Crudup takes centre stage

By Keily Oakes
BBC News Online entertainment staff

The acting world of 17th Century England is brought to the big screen in Stage Beauty, the latest film from Iris director Richard Eyre.

Crudup biggest role was in Almost Famous

It brings together some of Britain's most celebrated actors, including Rupert Everett, Tom Wilkinson and Hugh Bonneville.

But Eyre chose two Americans to play the lead roles - Billy Crudup and Claire Danes.

Crudup, best known for his role as a rock star in Almost Famous, admits he was nervous about joining such a distinguished cast of Brits.

"Apart from the fact they are some of my favourite actors and I was an American playing a British character, they were incredibly welcoming and collaborative," said Crudup.

"Richard Eyre has a habit of surrounding himself with really nice, talented people and so I was grateful that he had included me in that lot."

Unlike Danes, 36-year-old Crudup has a wealth of stage experience, regularly appearing on and off-Broadway.

Stage Beauty is based on the play Compleat Female Stage Beauty, which in turn was inspired by the musings of diarist Samuel Pepys.

Real-life romance

It tells the tale of actor Ned Kynaston, who was famed for playing female roles on stage before women were allowed to act.

But when King Charles II decreed that men should no longer dress up as women, Kynaston's career is left in tatters while his dresser Maria becomes a pioneering actress.

I want the things I've been in to reach an enormous audience and for them to share my tastes, but I'm not going to chase the audience Billy Crudup

The film mixes comedy and tragedy with romance.

It was a romance that spilled into real life, as Crudup and Danes reportedly became an item - although both are extremely guarded on the subject.

Although billed as a British film, Crudup is confident US viewers will be similarly captivated.

"I liked it and I'm American," he joked.

He added: "I'm hoping people will have the same reaction to it that I had. I think they too will be surprised and invigorated by the pace and the thrill of this story.

"I think men will relate to this quite well because it is essentially about job stability, it's about someone whose livelihood is taken away from them.

"I think most men at some point in their life confront the anxiety and fears surrounding being the breadwinner."

Rejection

Crudup found it easy to relate to the character of Kynaston and his struggles in the acting profession.

Crudup and Danes are keeping tight-lipped about their relationship

"Every job is your last. It's a hazard you learn very early if you're an actor, that you have to deal with rejection at every stage... and you have to find a way psychologically of coping with that fear without it overwhelming you."

Crudup is known for choosing his roles carefully, even turning down a starring role in Titanic, and has taken steps to ensure financial stability so he does not have to resort to working on films he does not want to do.

He is also manages to keep much of his private life out of the public eye.

"My primary interest was not being a personality.

"My concern as an actor is to act and play the parts that I play, that's what I spend most of my time doing."

His shunning of traditional blockbuster movies has been seen as a deliberate decision to keep out of the spotlight.

Disagreeing, Crudup said: "I think it came about because of the things I refused rather than did.

"Frankly I want the things I've been in to be enormously successful, but people saw it as me running away from being a success.

"I want the things I've been in to reach an enormous audience and for them to share my tastes, but I'm not going to chase the audience."

Stage Beauty is largely set in the theatre, somewhere Crudup feels comfortable and will return to shortly.

"I can usually go a year without doing theatre, but that's about it.

Crudup wears a dress for much of Stage Beauty

"It's part of what I think being an actor is, and so I can't imagine continuing my career without continuing to do theatre.

West End aspirations

"One of magical things about the theatre... is the pressure that you only have that one night to do it for those people and that creates an exciting atmosphere - and once it starts there is no stopping it."

Unsurprisingly, Crudup is keen to join the growing list of US actors who have trod the boards in London's West End.

He had originally planned to bring a production of The Elephant Man to London, but shortly after 11 September attacks funding fell through.

But having made friends with Eyre, who previously ran the National Theatre, and Eyre's successor Sir Trevor Nunn, he hopes one of them will hire him to work in London in the near future.

Stage Beauty opens across the UK on 3 September.