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HEN you have just 10 minutes to talk on the phone with a massively talented actor who has starred in more than 60 films and decided finally to direct one of his own, you can’t really begin by asking how he managed to keep his native Scottish accent while spending much of the past two decades in the US, even if that is the first thing that springs to mind when he says “Hello” in the same exuberant Perthshire voice he had in Trainspotting, the film that made him an international movie star back in 1996.

McGregor is speaking from the UK set of T2, the sequel to Trainspotting, which might explain the ease with which he has slipped back into Scot-speak. Also, it’s part of his charm. Also, it’s how he speaks. In American Pastoral, however, all traces of the