13: Brian Cox: Succession, socialism, and Scotland

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1:48Right, welcome to another episode of The Rest is Politics Leading. I'm on my own. Well, I'm not on my own, but I'm without Rory Stewart, because this is what we call an opportunist capture. because my guest today, I just heard, was in the hood. Oh, you're talking about me? Brian, you can't say who you are until I've said who you are. I'm sorry. So I was around and I thought, I know what I'll do. I'll get him on for a quick chat. He's given the game away. Welcome, Brian Cox. Sorry, I'm sorry, Alison. That's fine, that's fine. Brian Cox, that is, actor. Did he get on your nerves that there's now this other young whippersnapper, Brian Cox?

2:23No, no, I mean, he's a very nice lad. Very nice, chap. He's very, very nice. And we did a Guardian thing together where we sort of exploded the myth of both of us because everybody thinks I'm a physicist and I'm not. Who do you think hates Brexit more, him or you? Because you both hate Brexit quite a lot. No, he must as a university man. Of course, I mean, the universities. I know as a former rector of Duny University, that was the terrible thing about it is all those relationships just went up in smoke. Now, listen, I was sorry to hear about your sister. You've just been back for her funeral.

2:54And of course, you essentially were raised by your sisters, weren't you? I was, you know. I mean, she was always there. I mean, that was the thing about it. She was like, for me, home and safety, you know, both. She was a wonderful person. Funny, funny, funny, funny. And kind of secretive in a way, actually. A lot of people couldn't get her sometimes, but she was, I don't know, she was solid. Because your dad died when you were... Eight, yeah. And your mum was kind of in and out of institutions. Yeah, she tried to commit suicide. And here is a marvellous letter that she wrote. She was a good writer, a letter that she wrote about my dad when my dad passed.

3:35You know, but I think it was too much for her. She sort of predicted everything that was going to happen. And it happened as she predicted. And that kind of broke her in a way. She lost her husband and then he'd given too much away to friends. This was known as a received occupation because he was a grocer. so he made about 28 grand which was a lot of money but I don't know he kind of helped these pals go into building we had years and years trying to get the rights of these buildings that we're supposed to have owned and it was all a mess So he just started giving stuff away to people He was giving stuff away he was very generous I mean he would go off he would he had this shop which was like in this ghetto community of Charles Street and he had this shop and people came in he gave endless credit I mean, I was reading of my book last year, and this man, and he's eight, he stood up and said, I remember your father, what he did for me when I was a nine-year-old, and that was the kind of man he was.

4:34He would go off and decorate an old couple's apartment, you know, after he shopped shut at 10 o 'clock at night. He was that kind of animal, and my mother just worried about it, and she was right to worry, actually. She always used to say to me, just remember, Brian, charity begins at home. and I understood what she meant and it was this balance and of course when he died and he got his bank book and he left 10 pound in the bank that was what it was well I think that that broke her like a twig it snapped her. A doctor today what would they define her illness as? Oh I think she had a complete nervous breakdown I mean the strain of it and also guilt she felt guilty I mean there was she was on at him quite a bit I think in the end she had massive guilt because He died within three weeks of his diagnosis.

5:21He was only 51. I mean, he looked a hell of a lot older, but that's all he was. And it was guilt as much as anything else, which really broke her. And a lot of other stuff as well. And actually, interestingly, she had electric shock treatment, which was very primitive and not very nice. And how important is your Scottishness to you? Very important. It's become more important to me. It wasn't when I was younger. I mean, I was so ambitious. I wasn't even politically minded. That's all happened to me in latter life that I've become so disgusted with the political state of affairs, particularly in, well, the States.

5:54And yes, here, very much so. So I didn't have any of that when I was younger because I was plowing my acting and career furrow, you know. And because I used to think, you know, at the time of the referendum, I kept thinking, why doesn't James McAvoy and David Tennant get on board, you know, for the country? And of course, they didn't because they were like I was all those years ago, you know, pursuing their careers, you know, and it's very difficult being in a way I'm doing this film called Glenrothen, which is about roots. And it's very difficult to know when you come from one country and you move to another country.

