From our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Charlie bill nighy is here. The british tabloids have dubbed him the thinking womans crumpet. His acting career has spanned several decades in television, film, and theatre. He is currently on broadway alongside Kerry Mulligan in david hares play skylight. He also stars in the second best exotic Marigold Hotel. Here is the trailer for that film. The Marigold Hotel has been going properly for 8 months now. People come and go but there has been a corps of regulars from the beginning. Sonny takes the roll call every morning. A most valuable precaution. To ensure nobody has died in the night. Mrs. Evelyn greenslate . Here. Douglas insley . Yeah. Im here. Mrs. Madge hardcastle . Here. Norman cousins and miss carol park . Both here. Mrs. Murel donnely . Whats left. Ladies, and gentlmen, this is the great guy chambers. Lord have mercy on my ovaries. First time in india . It was pretty much a dream until now. Any other dreams i could help you with . You should marry that girl. I want to. Sometimes it seems to me that the difference between what we want and what we fear is the with width of an eyelash. Im so sorry, were you talking to me . I dont know why i tell you anything. Because im older and wiser. 19 days older. Thats the entire lifespan of a wasp. The second best exotic Marigold Hotel. Charlie i am pleased to have bill nighy back at this table. I was just asking who wrote that line. Bill park. He is a brilliant man. Charlie let me ask about three relationships. The first is michael. What is your relationship with him . Bill when i was young, michael used to creep up behind me in the canteen of the national theatre. He would Say Something so profane that i cannot possibly repeat it. It was encouraging. He would Say Something good. He had seen me in a play and would Say Something good. That would get me through the next 18 months. He was the one i responded to. He was a modern actor, a contemporary actor. Charlie what does that mean . Bill it means he was not, somehow, confined by any of the conventions of performing that we are around all of the time. He was kind of radical in a way. Apart from the fact that he is touched by genius. I know that is the cliche but i feel it to be true. He has thrilled me. When i first saw skylight, i swordfenced all the way home. You know like when you were a kid . It was exactly like that. I was thrilled and i remember feeling obscurely proud to have the same job as those people. I wrote to michael and i said i have never written to anybody. I wrote to David Beckham once. I wrote to michael and i said id now consider you to be the leader of my profession. He wrote back and said Something Like pull yourself together. [laughter] also surrounded by lots of profanity. [laughter] but i am deeply, deeply i admire him but im also deeply fond of him. I recently did a movie with him and because i knew michael would make me laugh every morning and he did. We sat on a beach in the freezing cold and he made me laugh all day long. Charlie didnt he also tell david hare that he ought to get you for the role . Bill i didnt know that at the time but i believe somebody said that. Charlie he said, there is a young guy. Bill he has been instrumental in my career and he has been very encouraging. He is one of the few people who really gets your attention if they Say Something encouraging to you. I do believe he was instrumental in getting me this role the first time around. I had worked with david before. So he was not unaware of me. Charlie my next person is david hare. What is it about the two of you . Bill it is the great good fortune of my career, my association with david hare , which started when i was 30 and i did a Television Film with him. When i read the first thing id ever read by david hare, it kind of rang in me in a way great writing or great art often does. It was almost as if it were familiar to me. As if, if you would have given me time, i would have gotten around to saying those things. In terms of its attitude toward the world were things that i was already thinking. The elegance and beauty and wit. He writes the best jokes in town. It was something that was very kind of familiar to me. It was the first time i had read a contemporary script where it really blew me away. That david counted recently and i think it is 10 things we have done together now. I treasure that. Charlie theater, film, and television. Bill yes. I did the dreams of leaving on the television and i went and did a play called the map of the world. I came here to new york many years later in the vertical hour when we first met. I have done skylight twice. I have done four Television Films with him. I also did with anthony hopkins, we did a big comedy. It was the first comedy ever produced at the national theater, rather the first contemporary comedy. David wrote it Howard Brenton and it was a massive hit. It was in the 1980s, i believe. Charlie the third relationship, the relationship with bill nighy. Bill ah. [laughter] yeah, i dont know how that is going. We dont get on terribly well. He doesnt think a great deal of me. Charlie oh, really . Bill especially the morning before i put the kettle on. He has a very low opinion of me. Charlie i sometimes think there are two of you. One is the person who is a rascal, who loves the challenges of light and a person who really does like to be quiet and like to be at home and likes to be alone. Bill the latter part of that is true. I do find it increasingly i find it thrilling to be on my own, to be honest. Charlie i treasure time alone. Bill i do, too. Maybe it is the fact you have a very populated or vessel life. As do i. I go to work with 100 people. Those times would be treasure herbal. There is something i about it, i can control the environment. I dont necessarily have to be at home. I like to walk. Charlie it is doing things you want to do whether it is just things you want to take time to do. To see something, read something. Play something. All of that. Bill absolutely. It has become more and more precious to me. I am very pleased im able to relish it. I feel like it is a function of being younger. You miss stuff. Now, i make a point. You look at the clock and think hey, come on. Charlie do you appreciate all you have now because it did not come early . Bill i think