Peter Capaldi: This is the nearest I get to a regular job

Moustache-twiddling villains are the most fun to play, The Ladykillers star Peter Capaldi tells Laura Davis

Liverpool Daily Post, November 2, 2011: archived on Nexus

Peter Capaldi is running. Dashing out of rehearsals. You can imagine him leaping old sofas and dodging the odd mop and bucket until he comes flying out of the church hall with a final cry of "Sorry!" This sort of madcap behaviour is very Ealing comedy, although perhaps less suited to his role in the new stage version of The Ladykillers than to his bumbling crew of security van robbers.

​

Following in the great tradition of Capaldi villains - including unpleasant civil servant John Frobisher, in Torchwood Children of Earth, and the bluemouthed Malcolm, from political satire The Thick of It - he will play Professor Marcus.

The dastardly character was portrayed with sinister charm by Alec Guinness in the 1955 film.

"He thinks he's an evil genius but he might be better described as an evil clown," says the 53-year-old actor, who began his screen career as a much softer character in Bill Forsyth's 1983 film, Local Hero.

"He's a criminal mastermind of a type we don't see much in movies and the theatre any more."

Capaldi loves playing villains, and is apt at twisting his narrow face and lean frame into the pinched physicality of the mean-spirited.

​

The Ladykillers writer, Graham Linehan, has described the actor as having "violence in him" - "Putting him together with a little old lady is a perfect combination," he said in an interview with the Daily Post.

"They're more fun," the Glaswegian says of nasty characters.

"There are more places where you can twiddle your moustache and be evil and nasty and manipulate people and wind people up."

​

And Professor Marcus is a terrifically comic rogue, leading his unfortunate gang in the theft of a stash of bank notes with - as they tend to say in dramatic tones during film trailers - hilarious consequences.

Nantwich-born comedian and actor Ben Miller and The Vicar of Dibley's James Fleet are two of his sidekicks, while twice Olivier Award winner Marcia Warren plays eccentric widow Mrs Louisa Wilberforce, in whose home they seek refuge.

Also on the long list of high-calibre talent associated with the play are its writer Linehan, creator of The IT Crowd and co-creator of Father Ted, and multi-Olivier winning stage designer Sean Foley.

These names helped lure Capaldi. "It was a wonderful cast with a wonderful script, and it's so rare to be in that situation," he says.

​

"I was asked to do a reading of it and it was so hilarious that I thought 'I want to be a part of this'."

He chooses roles by "whether or not I like the part, how well it's written and the quality of the production" but is not always in a position to turn down offers of work.

​

"It depends how poor I am at the time," he laughs.

"I'm like anybody else - you've got to earn a living. I do whatever comes along.

"But obviously you go through more successful periods, which I've been lucky enough to have over the last few years, and you have a bit more choice then. Also, my wife works - that's a very good solution."

​

Having acted in some 40 movies and TV programmes, Capaldi has clearly had no shortage of offers. He is also an Oscar winner - for the short film, Franz Kafka's It's a Wonderful Life, which he wrote and directed.

There is good news for fans of The Thick of It, which Capaldi thinks will have a new series next year, reflecting the country's political changes since the fall of New Labour: "We'll have to see how that falls".

​

But while he is most associated with the screen, he has had plenty of stage experience including in John, Paul, George, Ringo and Bert, and Blood Brothers, both by Liverpool writer Willy Russell.

​

"It's nice to go back to that," says the father-of-one.

"It's a totally different experience because obviously the preparation of it is almost a 24-hour thing and it's the nearest you get to having a regular job.

"Because The Ladykillers is a comedy, it doesn't really come to life until you get it in front of an audience. There's just no other way you can do it - you have to see if they laugh. I know in Liverpool that will happen and they'll also tell us where it's not working."