[names of questioners removed for this transcript]

Q. Pierce Brosnan started off his career in The Long Good Friday. Would you ever like to repay the favour by appearing as a Bond villain?

A. I never met Pierce.  When they shot me, it was the film crew in the back.  And when they shot him, they were in the front.  So they were shot separately.  And all his scenes were shot on my days off, so I never met him.  I'd love to meet him.  And yeah, I'd love to be a Bond villain.  It would be something different.

Q. Whatever happened to that mooted Three Bears project with you, Danny DeVito and Phil Collins?

A. I don't know.  It was Phil's idea in the first place.  I think Jim Hart wrote a script, but Danny said to me, "What are they paying for me for if they're going to dress me up as a bear!" (laughs) There are so many of those things that never take off.  I think we're a bit too old for that now.

Q. Your character in Last Orders, Raysie, is a gambling man.  Are you?

A. No.  It's funny, though.  I've won on poker, I've won card games, I've won horse racing, dog races.  But not because I'm into the knowledge or anything like that.  I'm just lucky.  I've never won really big.  Couple of hundred quid, maybe.

Q. You worked with Michael Winner on Parting Shots.  One word: why?

A. He got mates in.  (laughs)  I said to him, "Keep it short, two days."  I was away when it came out, so I missed all the criticism.  I've never seen the film either.  Meeting Chris Rea was good, though.  He was a lovely fella.  It was the same with Bob Geldof on Pink Floyd The Wall.  Bob and I were going to do a few together, but they never materialized.

Q. On The Cotton Club, you shared scenes with Herman Munster himself, Fred Gwynne.  How was it?

A. When I walked in, in front of 200 New York actors, and Francis said, "This is the guy, Fred Gwynne," I was like, "Jesus, it's Herman Munster!"  And he got up and just went on and on and on forever.  (affects deep voice) "Hi, I'm Fred."  I was like, "I know." (laughs)  We spent eight months stuck in a dressing room together.  It was wonderful.

Q. You've worked with Oliver Stone, Steven Spielberg, Terry Gilliam, Francis Ford Coppola and Robert Zemeckis.  If you had to pick one to work with again, who would it be?

A. All of them!  If I had to pick one... I suppose I'd always go for Terry Gilliam, because he's a mate, you know?  He's sort of a bloke I see quite regularly, and you never know what's going to happen with Terry.

Q. Do you have a favorite cockney rhyming slang phrase?

A. (long pause) I've got a most confusing one.  A guy said to me once, "Bob, I've got some great kettles in the haddock."  I was like, "What are you talking about?"  And he had all these stolen watches in his car.  So how you get kettle from a watch, I never worked out.  Haddock, I figured that out - haddock and bloater, motor.  But the other, I never got.

Q. You've played Mussolini and Churchill.  Any plans for Hitler to complete the set?

A. No, but I am going to play Pope John the 23rd.  I hear we have the same shape: short and fat (laughs).  What's great about doing historical figures is the research.  Any sort of acting job, if it involves a certain period or a certain science, or something like that, you need to know what you're talking about.  You go down with any group of actors and mention any subject, one of them will have done something in it, and they'll know all about it.  So don't get an encyclopedia, get yourself down to the pub with the actors and they'll tell you about anything.

Q. You worked with Spielberg on Hook.  Did it feel like a project going out of control?

A. No, Steven's not one to get out of control.  He knows exactly what he's doing.  Every shot is mapped out carefully and I didn't feel it was out of control.  We were just stuck in the studio with a boat.  That's just the media doing what they always do.

Q. Did Last Orders make you think about your own funeral?

A. I think once you're gone, you're gone.  It's no use worrying about something I'm never going to experience.  The people who have to cope with the memory of it, they should decide.  They can have me stuffed if they like!

Q. Did you get into the role of Nixon's J. Edgar Hoover by wearing frilly undies?

A. I said to Oliver [Stone], "We should do this in pink tutus," and he was like "Do you think so?"  And when we turned up, he had feather boas ready.  I was like, "Oliver, we were joking!"  "Oh, really?  I thought it was a good idea!" (laughs) Imagine me and Brian Bedford (fellow Nixon actor) done up in tutus - we'd have looked the business.

Q. Hi Bob, I don't know if you remember, but I was on a bus in Charing Cross Road once, when the whole upper floor shouted "It's good to talk!" at you.  To your response I just want to say, "The same to you!"

A. Oh yeah, I told them to fuck off!  (laughs)  What got me about that was before I did BT, people used to stop and talk to me, they used to think they knew me.  But as soon as that came out, people didn't talk to me anymore, they just came up to me, said "It's good to talk! (mimes V-sign) and ran away laughing.  Fuckers.  (laughs)  It got really boring.