6:29I mean, Tony Hopkins suffered from this greatly. You become rationalized or anglified. I mean, I'm an anglifier. I love this country, and I've had a great time here. But I've always been a stranger, and I'm always a sort of non-commissioned officer. This is a thing that I felt very strongly, and it's a thing I've loathed. And it's a sort of class thing. It's a feudal thing that they want to put you in your place, and it's the thing I hate. I hate about this country. About Britain or about England? About the whole thing. You know, I mean, I think we've got less feudal in Scotland. I think the interesting thing is in Scotland and why I'm proud of what's happened and particularly proud of the work that Nicola did.

7:08I mean, because she's an astonishing woman, absolutely astonishing, is that we move from a kind of tribalism to a really form of egalitarianism. That suddenly we were able to, you know, strike out for what we believe. And that was what I came to believe. And unfortunately, it was my disillusion with the Labour Party because, you know, I was a big Labour man for many, many years. And I loved the Labour Party. I believed in it. And I still do. I mean, I really still do fundamentally. But then it came a choice between Labour and my country. And I realized that my country needed something. We needed to do something about it because it's always been the poor relation.

7:45When I consider what we gave, you know, what we've given in terms of, you know, invention, Fleming and penicillin and all the stuff that we've done, that the Scots have done. And, you know, we get a little bit of tokenism about it, but we don't realize what it's come from, from our culture. I'll come back to Labour, but you talked about feudalism. And yet when Hamza Yusuf was sworn in as first minister, he still had to sort of bow down to King Charles. Oh, don't get me started. Well, I am getting you started. And I remember talking to you before the Queen died, and you said, the Queen's an amazing woman, but once she goes, the whole thing goes.

8:25Yeah, I should. I think it's not going to go, is it? No, of course it's not going to go. Of course it's not going to go, because they want that. It's so in the DNA of people that that's where they are. They are, you know, you see it. I mean, the Northwest and the north of England has been so neglected and is so confused. And, you know, when you think of how they all went towards the Tories and now they must be kicking themselves like mad for what they did. Well, I think they will come back. But what it shows is the insecurity that's there, the deep insecurity. And that has to be dealt with. You see, what I'm coming around to believe in now, Alistair, is that really the United Kingdom is just bollocks, total bollocks.

9:10And what we should have, I'm sorry, I do feel that. I really do. But I'm all for an independent Scotland. I really am. I believe that we need that freedom. But at the same time, I do worry about England and Wales. I worry about these islands. And if you look at it, we are all part of a one. You can't just ignore it. You can't pretend it doesn't exist. There is a separation. There should be a separation, but it should be on a federal basis. I think what we need is a united federation. I think we need a separate Scotland, a separate island. We've got to get Ireland together in some way. And I think that's going to happen through just breeding, apart from anything else, and a separate England.

9:48Well, actually, a separate Wales. And in England, this is a radical thought, should be divided in two. What, east and west or north and south? North and south. what about i had a very radical idea brian okay of creating a new country called scotland where you have london and scotland both very very anti-brexit both full of scots yes right right and maybe build a bridge or something well i think i think i love the uh what shall i say the artistic aspiration you could still live here and look i can still live i can look on hamster's heath Yeah, I know. I mean, I love it. London, of course, you see, this is why I've always hoped London should be a city-state anyway.

10:29I mean, because London is where I came to. So hold on, that's perilously close to Singapore on Thames. Oh, well. We don't want that. That's the Brexit vision. We don't want Singapore on Thames to be set. But it's not like the rest of England, London. It's not. I am, you're a wee bit younger than me. In fact, you're quite a bit younger than me. And when I came to London, it was amazing. The time of social mobility was incredible. I left school at 15. I had no educational qualifications whatsoever. I was given a grant. I came here and I studied my craft and it was the best years of my life. And everybody came and I was welcomed.