so, yes. I am pretty sure that that is the case. Charlie i think it is true also. Bill i am very vigilant about registering my good fortune each day. The odds on it or long. Were long. When i wake up, i can wake up with a negative head and decode as i am walking towards the kettle. Id code it into positivity. There is so much to be positive about. Charlie lets talk about the movie. It was so successful and everyone was surprised. It was an obvious choice for someone to say we did something right. Lets try it again. Bill it didnt look like box office dynamite. I thought we would make a good film. Once judy became involved, i have worked with her a great deal. If i had to go to work every day with judy, i would be perfectly happy. When she became involved come it became very easy to decide. I have known the cast most of my life. I have been married to penelope, then her doctor. Charlie you mean on the zone . Bill yes. I had letter sex with her. It was hilarious. It was as sitting across a table. Charlie it was all through the mail . Bill it was mostly us try not to look at each other so we wouldnt laugh. It was racy and funny. I have known serial celia since she was 16. I have known tom lukens for 25 years. It was a bit like the traveling supper club of great britain. You could sell tickets just for the stories around the dinner table. Charlie and richard gere. Bill he entered the language very easily. It he is a big india hand. He knew the country and was happy to be there. I would be playing music and he would say, what a great guy. You say, you know john hooker . He says, i am doubt with john a lot. I used to pump him for stories. Charlie what you ever consider being a musician . Bill no. I tried to be in a band when i was 20. We did not get out of bigger roche. We did not get out of the garage. I cannot play anything. I have bad hands. Charlie this movie what is it that makes it successful . Is it just the actors . There is such a good feeling about them . Charlie it is possible that is an element. I think parker is a brilliant man. I think a lot of it should be handed to him. John madden is a fantastic filmmaker. They extrapolated brilliantly from the first one. To give everyone a good story again and to resolve everything, to make it funny and romantic. I dont really know why it would be so successful. There is the fact it offers some alternative do the usual traditional way of looking at old asian movies in old age movies. It is exciting for a certain part of the audience. Charlie there is adventure for these people at their age. This is where you enter. Or and wife arrive in india. Hello, dad. Darling. Hello. Darling. Hello. It was also delightfully lastminute. A bit of a warning would have been nice. He didnt get my text . Laura is giving a speech at an international conference. About the x potential growth of internet startups and the consequences. When she mentioned she would be here, i cannot resist the chance to come out and visit the old crumbling ruins and see how the hotel was doing as well. Charlie you once said to me playing off of great actors makes you up your game. Bill i believe that to be true. If you work with those actors not even consciously but in retrospect, that is how i experience it. They have enabled you to raise your game. Charlie what does it raising your game mean . Focus . Bill those things are included. I guess you are able to operate at a level in sight or intelligence or wit that might be available to you if the people you are working out the set with working the opposite with. They open you up the cause they deliver something which is sophisticated. It is simple or true. It unlocks something and it becomes a proper extent. Charlie you once said this character you played was a man who was longsuffering but acted decently. Bill it is radical. I like the heroism of socalled ordinary people. The people who have decent, from the point of view of headlines, unremarkable but decent lives who are drawn to the idea of doing the next great thing. I like the idea of playing someone who is apparently decent. There is to ambiguity about that. Douglas is pretty straightforward. Charlie the text is how much of what you do on the stage or on a film . Bill off the top of my head 90 . Charlie really . Bill without that, i dont think you can begin. Im interested in the writing and how it is expressed. That more than anything else. Charlie directors essay the casting is 75 of what they do. Bill i believe it. They cast somebody they think is in conjunction with the writing and will give the right merger. Between words. Bill it must be the most difficult part of the job, getting that right, getting it straight. Charlie are you a man of ambition . Bill i have to work out here which is the pr part of my brain. To answer honestly, i suppose yes. Im not interested in anything else either. Just to try to separate. I think probably yeah. In my own way, i am. Charlie doing what you like and doing it well appeals to your psyche. Bill i am not the end on world domination. Charlie you are not an imperialist . Bill i am not. Even when i was younger, my expectations were incredibly low. Charlie why did it change . Bill i dont know it did. Things got good. Things were good for a long time but things got better in terms of charlie i think ambition is a good thing. I think you take acting really seriously. You take the profession seriously. In a sense that you really do want to excel at doing the thing. Not just being the thing. Bill i got interested in acting and i have remained fascinated by it. I am ambitious to do it as well as i can. Charlie and find out how good you can be. That is the great test. Bill i am keen for that. Charlie some actors tell me that they rarely accept a part if it scares them. Bill yeah. When i was younger, i used to drive them down. If they were scary, turn them down. In fact, it was just fun. Then, i got real and started to take jobs that apparently i had invented as out of my range. Thanks started to get better. Charlie what is an example . Bill skylight is an example. I had turned it down three times. It was one of the greatest things i had seen. Traditionally, i would turn it down with my agent and david hare would call me personally and i would say, ok i am coming. Where do you want me . Charlie i thought you would say if david hare