Q. Did you see the Steve Martin version of Pennies From Heaven?

A. Yes, I did.  They made the same mistake we would have made if we'd had the money.  The thing about the BBC's version is that the fantasies were just as seedy as the reality.  But the fantasies in the film were so amazing you thought, "Well, smoke the pipe mate.  If I were you, I'd just get stoned out of my brains and stay there!" (laughs)

Q. Do you think Harold Shand could have taken Jack Carter?

A. (pause) God knows.  Jack Carter was a henchman, Harold Shand was a boss.  Different things.  One orders and pays for it, the other doesn't and gets paid.

Q. You worked with Daniel Radcliffe on the BBC's David Copperfield.  Did you sense big things for him then?

A. Oh, yeah.  He's very special.  Very funny.  He's an instinctive pro.  Jesus, when I worked with him, he was only 10 or 11, and he was wonderful.  He's getting old, mind.  Might have to retire soon.  (laughs)  I would have loved to be in Harry Potter.  But oh well, we'll see what happens.

Q. Are you insecure about your size?

A. I never knew I was short until I worked with Cher, and it came to the kiss.  They gave me a box to stand on, and I said, "What's that for?"  "You're going to kiss Cher."  I said, "I can kiss her, what's the matter with you?"  They were like, "Bob, I don't know if you've noticed but you are quite a bit shorter.  Especially when she's got her heels on."  "Am I short?  My God!"  I thought of going up to ex-girlfriends and going, "You should have told me!"

Q. Would you ever want to hear the words, "Arise, Sir Robert?"

A. No.  Not for me.  I can't see it happening, it's not really my sort of thing.  For me, it's like a bowler hat.  It looks great on other people, you know?

Q. When filming Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, did Jessica Rabbit ever give you the horn?

A. She wasn't there when I was working, so they said, "Think of the sexiest thing you can think of."  So I was like, "Right."  I was conjuring up all sorts of things, and then when I saw her when the film came out I thought, "God, my imagination is so boring!"  (laughs) What I thought of was nowhere near as good as her.

Q. You read scripts on the toilet.  Ever come close to using them as loo paper?

A. Very close, a few times.  But my loo is too good for them.

Q. You apparently stumbled into your first audition inebriated.  How drunk were you?

A. I wasn't drunk enough to slur my words.  But I was game for a giggle.  I remember it quite well, surprisingly.  I came in and they said, "Have you seen the script?", and I was like, "No."  "Would you like to read it?"  I said, "Yeah."  (mimes reading script)  "Out loud," they said!  "Oh right, cool!"  And I got the part.  I know there are a lot of people who've gone drunk to auditions and they've always got 'em!

Q. Were you impressed by Anatol Yusef's performance as the young Raysie in Last Orders?

A. Yes, I was.  He's got a better arse than me, though.  Even when I was that age.  Nobody ever said to me, "What a wonderful tush you've got."

Q. You played a plumber twice, in Brazil and Super Mario Brothers.  Could you come round to my house and fix my leaky taps?

A. (laughs) I wouldn't advise it.  I was an apprentice plumber once, burnt the boot of the bloke I was with.  I was on a ladder and he was fixing a pipe up in the ceiling.  I got a blowlamp, and set fire to his boot!  That was the end of the trade for me.

Q. You played a serial killer in Felicia's Journey.  Was that disturbing for you?

A. I don't take film characters home with me.  Can you imagine, being in the kitchen with some of the characters I've played?  But on that, I thought I was fine, carrying on and the like, and my wife Linda said to me after two weeks, "Bob, you do realize you're very strange at the moment?" "Am I?" (laughs)

Q. Will we ever see you in EastEnders?  I think you'd make a perfect Mitchell father.

A. I do this for a living.  I'd do what was available.  If I wind up in a rep. company in Grimsby, I wouldn't mind.  I'd go wherever it took me, but you never know (laughs).

Q. You missed out on playing Al Capone in Brian De Palma's The Untouchables.  Were you miffed?

A. No!  He sent me the script and told me to look at Al Capone.  And then I met him and he said, "Well, actually I want De Niro to play Capone."  So I was like, "Well, what am I doing here?"  He said, "It's hard to get an answer out of De Niro, and if he lets me down, will you do it at short notice?"  I said, "Yeah!"  Then I heard De Niro was doing it so I forgot about it.  Then one morning I was having breakfast and opening the post, and I thought, "What's this?"  It was a cheque for $200,000!  It said, "Thanks for your time.  Love, Brian."  And I phoned him up and said, "Brian, if you've got any other films you don't want me to be in, son, I'm with you all the way.  You can count on me!"