11:03People were pleased to see me and people of my ilk and people from my class. We were welcome. Now, there's no pathway. There's none. It's gone. Well, unless you went to the Porsche schools and they're all making it very, very nicely. Well, yeah, but that's a pathway. You know, that doesn't help. No, no, that's my point. The arts has become pretty elitist. Exactly, and I think that's not a good thing. I mean, I can't, I'm not going to knock the Cumberbatches and the Eddie Redmaynes and the Dominic West. I understand that that's a background. And of course, those institutions that were built are amazing.

11:32And ironically, they're all ex-actors who teach there. So I can understand that. But the pathway for the working class, for the poorer classes, is just non-existent. You were desperate to be an actor, even as a child, weren't you? Where did that come from, do you think? Well, it came from the sensation I got when I was about three, actually. and my dad used to, well, you're part of Scott, you're nobody, well, you're mainly Scott, aren't you? Well, my blood is, 100%, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So you understand about Hugman A and New Year and how precious that was and the ritual of it and the first footing and the guy comes in with the coal or the whiskey and greets the house, you know, so we used to do that every New Year, every Hugman A.

12:11Our wee flat used to be full of people, in fact, so full that me and my brother, who slept in the kitchen alcove, we had to move out, so I don't know where my brother went, but I went to my mum and dad's wee bedroom and my sisters, they were, three of them shared a bedroom. Anyway, so I would go there and they woke me up at one o 'clock in the morning and I would come out and my sister, she would sing and everybody would be very happy and then I would come and they would get me to do my turn and I used to do Al Jolson impersonations. Age three. Age three. And I would do that and I would get up there on my, and I didn't even know it was my first stage but it was my, it was the coal bunker which was in the window recess of our apartment and I would sing.

12:51And I just remember the effect on the room. I thought, how is it that people can come to such harmony? I mean, I didn't know what it was, but there was a sort of, you know, kind of hustle, bustle, noisy and all going on. And suddenly the singing provided this focus and this, you know, it's like when you go to the theatre. I suppose, you know, if you believed in churches, that happens the same way. But it's when human beings come together in a kind of, where they're just relaxed and they're open. They're open to something else. They're open to another experience, and they go into another zone. And I just thought, God, that's precious.

13:26And then because I was a show-off, you know, it was just a natural step in because, you know, in my hometown we had 21 movies, so I had the great inspiration of going to every picture house there was. You had 21 cinemas in Dundee? Yeah. How many have you got now? I mean, three, I think, something like that, three or four. And you had theatres? We had the rep, yeah, and we had the palace, the City of Varieties. My dad was to take me to the palace to see a comic called Johnny Victory. You sort of went and bashed in the door and said, I want to be an actor. I was completely adrift scholastically.

13:55I was just, I mean, I did well. I mean, I've still got my report card somewhere. I did well, but I wasn't happy. I was never happy. But there was two teachers, a guy called George Hackett, who was my registrar teacher. And there was a guy called Bill Dewar. And Bill was a, you know, he sang an amateur opera and stuff like that. But he also went to the theatre. And he was the first person who, he set up a little group called The Rep Club. It was the repertory theatre called The Rep Club. And we used to go at four o 'clock to the matinee on a Wednesday. And I only went there like literally three months before I started to work there.

14:29And it was great because it was the first time I saw live actors. I mean, all the actors I'd seen had been of the celluloid variety. And I hadn't really considered the theatre at all. And that was the other thing about the 60s, was the free cinema. I got depressed until I saw, I was 14, and I was at the Plaza Cinema in Dundee, and I saw this film called Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, and there was Albert Finney doing it, and I'm going, it's possible. I mean, because I felt, oh, I'm not American, I can't do any of that stuff, because I wasn't really interested in English movies. I have, you know, I've gone towards the Ealing comedies now subsequently, but at that point, no, I was all American stuff.

15:09but when I saw Albert I just thought this is amazing this was like a miracle this is possible I can she possibly because he we were often mistaken for one another when I was younger and I just thought wow this is the best and then eventually I got to work with him and he was just one of those truly great individuals we'll come back to politics but let's just talk about succession for a little while were you surprised at just what a big success it's been well it's gone way beyond anything I imagined. I mean, I thought it was going to be a good I mean, I thought it was a good show. I thought it was, you know, but I didn't know if it was going to go well with the American audience.

