MAD ABOUT THE BOYS

More than a decade has passed since Croupier, a small British film by Mike Hodges and a flop in its native territory, slugged its way onto critics’ polls and became a sleeper hit in the US. All eyes were on the film’s star, a respected 35-year-old English character actor named Clive Owen. It was an immaculate performance; as the amoral titular hero, Owen was charming, dangerous and vulnerable, often simultaneously. American critics went nuts.

At home this Coventry-born RADA graduate was admired for his work in the ITV series The Chancer or going full-frontal in Close My Eyes. But in Hollywood he was an overnight sensation.
In the intervening years he has cemented his unexpected A-list status with show-stealing turns in Children Of Men, Closer, Gosford Park and Inside Man. There have been breakout hits like Sin City and high profile flops such as King Arthur. Owen is, by now, accustomed to the ups and downs.
“There’s no question that it helps an actor along if the film they’re in makes money. No Question, film is commerce,” he tells me. “That said I’d never choose a project based on location or budget or trying to guess what money it will make. I’m a slave to the script. You have to work on projects you can stand over.”
He’s philosophical, yet admits that 2009 was an odd year. For one thing, his beloved Liverpool FC have let him down.
“I’m actually not very happy. I keep wishing there was more tennis or horseracing on so that I can watch sports I like without the pain. Football hurts just at the minute.”
Meanwhile, having landed two quality projects in Tom Twyker’s The International and Tony Gilroy’s Duplicity, both films would underperform at the box office.
“It’s a kick in the teeth sometimes,” he sighs. “I loved Duplicity. I loved the director. I loved the script. I was happy with the finished film. But for whatever reason it just didn’t take off. The bottom line is just because a film is successful it doesn’t mean it’s any good. Think about all the films that made money in the last three or four years. There’s a few gems in there, eh? But Duplicity and The International. Put either in front of me again and tell me the whole scenario and I’ll still say ‘yes’. If I read it and get excited, that’s it. I’m not guided by anything else.”
True to his word, his latest project is a small Australian-based drama for Scott Hicks, the director of Shine. Based on a memoir by Simon Carr, The Boys Are Back charts one widower’s struggle with fatherhood and bereavement.
“I was very taken with the script,” Owen explains. “It was beautifully written and I’d never come across anything else that dealt with grief and loss and parenting from a male perspective. It was very moving without being sentimental or overwrought. It was very precise, always about the details, not big epic scenes.”
In The Boys Are Back, Owen plays sportswriter Joe Warr, a far from hands-on dad who, desperate to please his sons, instigates a ‘Just Say Yes’ policy around the home. The resulting rambunctiousness is not always beneficial.
“When you read the memoir it strikes you as being radical and extreme. But for Simon Carr it was a crash course in bonding. It was a way of forcing the issue. The opening scene – with a 6-year-old kid riding on a car bonnet – tends to split men and women. Women tend to think it’s the most irresponsible, terrifying thing they’ve ever seen. Men tend to watch it like a Top Gear challenge.”
Many of the film’s better moments are derived from seeing the man who should be Bond struggling with simple domestic arrangements.
“Everybody tells me it’s a big departure and it must be,” says the 45-year-old. “Eventually you have to admit that they can’t all be wrong. But I think because I’m a parent and that’s such a huge part of my life, it seemed like an easy transition for me. When I read it I kept thinking I’ve been in lots of these situations. I’ve been dad dealing with a child in a funk. So the only real departure for me was doing scenes with a 6-year-old boy. It’s such a different dynamic than what I’m used to. You have to be loose. We filmed a pillow fight without him noticing. We spent time together. We went on the dodgems. The film rests on whether or not you believe we’re father and son. He needed to feel safe with me.”
How very different from the home life of the real Clive Owen. Following what he describes as a “rough” childhood – country and western singer dad took off early on, leaving the young Owen and four brothers with mum – the actor met his future wife, Sarah-Jane Fenton, when they played Romeo and Juliet at the Old Vic. They have been happily married since 1995 and have two daughters, Hannah and Eve.
“I don’t like going away to make movies,” admits Owen. “It’s like when you spend time away, there’s a lot of recalibrating when you get back. As the kids get older it gets harder to go. They ask you, ‘How long you going for, dad?’ and I say ‘12 weeks’. It gets hard to say ‘12 weeks’. There was a time I was going back to back on movies. And it’s not good for the home life, it’s not good for the work, it’s not good for me.”
To that end, he’s taken the past year off, a risky hiatus in such a fickle trade.
“Yes,” he nods. “But I suddenly realised that if I wasn’t careful I was going to come home from a shoot one day and my girls will be heading off to college. I had to make choices about getting the balance right. I dictate my work schedule now, not the other way around. I have this little thing with myself that if I’m off making a movie for three months then I have serious downtime afterwards. Regardless of what offers come in. Next month I’ll start shooting for the first time in a year. Then back to school runs.”
In the meantime, he’s still awaiting word on Sin City 2 (“no idea what the story is”) and a final screenplay for Inside Man 2 (“it is happening but not sure when”). Next up is Trust, a thriller and another dad role.
“It’s a horror story from the real world about a family that are torn apart when their 14-year-old girl is groomed on the internet,” he explains. “It’s a seriously good script. I’m the father, Catherine Keener is the mum. Viola Davis is in it. Todd McCarty is in it. It’s inspired by a real story and really upsetting and unsettling. I’ve been researching with this guy from the FBI about it. This is a terrifying and huge problem, And it’s something I haven’t seen on screen before. My girls normally spend time with me on set. But not sure that’ll be happening this time.”
What happens if they decide to follow in his footsteps?
“It would be pretty hypocritical of me to try and stop my kids going into acting. I’ve had such a great time out of it. I’d hope they’d be doing it for the right reasons; for the work and the craft of acting. Not for showbusiness.”
He laughs.
“Call me old fashioned but I prefer being in good movies!”

The Boys Are Back opens on January 22.