Liverpool-bred actor Ian Hart settles into the hotel room so easily he seems a part of the furniture, an unassuming young man who doesn't strike you as an ego-driven actor. Rather he seems like a lad who just wants to have some fun. Of course this superficial image is quickly set aside once Hart speaks in his scattershot way. Brimming full of energy and ideas, Hart offers a mixture of intelligence and charm that makes his portrayal of the dense Kieran O'Donnell in Scottish director Aileen Ritchie's feature debut, The Closer You Get even more insightful and funny. Besides this film, Ian Hart has had an extensive film career working with some of Europe's most acclaimed directors including Neil Jordan--The Butcher Boy, Michael Collins and The End of the Affair-as well as Jet Butterworth's Mojo, Michael Radford's B Monkey, Peter Cattaneo's Loved Up, Ken Leach's Land and Freedom, Ian Softley's Backbeat and Michael Wittenbottom's upcoming Phone Call Wonderland. For his role in Nothing Personal, he won the Best Supporting Actor Award at the Venice Film Festival and for Clockwork Mice he was awarded The Evening Standard Film Award for Most Promising Actor.

Q & A

Tell us about The Closer you Get?

I play Kieran O'Donnell, master butcher. Kieran lives in a small community on the West Coast of Ireland in Donegal. He's a happy-go-lucky guy, who works in the store, goes to the pub, drinks till he falls over and goes home--that's his life. Until one day they get the idea, from a conversation in the pub one night, that the one thing missing from their lives is a beautiful woman. They decide to send for mail order brides. That sets them at odds with women in the village once they find out what's going on. It's a conflict of interest between he and the girl who works in the shop. He just takes her for granted. He's known her since he was a kid as someone to make a cup of tea, not to fall in love with.

They're jealous?

Yeah, like anything else you don't want it when you can have it.When you can't have it you know it automatically becomes attractive.

Tell us about your other buddies in this movie.

There's about five or six sitting in the pub one day. I suggest the idea to the other men and it takes to us like a virus. All these guys have been married for about 30 years. They all start dressing up and cleaning their fingernails, things they've never done before. So there's a huge conflict of interest between the women and men in the village.

What was it like getting your hair bleached?

Well Kieran has this idea one Saturday. He goes off with this great plan to make himself standout, so he has his hair bleached blond. It looks insane and everybody else in the village thinks so. His brother and his friends say, "you look stupid" but in his point of view he looks the best because to him he's the cool guy. He thinks he's on the cutting edge, he wears a velvet suit. I mean he's missed the point massively but from his perspective he hasn't.

Tell us about the other actors and the characters they play.

Sean McGinley who plays my brother is an actor I've worked with twice before who I think is a great, strong actor. Pat Short, who plays Arlee, is primarily a comedian and is part of a double act called D'Unbelieveables who are incredibly funny, lovely people. The character of Siobhan is played by a first-time actress, Cathleen Brady. She'd only done two or three plays in the local theater.

What was it like working in a pub a lot of drinking scenes!

Oh, they gave us Coca-Cola with a Guinness top because they didn't want to get us drunk. So after spending a lot of time in a pub you want a pint, a real drink. But if you have too many you won't be able to perform. A couple of times you say to the prop guys (whispers) and they give you half a Guinness. You can't sit in a pub too long, certainly not in Ireland, without somebody wanting to have a drink.

You guys shot in a small town.

We were in Dungloe, a village with maybe a thousand people. The village we shot in was the next one, with 150 people in it. It's on the West Coast of Ireland, in County Donegal, a really strange and beautiful place with amazing beaches. There is a mountain in-land about two miles which is the biggest mountain in Ireland. It's a beautiful part of the world. You don't go there for any other reason than to get away from it all.

What was the director like on this film!

She really understood how actors work which is nice because you'd be surprised how many directors don't really like actors. They have a concept and actors are gray areas because they have a mind of their own. She was very giving to the actors, she allowed them the freedom to offer something up. She would say "this is what I'm thinking. What do you think!" I found that generous. You were working in a butcher shop! That was weird. I did a week's work in a butcher shop. Horrible really. It was good, but the first two days were shaky. This guy's livelihood is his meat and you're about to take a carcass, which he would turn into 14 chops, and you'll make it into two chops, really clumsily. Then he couldn't sell them. I kept thinking, "Ohhh, can I buy them. Can I buy those chops." The first week I must have bought 20 pounds of meat.