15:45I didn't think they're going to get the satire, they're going to get the intelligence that's there. I know the British audiences are much more within the thick of it and, sorry, I'm not.

15:58Anyway, won't go there. And Peep Show, you know, that Jesse did and the work that amando and yuchi has done you know which has been really extraordinary and has shifted the paradigm a wee bit you know jesse armstrong used to be a special advisor to a labor mp called doug henderson you're joking yeah many many many many years ago well which what career choice do you think he made do you think he got the right choice in going down the road he went or do you think he should have stayed as a no no he made absolutely the right choice he's so gifted he's got a fantastic team and it's he's the way he works with his team occasionally and we'll get, there's one actor on our show who will start asking questions.

16:33And I go, oh, fuck, stop all that. Just do it. Get on and do it because the work is great. There's no questions to be asked. It's a gift. You're given a gift on a daily basis. What are you doing? You were meant to be killed off in the first series, were you? Well, no, not really. I mean, that was the thing that my manager told me, but actually nothing was decided, really. And when I said that, there was a big, whoa, whoa, whoa, no, no, that's not happening. If I was killed off in the first season, that wouldn't have gone into a second season. It would have been pretty hard, wouldn't it? Yeah, it would have been pretty hard.

17:02So I just thought, no, I mean, it is the gift that keeps on giving, but the other stuff is tough. Do you like Logan Roy? I do, actually. I mean, he is the antithesis of everything I believe in politically. But I think he's a very interesting character as how he's come to that state. You know, and I kind of worked it out that his backstory, you know, Jesse drops little markers throughout. He's very good that way. He just drops these little markers. You know, there's one scene where he gets in the pool and his back's all cut, you know, and we reckon that that's probably from an abuse of an uncle in Canada when he went.

17:36That was the other thing, because for the first series, there was this, when I was asked to do the show, and I suggested to Jesse, I said, you know, he could be Scots, Logan and Jesse, oh, no, no, no, he's got to be American. He's got to be American. He has to be American. And Adam McKay, better known as Mackay, I don't know why they, I think it's, I think it's laziness on Americans' part. Okay, well, Kai? No, let's say Kay. Anyway, Adam McKay, he thought it was a great idea. And Jesse said, no, no, no, he's got to be, he's got to be American. He's got to be American. So I thought, well, okay, I'm American.

18:11And then we started the first episode and, you know, you get the script and finally I got the script. I mean, I'd already filmed a bit and I got the script. It was my birthday and I was born in Quebec. And I thought, oh, I'm in Quebec now and I'm not really doing a Quebec. Well, never mind. I'm doing what I'm doing. so I carried on and then in the ninth episode the ninth episode Peter Friedman who I work with said they've changed your birthplace and I said what do you mean they've changed my birthplace he said yeah you're no longer born in Quebec I said well that has its pluses I said so where am I born he said oh I can't remember he said no hang on let me look and he got his device he said oh yeah somewhere called Dundee Scotland and I said that's where I was born and they said oh that's a coincidence and I said, yeah, it's a hell of a fucking coincidence.

18:56I said, for nine episodes I've been playing this guy and suddenly I'm a Dundonian, you know. And then I went to, and these are writers for you. I mean, oh, God, writers. Anyway, so I went up to Jesse and I said, so, Dundee? Yeah, we thought it'd be a little surprise. That's what he said. I said, it's a hell of a fucking surprise. For nine episodes I'm playing this guy and finally, oh, it's okay, it'll work. It was good for Dundee, though. You went and filmed it there. Oh, it was great for Dundee. Good for V &A. Yeah, we did it all and it was a great episode. because Logan's dealing with Dundee and my dealing...

19:28I mean, I had to take people around Dundee to show them what it was really like rather than what Logan was telling you was all I... But I do understand Logan. I think he's a very misunderstood character. I mean, if you think about it, all he's trying to do is pick a successor for his horrible business. That's all he's trying to do. He's also trying to be powerful, abuse his power, use his power. Well, he does that, but he's been doing that. He doesn't try to do that. He's done it all his life. All his life. I mean, that's second nature to him because that's what he's become. Does he like his kids?