called me, i would not take the call. Bill i would take it and he would say what is that about . I say i dont know, where do you want me . Why do i have to be there . That is what happened with skylight. Charlie how would you do it again . Bill i did it this is a question to which i dont out salute we know the answer but i will speculate. I wanted to do a play and there arent many i want to do. I wanted to do it originally in new york. Then it turned out people couldnt do that. I did it in london, which was wonderful. I loved the play with all of my heart. I think it is brilliant. It had not been produced majorly for a long time. David protected it. I love it. Charlie what do you love about it . Bill i love the fact that it is funny in a way i find heartbreaking. I love the way that the broader issues perfectly and invisibly are integrated into this story of two people trying to come to terms with one another on a personal level. I love the fact it is built like a bomb, like a clock. It is beautifully put together so that it unlocks something in the audience so they go away hopefully, full of hope. And about personal relations and about things more universal. I think it is i rare occasion where those things are beautifully integrated. Charlie you didnt want to do it because of michael . Did you see it differently watching a performance by him . Bill it would be different, i guess. It was a long time ago so i cannot really remember. I cannot remember my first performance. I have fond memories of the people involved and a lot of the offstage stuff. I cannot actually recall much about the performance. Im not repressing anything. It is a brandnew production and stephen, who is a brilliant and wonderful man, has really delivered something beautiful. It is one of the most beautiful sets i have ever seen. It is a beautiful package. Charlie how did you say no . Bill everything was attractive. Robert fox, one of my favorite producers. Natasha kline bathed it an intelligent light. Everything about it is beautiful. Charlie you said bathed me an intelligent light. Bill she did it. Carey mulligans is utterly brilliant. I love her with all of my heart. Just to get back out here so everybody is clear. [laughter] roll tape. Used to tell me you had this great thing. You called at your Man Management skills and you still treat people. He is a driver. That is what he does. You know that a driver drives. They spend their lives waiting. That is what they expect. Frank is very well paid. Have you seen the weather . The snow about to come down. Frank is better off sitting in a warm mercedes than he would in your house. This ridiculous selfrighteousness. You always had it. It will not get any better. It will get worse once you decide. It has nothing to do with my teaching. It is a way of respecting people. Frank isnt people. Frank is a man doing a job. These steep adjusters. Nothing to do with what people might want. They want to be treated, respected, not look down on as if they were chronically disabled, as if they needed help all the time. You look down always on the way we did rings come on the way things are done. You could never accept the nature of business. Well, i must say i never knew that was the reason. I am sorry. I never knew that was the reason i had to leave. I feel badly. I thought i left because your wife i discovered i had been sleeping with you for over six years. That as well. [laughter] charlie you want to shoot me now . Bill i want to shoot you now. That is absolutely bizarre. Charlie you looked away because you did not realize. Then you said, i think bill there was one bit where he got a laugh. He was corpsing. It means laughing when you are not supposed to laugh. Charlie when you came back on do you watch yourself . Bill i dont like to risk it. It is a risk assessment. What is that phrase . I feel that, why risk it . I dont watch movies i am in. Charlie never . Bill not if i can help it. I never watch movies on planes anyway because i read on plants. I dont watch myself if i can help it. Why risk it . Charlie why risk it . Bill i dont like the sight of me. I have never fancied it. It is not that so much. You see all the compromises thanks i did not quite pull off. Im not the audience for it. Then come i have to recover from it and go back to work. It is best if i am left in the dark. This ischarlie this is what michael said. The only thing i am jealous of is bill nighy. [laughter] bill well, there you go. What do you know . I spent decades thinking i just want to be michael. Charlie and he is jealous of you. Bill i dont know what that is about. Charlie re comparable with that . Are you comfortable with that . Bill i am. Here is what ben brantley said. I think that was very flattering, dont you . Bill deeply. Charlie are you comfortable at long last . This is like john joseph welsh. Are you comfortable at long last, sir, with the that people love you . Love you. Bill no, you can see i am scoring squirming in the chair. It is against my upbringing. I crave it like everyone house but i guess it just goes against the one man cult i have invented in my head. You can tell im struggling. I love to hear it. Thank you very much. Charlie you have never played shakespeare. Bill not really. Once, i was in the taming of the shrew. I have played twice. I only did the second one because it was david. I think i turned it down and he phoned me personally. [laughter] charlie you said, ok, what do you want . Bill he said Something Like it is made. I said ok. He meant, trust me. He was right. Charlie what does it mean to trust a director or writer . Bill it is a big deal. It takes time, i think. Im very fortunate. I work with you same people over and over again. I am grateful. Even i have to accept they will probably take care of me. Charlie here is another clip from skylight. Take a look. Bill you take a look. Im just going to listen. Misses it. I realized i have to go one step further. I have to really give myself to the children. I have to really let them know who i am. Now, no problems with discipline. I have to say my grades are amazing. I check on the job and i bloody well did it. It sounds like a challenge. [laughter] i have seen the way things are now in this country. For 30 years, i lived in a dream. I dont mean that on kindly. Everything you gave me i treasured but you go out n