Spotlight - Peter O'Toole

In Peter O'Toole's new film, Venus, there's a funny scene in which the septuagenarian scrambles around a carpet, looking for a fugitive toenail clipping. It's a long way from traversing the Sahara in search of King Faisal in David Lean's epic Lawrence of Arabia, the film that made his name over forty years ago. In that film we see the chiselled features (literally – by this time he'd had two nose jobs) of a man in his prime. Venus shows a different man, one who has long since come to terms with the loss of his youth. It's a transition few have had the opportunity to portray on screen, and fewer still have portryed it so starkly.

Epitomising the generation of British theatrical actors who rose to fame in the late 50s and early 60s, O'Toole reached a level of celebrity that grew as much from his reputation as his work. Classically trained actors had always equated the two of course, the thinking being that everyone had already seen Hamlet and knew what happened, therfore what people were paying to see was the actor. Such notoriety previously meant constant touring and good notices, but in a world of tabloids and television the new generation hardly needed to try, the wild off-stage antics that had always gone on in theatre suddenly being broadcast to a general public aspiring to a hassle free lifestyle.

O'Toole always obliged without it ever seeming forced. The son of an Irish bookie in England, he learned early the importance of cultural identity, proud to be Irish despite not actually knowing his birthplace for sure (the "family version" is Connemarra, but it could also be Leeds). After being rejected from Dublin's Abbey Theatre Drama School for not speaking Gaelic, a RADA scholarship saw him studying alongside Richard Harris, Albert Finney and Alan Bates. The break of a lifetime as Lawrence sealed his fate, and he enjoyed several great roles afterwards, particularly as a hypnotically psychotic aristocrat in The Ruling Class, and as Henry II in both Becket and The Lion in Winter, all of which added to his tally of seven Oscar nominations.

As his role of "British establishment figure" slowly became reality, Hollywood could only come up with disillusioning typecasting in films like Supergirl and King Ralph. This has meant that most of his decent recent work has been onstage, such as in Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell. He's making a film comeback though, appearing in the Neil Gaiman adaptation Stardust, and biblical tale One Night with the King. Long may his reign continue.


Filmography
Venus (2006) SSS
The Last Emperor (1987) SSSSS
My Favourite Year (1982) SSSS
The Stunt Man (1980) SSSS
The Ruling Class (1972) SSSS
The Lion in Winter (1968) SSSS
Becket (1964) SSSS
Lawrence of Arabia (1962) SSSSS