20:00He loves them. That's his problem. Actually, it would be a lot better if he just liked them because liking goes on longer than loving, unless you're in a very loving relationship. But, you know, I mean, no, he loves his children. Oh, Jesse made that very clear to me very early on because I asked that question. I said, does Logan love his children? He said, yes, he loves his children. And that's his Achilles heel. is that he loves those kids and it's those kids. And, you know, I've got an episode coming up where I say, you know, I love you, but you're not serious people.

20:35Is Shiv his favorite? Shiv was his favorite. And now? No, she's lost credibility because she's a blabbermouth and she has no self-control, you know, and she's, no, she's not very nice. The only one that's really, he sees potential and ironically, I think, is Roman. I mean, I think that's the interesting thing. He's the least serious, isn't he? He's the least serious, but actually he's not bad at the business side. He's the one that spotted in season two that the Middle Eastern money was fake. He got that in a one-up. You know, Logan clocked that. So he's always seen the potential of Roman, but he's stunted.

21:13You know, he's a potty mouth. And what about Conor? Because he was like the hapless wannabe politician, wasn't he? Didn't really have it in him. Well, no, I mean, Connor behaves in a very odd way. And he has done since he was a wee boy. Yeah. I think he's very sweet, Connor. He's a very, he's a very, you know, and also he's very, he's been the ignored member of the family. But clearly, at an early age, it was realized that he couldn't really handle that, the nature of the kind of persistent thing that you have to have in that business. Connor couldn't do it. And is Logan a little bit scared of his wife?

21:50I just don't think he can handle relationships at all. I think that's his problem. He doesn't understand intimacy. I mean, I think he's found this young girl, Carrie, who doesn't make the same demands on him to be this or be that or be that or think more of that, which I think has happened to him a lot in his relationships. She accepts him. That's why one of my very favorite scenes is the scene with Colin, my bodyguard. And I say you're my best pal. Yeah, but that's sad. I know it's sad, but at least it's honest. You know, and everybody goes, oh, what is he doing? He's actually saying, look, I think you're my best pal because you're the only one who's constant in my life, who doesn't ask for anything, who's not trying to get something out of me.

22:35Yeah, probably thinks you're a complete knob. Yeah, but he may do, but he doesn't express it. He doesn't think so. No, he never expresses it. He's always grateful, and he's always front and centre in everything he does. Yeah. You know, I mean, it's an interesting kind of dynamic about what he thinks. And I just thought it was wonderful of Jesse to write that scene. He's looking, who's there? And he sits there and he says, you know, you're the best pal. You are. It is sad, but it's also, I can understand why he thinks that because there's no, he doesn't, all he wants is to be paid and that's it.

23:09There's no hidden motivations there. And he can see that. And the same with Kerry. Kerry's the same. The girl's the same. There's no hidden motivation. and that's why he goes this person's worth it this person's considerable this person's considerable because he's surrounded by people who are on the make and it's not healthy it's not healthy and it doesn't help him at all it just deepens him in the mire and kendall kendall is just so i don't know he's a sad sad creature kendall and uh and he's always trying to prove himself he's a very he's very needy you know he was a needy child and he's a needy adult and he's also full of that entitlement he feels it should all come his way he feels that's where it all is and this whole thing about jeremy strong and the method acting is that not just a complete screaming pain in the ass when you're trying to be brian cox well have you ever done that what method acting oh fuck no No, no.

24:07No, let me say, look, the thing is that Jeremy is, you know, he's American. There is a thing in the American culture. A wonderful Polish man who was actually Stanislavski's assistant said it brilliantly, Richard Boleslavski. And he said, you know, the problem about America is it's all about the pursuit of the individual. It is not about companies. It is not about community. It's about the individual. It's the individual at all costs. Does it literally mean that he goes home and he's still Kendall? No, he doesn't go home and he's still Kendall, but he's Kendall in between everything. So he's Kendall constantly on the set, you know.