Ralph Brown

Mister Ralph Brown is a British thesp journeyman of some notoriety. A veteran of Star Wars: Episode I (it wasn’t his fault), Wayne’s World, Alien3, Nighty Night, the glorious Modern Toss series and Richard Curtis’s The Boat That Rocked , it’s fair to say the gentleman knows his trade. Maxim joined him in his favourite Brighton pub, the Thomas Kemp, to help test their Guinness tap, talk about his beloved football team and get him to record various juvenile voicemail messages in full Withnail & I character. So what if he fibbed about who rolled that oh-so-special spliff (he later admitted it was actually a bloke whose name he can’t remember from the design department), we’d have done exactly the same thing if it was us…

You’re a big Brighton football fan. Does that mean you get more than your average share of grief during matches?

When we go away, all we get is ‘Does your boyfriend know you’re here!’ It was great though, six or seven years ago at Swindon in the play-offs, when we went one-nil up. Our whole end starting singing ‘One-nil, to the Nancy Boys!’ It was fantastic. The humour of football terraces is a very special thing, and on that day just that one chant made the whole day very special. It was a huge adrenalin rush.

Is football your main passion?

It’s one of them, sure. It can be a beautiful thing, football. I don't know about you, but I don’t like watching the Stoke Citys of this world. Apparently all the top teams are trying to get refs to stop physical contact, and therefore teams like Stoke can’t bully teams like Liverpool. Fuck teams like Stoke, man! The whole self-perpetuating Champions League argument and the notion of ‘We haven’t got the level of players that you've got, so we’re going to kick you and might get a result’ is not the way forward.

What would level the playing field?

Take the games off the telly. If you want to watch football then go and fucking watch it, do you know what I mean? If the telly money vanished, the competition would get more fierce. It’s not gonna happen though.

Withnail & I. What was it about Danny that made him so popular?

I know when I first read Danny that I really, really wanted to play it. It spoke to me. It spoke volumes. The script was so wonderful. It seemed to me to be a character with a huge amount of charisma who didn’t seem to be relating to other people that much. You might come into contact with him and he’d say stuff to you and then just disappear. You got the feeling that whatever you said wouldn’t have affected him that much. Which is kind of weird, but I loved it.

What say did you have in the part?

It was all conducted by Bruce [Robinson]. He was the writer/director. He knew how all of it went. He knew how it sounded, how it looked, how it smelt. He was utterly in command of that film. He lived it so much and he was so passionate about it, you just wanted to please him. If you have a good relationship with the director they can just say anything to you and you’ll do it. That’s the skill of directing. I always say he didn’t really direct us as much as conduct us. He knew every comma, man, every comma. And every inflection. He literally carved it in stone. He has to take all the credit for the love that people give that film because it’s exactly as he wanted it. It really is.

How did you prepare for your audition?

I remember pacing around Kensington Gardens saying, ‘You’re looking very beautiful today, man. You’re looking very beautiful today, man.’  I knew I was going to meet the guys who had written it. If I got that line right, the first line of the character, then I knew I had it. If I got it wrong, it was over.

Because Bruce Robinson had such a clear idea in his head, was it less fun on set than most people would think? 

Not at all. We were pissing ourselves every day when we worked. It wasn’t just us. It was the camera guys, it was everybody. We’d say a line and hear this sniggering coming from behind the camera somewhere. It’s just a funny fucking script. It was a joy to do. It was everyone’s first movie as well. It was Bruce’s first movie, mine, Paul’s [McGann], Richard’s  [E Grant] and so we were all like new kids. We were all like,  ‘Oh, so this is what movies are like!’ And it’s not. That was a bit of a one-off. We were lucky. Lucky, lucky, lucky.

Do you get a lot of people still coming up to you, quoting Withnail lines at you, asking you to say stuff? Does it get on your wick?

Oh no. It doesn’t get on my nerves. Most people aren’t really brave enough to do that. Maybe if I was out and they get drunk, then they do. I always think of it as they ain’t doing it because they think I’m a wanker, they’re doing because they love what I did in a film they love. So for me, I look at it as love. And that’s got to be good.

What’s your favourite line that Danny says in the film?

I really liked what he says right at the end. (Assumes Danny’s laboured, rolling  intonation) ‘The greatest decade in the history of mankind is coming to an end and, as Presuming Ed here has so consistently pointed out, we have failed to paint it black.’ I always took that really literally. It probably comes across as a really hippy, weird line. But for me it’s very much about black liberation, you know. I think Danny would be happy that Barack Obama has been elected.

Was the Camberwell Carrot full of ‘the good shit’?

We had plenty ready and waiting all of which contained some kind of herbal nastiness. Not really my sort of thing. (Winks)

Who rolled the one in the movie?

I did.