TIPPED FOR GOLDEN GLOBE
in other things, but people worried about me breaking out. Because you can break out to a point where you can never have the make-up on your face again. That would have been a disaster.
“My average day was 18 hours, so that was the fear. But luckily I’ve got skin like old boots!”
There was a plus side to the make-up, he says, adding: “It is oddly liberating. It is like wearing a Halloween costume – and you lose your inhibitions.
“It is like synthetic skin and it moves with you. It was the most relaxed and free I’ve ever been on camera. This role has been a privilege and honour.
“And above and beyond what accolades may or may not come, the Churchills have responded to the film and particularly to the representation of him very well. I received a Golden Globe nomination – the first, as they have ignored me for 30 years.
“But I must be the only actor who has one without a publicist. I was so proud of that.”
Oldman stars opposite Kristin Scott Thomas, 57, as Lady Churchill. On Friday he landed the best actor gong at the AACTA Awards in Los Angeles. While further glory surely Kazuhiro fits mask to Gary
awaits with Darkest Hour – out on Friday – Oldman says playing assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was his toughest challenge, back in 1991. He adds: “I held the rifle at the actual window, looking through the sight from where he shot JFK. My first reaction was no way – how could he pull this off ?
“Yet I recently watched a documentary and, you know what, it had me convinced he was perhaps the lone shooter and that it really was Oswald who fired the shots.”
Oldman went on to land a string of roles as screen baddie – before turning good guy as Commissioner Gordon in the Batman films and Sirius Black in Harry Potter.
Off screen, he has been married five times and for many years struggled with alcohol issues.
He used to drink two bottles of vodka a day and at one stage the alcohol turned his tongue black.
Nowadays, he’s in control and reaping the rewards of a career spanning some 100 productions.
Yet such success all seemed so unlikely for the young Oldman – the son of a welder and written off as useless in his school days.
He recalls: “Many years ago one of my teachers said: ‘You are an idiot Oldman, a dunce, you will never amount to anything’.”
The star proved critics wrong by digging deep. And calling on his own Churchillian spirit.
I dragged make-up wizard out of retirement... he’s the one who made it all possible ACTOR OLDMAN ON TRANSFORMATION INTO WINSTON CHURCHILL