An Interview with Hugh Grant

Everybody's favourite fop is back on the big screen in 'Music and Lyrics' - we caught up with Hugh to ask him about playing a pop idol, working with Drew Barrymore and becoming a grumpy old man

You have to sing in 'Music and Lyrics'. Wasn't that a nightmare?
The singing thing has been a miracle. It is largely fakery. I couldn't believe how clever computers are now. You can literally bark like a dog and it comes back like Pavarotti.

Has the film allowed you to live out any rock star fantasies?
I have many fantasies. But oddly enough the rock star one is not one of them. I've always been teased by my friends for being something of a freak because I've never been madly into music. 'Puppet on a String', 'Godspell' - when you've said that, you've said about the whole of my record collection. So I've never been a big music person and was therefore shockingly miscast in this film. Drew (Barrymore) on the other hand. I challenge you to ask her a music question she can't answer. I'll give you journalists £50 if you can fool her. (Funnily enough we find one she can't answer and Hugh actually coughs up the £50!)

How difficult was it to transform yourself into an '80s singing star for the pop video?
The real problem, apart from the music, was how to make me look like I was in my mid 20s. And they failed dismally. It was a very expensive team of make-up artists, hair and costume people. And they managed to reduce me from 46 to 45. You see this bunch of mid 20s pop musicians and this tragic middle-aged Parisian prostitute wearing too much rouge and a lot of semi-visible lifting tape.

How did you cope with the dance moves?
I had a brilliant choreographer. He'd put the music on and go, 'OK Hugh, just express yourself'. And half an hour later I'd still be standing there because I had no self to express. Literally there's no dance in me. So for the first time in my career I had to resort to alcohol and had quite a nice day in the end.

Didn't you have to learn how to play the piano for the part?
You can't fake it. I just had to learn it. It's amazing what terror of humiliation will do. You just force yourself to do these things. But weirdly I got to enjoy it. And then I found I couldn't stop playing and I drove the set mad. By that time, the computer flattery had come to make me believe I had a lovely voice as well. By coincidence my teacher at Latymer in Hammersmith was Mrs Lloyd Webber. But I wasted that opportunity horribly.

What were you into in the '80s?
I was sitting there invisibly, in a silent room watching 'Newsnight'. Especially if there was a big disaster. I was living in my brother's house and he had truly shocking taste. There was wall to wall Dire Straits and quite a lot of Gypsy Kings or were they queens? Probably both.

Do you ever get nervous when you're performing?
I dry all the time now. About once every two weeks we'll be doing a perfectly straightforward scene and I'll know something's amiss because one of my armpits starts to sweat like a wolf and my tongue swells to twice its normal size. And I can't remember any lines at all. The make-up guys bring me my brown paper bag which I breathe into because I'm hyper-ventilating.

How easy is it to get the right chemistry with your co-star?
It's total luck really. Very often you do a film and you think this is marvellous chemistry and then the film comes out and everyone says there was zip. Conversely there are times, like this film, when you absolutely loathe your co-star and everyone says that's marvellous chemistry. Before that gets misquoted, I did, of course, love working with Drew(Barrymore).

You've made some grumpy old man comments over the years. What really irritates you?
It would be much quicker to tell you what doesn't irritate me. I don't know what's wrong with me. Literally everything. If I'm making a text message and I have to wait, I'm almost in despair with rage. If there's a very nice elderly person in front of me in the queue at the post office, I want to throw them bodily to the floor. That can't be healthy.

Do you enjoy playing playboys?
I quite like it. That's not the aspect of the part that attracts me. But I remember doing 'Bridget Jones' and finding that women are quite drawn to a character who's that much of a bastard. But then women are very inexplicable.

You seem to prefer acting in comedies...
I feel defensive of comedy. It is very difficult. I've never seen the point of me in a serious film. I mean I'm OK but if you want deep and serious I've always said get a Fiennes brother or someone like that.

Your character in the film takes a while to find Miss Right. Have you finally settled down?
Well I have taken a while to settle down. I can't pretend that I haven't. But my life is very nice now. I'm sorry to be a bore but I don't want to tell you any more than that.

'Music and Lyrics' is released in the UK on 9 February 2007.

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