On the Road ‘We’ve gone on holiday by mistake’

Richard

Is there something you really miss when you’re away?

For the last 38 years, I would say my wife [Joan Washington, who died in 2021, aged 74].

Do you travel light?

My luggage got lost flying to New York 22 years ago, and I swore I would never ever travel with luggage again.

What are your earliest childhood holiday memories?

Mozambique, one hundred miles from Mbabane where I grew up.

We went to the beach there almost every other Sunday and ate two dozen prawns for lunch.

What was Swaziland (now Eswatini) like when you were growing up?

Sub-equatorial Ealing…

It was a kind of homogenously sealed goldfish bowl of a very strict pecking order, according to where you were in the colonial hierarchy.

And that was pre-independence, which I remember very, very clearly. And then sort of vestiges of that carried on post-independence.

It was stuck in a ’50s sensibility. It was White Mischief, with the three Bs: booze, boredom and bonking.

Do you speak Afrikaans?

No, but I speak siSwati. Afrikaans wasn’t taught there because they were so fiercely anti-apartheid. I learnt siSwati in school.

Where does your mother live now?

She’s still there. She’s 92, plays bridge three times a week, thinks that England has gone to the dogs, reads books for a publishing company and writes précis for them, drives and is completely independent.

Did you know Withnail and I might be a hit?

God, no. It had no car chases, no women under the age of 75, no plot and nobody in it anybody had heard of.

When it was released in 1987 with an unpronounceable title, it got middling reviews. With the advent of video in the mid-’80s, and subsequently DVD, it got a student and university following.

It was re-released ten years later and then was a box-office success.

Did you find the script very funny – not least Withnail’s line on travelling, ‘We’ve gone on holiday by mistake’?

I thought it was hilarious – and because I’d been out of work for nine months, it wasn’t a huge leap to play somebody who’s so enraged at being completely anonymous and sidelined.

Was it true about the director making you drink even though you’re allergic to alcohol?

He wanted me to have a chemical memory of what it was like to be drunk. So he gave me a bottle of champagne and said, ‘Go home and get that down you.’

Where is the Cumbria cottage? And Uncle Monty’s flat?

It’s Sleddale Hall, about half an hour south of Penrith. And in Glebe Place in Chelsea.

Did you find it difficult to move on from that character?

That was made in 1986. In 2018, I played another alcoholic in Can You Ever Forgive Me? with Melissa McCarthy.

What was Hollywood like in the late ’80s? I’d obsessively followed the careers of

Francis Ford Coppola, Marin Scorsese and Robert Altman.

To be cast in three films in a row with those directors was beyond anything I could’ve dared imagine.

And the least exotic? Slough [he cackles].

Where did you film Wah-Wah?

In Swaziland, where all the events of my adolescence took place.

Do you prefer theatre or film?

In film, you get paid much better and you have a record of your work.

Whereas, in theatre, it’s ephemeral and, apart from having a programme and a couple of photographs, you have no record of it.

What’s the most incredible hotel you’ve stayed in for your hotel programme? The most expensive was the penthouse suite at the Four Seasons in Manhattan, at $45,000 a night.

The one I loved was the Ballyfin in Ireland, an 18th-century stately pile built for the Beckhams of their day.

How did you find the public’s reactions to your wife’s death?

I’m on social media, and have been astonished by how compassionate people have been.

How are you feeling now?

It’s nearly two years down the line now, and… People say time heals. I think you have to navigate your way around bereavement daily.

What’s your favourite food? Christmas pudding. I eat one every month.

Do you have a go at the local language? I speak Swazi, English – and French entirely in the present tense.

Richard E Grant’s memoir, A Pocketful of Happiness, is just out in paperback (Gallery UK, £9.99)

Across

1 Highlight resistance with worker being shameless (8)

5 Exhausted, take advantage of party (4,2)

9 Lose temper during viral infections and such weather conditions (4,5)

11 Gather popular whistleblower’s back (5)

12 Think I’m not sure it’s 16 or 26 perhaps (6)

13 &27 12’s queen with consort (8)

15 Fouling such a defender could produce such perverse pleasure (13)

18 Translated by soldiers and given a new meaning (13)

22 This may be in coffee as queen takes it (8)

23 Walk for some bread on the way (6)

26 Priest has trouble building in Madrid (5)

27 See 13 (3,6)

28 One’s regular partner is not easily shaken (6)

29 Dr Crippen perhaps losing love for right inmate (8)

Genius crossword 428 el

Down

1 Confront head of medicine and demand protective gear (4,4)

2 Finally docked to get a book of charts (5)

3 Relieved, and looking embarrassed about second prompt (7)

4 Boat builder showing evident lack of surprise? (4)

6 Has it moved American going north for hands-on treatment? (7)

7 Delay degree after vacation and create unrest (9)

8 Opening temporary facility for going loveless (6)

10 People agitating in prison? (8)

14 Three articles on mother’s pet hate (8)

16 Tradition has to include mass retreat (9)

17 Procrastinator’s promise for worshipper? (8)

19 One empty case left covered by fish that’s freezing (3-4)

20 Upsets child’s toys (7)

21 Pinches first of six cloths for cleaning (6)

24 Water may see criminal once stifling answer (5)

25 Moving up, partially cleared out river (4)

How to enter Please scan or otherwise copy this page and email it to comps@theoldie.co.uk. Deadline: 26th July 2023. We do not sell or share your data with third parties.

First prize is The Chambers Dictionary and £25. Two runners-up will receive £15.

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Moron crossword 428

Across

1 Sounds horn (5)

4 Cereal crop (5)

8 Objective (3)

9 Data, gen (11)

10 Spend money extravagantly (4,3)

12 Characteristic (5)

13 Pardon, forgive (6)

14 Deviated, diverse (6)

17 Conflagration (5)

19 Profaneness (7)

21 Vision, resourcefulness

(11)

23 Form of matter (3)

24 Admission, ingress (5)

25 Fencing swords (5)

Down

1 Hearing; tribulation (5)

2 Cancelled; turned (of food) (3)

3 Grave, important (7)

4 Ghost (6)

5 Throw out of accommodation (5)

6 Provisional, speculative (9)

7 Took as your own, fostered (7)

11 Mix well at parties (9)

13 Trade barrier (7)

15 Conciliate, assuage (7)

16 Dismissively (6)

18 Precise (5)

20 Donkey’s years! (5)

22 Form of water (3)

We apologise for the missing clue at 26 down. All otherwise correct solutions have been accepted (left blank/ DEB, DUB, DAB etc)

Moron 426 answers: Across: 1 Weighty, 5 Tout (Wait it out), 7 Topic, 8 Attain, 10 Reap, 11 Bloomers, 13 Entrap, 14 Escape, 17 Eviction, 19 Apes, 21 Devout, 22 Throb, 23 Glad, 24 Repulse. Down: 1 Water level, 2 Implant, 3 Hock, 4 Yearly, 5 Titmouse, 6 Unite, 9 Ostensible, 12 Fast food, 15 Apparel, 16 Doctor, 18 Ideal, 20 Step.

Should you make Four Hearts on best play and defence?