What was it like to were the little slick costume?

I used to be frightened to get up in the morning to see what they would give me that day. Hideous, truly hideous clothing, boy. It was right for him, it was not about me. But the costumes really worked well for the characters. The guy who's the farmer is just wearing jeans and a shirt, and he's by far the coolest guy in the thing. Everybody else made an effort to look stupid. I looked most stupid.

What would you say is the theme underlying this story?

It's always what you don't expect. By being obvious it's not. You've taken it for granted; you haven't seen the big picture. It's like anything else, somebody can always surprise you.There are always surprises, something you think you know but you don't. That little piece of knowledge can turn the whole thing around, and the mask is lifted from your eyes. That's what it is like for Kieran, everybody said, "You two would make a great couple ('He had to see it for himself and it is one little thing that clears the picture for him.)

What are you up to next?

The End of the Affair is out now--it's just come out in England. And I got Phone Call Wonderland, which is out now in England. It is coming out the opposite way, opening in the States in a couple of months. I start working with Steven Frears in a couple of weeks. This one's about the fascist movement in Britain between the First and Second World War when there was a huge economic depression. Oswald Mosely was the fascist leader in Great Britain during that period. It is about somebody starting off with no political beliefs, just a working class guy who wants to go to work and he feels let down by the system when he loses his job. He starts feeling the reason we don't have any jobs is because of the blacks, the Irish, the ]ews, anybody. It is that simplistic: understanding of the world which is happening now in Austria. People are naive in the rest of the world to think that fascism has died since the Second World War. When the wall came down, East Germany was celebrating democracy; it's beautiful, east and west united. However people were setting fire to blocks of flats because Turkish people lived there.There's always been a lot of ethnic problems within Europe. When you remove a system like communism, which keeps that in check, and you give people free reign to express their opinions, that is what democracy is all about.

You've done three films with Neil jordan--some have interesting implications.

Neii's a very, very bright man. I'd rather spend time in the company of somebody like that than people who are less able to express themselves or less generous. I like Neil as a person but also find him tremendously kind, you always learn something from those experiences. Most films are made on a wing and a prayer. Most films are a scramble and a mess--the van doesn't work and you're doing makeup in a box. In Neil's films it's different. People are treated alike; the driver is treated just as well as Ralph Fiennes. That creates a very comfortable environment for actors to work in. [ The Butcher Boy] was a completely unique vision, not like anything that was released that year or the year before or the year after. It stands up as a unique, odd film; it really spoke a lot to me. I like the fact that the man has got an idea or two. He wants to have a look inside the head on occasion.

Are there directors or actors you look forward to working with?

I like Ivan Bender but the popular sway of opinion seems to be against the man. I'd like to work with Ken Leach again if I could and I'd also like to work with Neil again. Hopefully I'll work with Neil till the day I die, that would be ideal for me.

What made you become an actor? I didn't have any other outlet. I don't have any particular skills. I'd been floundering. Acting is the only thing I can do. Through a chance meeting, I went to a basic improvisational class for 15-18 years olds and there was no form to it. It was more like a youth therapy group sitting around in a room and mainly improvising whatever we felt. We were given the opportunity that we didn't have anywhere else to express ourselves and that worked really well. It was geared towards producing better people as teenagers. It's a difficult time for everybody and not everybody has a network of support. I was glad to have found that environment. I knew this guy that led me to it and somebody else told me about this play that I auditioned for. I would do an episode of a soap opera and usually get 300 pounds and that would get a week's rental in a theater space. I could then do a play; that's how I existed for a while because there was no way of getting work; there was no work to be had. I kept on going for 12 years and then I got a break when I got a film.

You're from Liverpool so I thought of the Beatles, and Backbeat.

As a kid I wanted to be a pop star, to be in a band; I never wanted to be an actor. I was in a band called We be Minks and I got kicked out because I didn't have musical skills. I can't keep time to save my life. When you're 16 and you form a band with friends regardless of any musical ability, It's just born out of friendship.

Are there books or plays that you want to make into movies?

The Geography of a Horse Dreamer by Sam Sheppard. That has a film in it. Julian Cope, who was in a band called Teardrop Explodes, wrote a book called Head On about Teardrop's first tour of the States. It's about how he got into the band, how the whole scene developed for him, and is also a story about an American girl that he meets when he's on tour. He had a wife back in England. It's a very well written book with great insight into being in a band of that period.

by Roger Wong and Brad Balfour