROSS, host:

The new summer action film "Swordfish" stars John Travolta as a renegade
secret agent out to steal from government bank accounts in order to finance a
personal war against terrorism. Helping him out is a computer hacker played
by Hugh Jackman, who was Wolverine in last summer's "X-Men," and Halle Berry,
who played Storm in "X-Men." Berry appears topless in one "Swordfish" scene,
in what our film critic Henry Sheehan assumes is an attempt to attract a young
male audience. Here's Henry's review.

HENRY SHEEHAN reporting:

For years Hollywood has been claiming, to itself as much as to anyone else,
that it makes the best action movies in the world. This is demonstrably false
and laughably so to anyone who's been watching Hong Kong action movies for the
last 15 years. Now even the broader American public knows just how phony the
claim is after the unbridled commercial success of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden
Dragon," which was only a fair example of Asian expertise.

To prove their dubious point, Hollywood executives invariably point to how
much money these movies make, both in America and abroad. This week's exhibit
A is "Swordfish," the saga of a rogue spy who plans to rob the government of
some secret bank accounts, both through computer trickery and brute force.
This corrupted 007 is played by John Travolta, who seemed to enjoy making a
comeback so much that he's been doing everything in his power to make another
one necessary. Here, as maverick spy Gabriel Shear, he explains the
foundations of his evil plans to hero Stanley Jobson, played by up-and-comer
Hugh Jackman. Once a co-conspirator, Stanley has blanched at the violence of
Gabriel's plan.

(Soundbite from "Swordfish")

Mr. JOHN TRAVOLTA: (As Gabriel Shear) You asked who those men were. I'm
gonna tell you.

Mr. HUGH JACKMAN: (As Stanley Jobson) I don't care about any of this. All I
care about is my daughter.

Mr. TRAVOLTA: I'm talking about your daughter. I'm talking about you and
your daughter and 200 million other Americans who take their freedoms for
granted.

Mr. JACKMAN: I see.

Mr. TRAVOLTA: You don't understand what it takes to protect those freedoms.
That's my job, Stanley.

Mr. JACKMAN: So you and your band of lunatics are really stealing all this
money just to protect little old me.

Mr. TRAVOLTA: That's right, Stanley. Because wars cost money.

Mr. JACKMAN: War? Who are we at war with?

Mr. TRAVOLTA: Anyone who impinges on America's freedom. Someone must bring
their war to them. We've been doing this stuff for years. Our job is to make
terrorism so horrific that it becomes unthinkable to attack Americans.

Mr. JACKMAN: You're not going in over the phone lines. You're going
(unintelligible) bank.

Mr. TRAVOLTA: And you're coming with us. In the end, you'll have done your
small part in ensuring America's way of life. You're a hero, Stan.

SHEEHAN: I don't know. It just strikes me that detailing your plans in a
sing-song rhythm isn't the way to strike fear into the heart of either your
foe or your audience. This cluelessness permeates the entire movie. The
filmmakers, led by Dominic Sena, who like most of the current crop of action
directors is a former commercial and music video director, are so morally
obtuse that they don't even know whom it's OK to kill off. The movie begins
with the bravura special effects scene incorporating many of the stop-motion
computer imaging gimmicks of "The Matrix." But rather than base the scene on
the death of a bad guy or the usual sacrificial good guy second banana, the
filmmakers begin the fireworks by blowing up a terrified hostage, a young
woman who spends her last moments on screen begging and pleading to live. Hot
damn, what a blast.

More grotesquely, for a self-anointed action film, there are only a niggling
few big action scenes in the whole movie. Filmmakers have turned to more and
more extravagantly computerized effects as their ability to stage and edit a
normal action scene is diminished. Remember last summer's "Gone in 60
Seconds"? It featured a car chase that would've been booed off the screen 20
years ago. So Sena and his crew go almost exclusively with optical and
computer tricks. The one natural effect is Halle Berry's topless scene.
Playing Gabriel's girl Friday, she decides to have a talk with Stanley in the
middle of sunbathing.

Anyway, computer gimmickry is expensive, so the filmmakers are forced to limit
how much action they can put on screen. The opening action bit is, in fact, a
flash forward to the climax, which by the time we get to it after endless
servings of Travolta ham, is quickly replayed and then adorned with a
grandiosely awful chase scene.

What's really irksome about all this is the implication that the action
audience is so docile and dumb that they'll pay up to see trash like this no
matter how much it stinks. Action fans of the world, unite. Stay home and
rent a good Hong Kong flick like "City on Fire" instead.

GROSS: Henry Sheehan is film critic for the Orange County Register.

(Credits)

GROSS: I'm Terry Gross.
Transcripts are created on a rush deadline, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of Fresh Air interviews and reviews are the audio recordings of each segment.