Times (UK)
April 1, 1995
By Kate Bassett

Profession: Actor

Age: 24

Where have we heard that name before?
Fiennes was in the West End a year ago with Helen Mirren in A Month in the Country. His Belyaev was judged to have "just the right gangly charm".

Is that it?
Before that, he was lifted out of drama school to play the arrogant Actor in the two-hander hit, The Woman in Black.

lsn't there something else?
He is about to score in his West End hat trick in A View from the Bridge, transferring to the Strand Theatre. Fiennes is the gently lovable Rodolpho who inspires dangerous jealousy.

But that surname?
Oh, all right. Joseph is Ralph Fiennes's brother.

Did Ralph, seven years older, inspire him to act?
"Not as such." He has been acting since primary school. Moreover, far from romanticising an actor's life, he "knew the reality. And I probably didn't want to embarrass Ralph," he adds with light frankness. He went through art school before taking the theatrical plunge. "Really my mother inspired us all. We had a large library, lots of books and paintings," he says, recalling growing up as the youngest child of his photographer father and the novelist-artist mother, Jini.

Just how many Fienneses are there?
He has six siblings including his twin: Jake, a gamekeeper. The rest are in the arts. Magnus has a recording studio. Martha is involved in film direction. Sophie works in production (with Peter Greenaway among others). Roll over the Redgraves. The future is Fiennes Family Films.

Would he like to act with Ralph?
"Well," he says with genuinely startled modesty, "It hadn't crossed my mind."

What parts would he like to play?
"Thousands. With as many dimensions as possible," he says with lively seriousness. "One ideal is to juggle the different media. But employment is a wonderful goal, to pay the rent."

On himself:
"I know more about the characters I play. That's awful, isn't it? I seem to be able to invest more time in dissecting others' thoughts and motivations than in looking at my own. But maybe, in doing that, I can reveal parts of myself."

Sorry to go on about it, but what is it like being Ralph Fiennes's brother?
"It's like being all my brothers' and sisters' brother. He's brilliant."