"Meet Joe Fiennes" (Dec. 9, 1998)
Author: Jan Stuart


THE PHOTOGRAPHER is not scheduled to arrive for another four hours, so we have no way of recording the look on Joseph Fiennes' face as he contemplates his Internet Web site for the first time. Cobbled together by rabid fans, the adoring page is headed "The Joy of Joseph Fiennes," a title that conjures odd echoes of Beethoven symphonies and best-selling sex manuals. As the actor flips though the printout, his eyes register that inseparable blend of amusement, flattery and heebie-jeebies one experiences when one realizes a complete stranger has been amassing every last detail of one's life.

Fiennes speaks a great deal about joy. When he does, however, it is not about the joy of being the youngest sibling (along with his twin brother, Jacob) of that brooding English star Ralph Fiennes. Nor is it the joy of finding himself the romantic magnet of the moment in the season's two hot British screen exports, playing Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester in "Elizabeth" and the greatest English-speaking playwright of all time in "Shakespeare in Love." Rather, he speaks of the elemental pleasures: the joy of work, learning, music and the written word.

"I've got a vendetta to destroy the Net," he says in a half-mocking tone from a mid-Manhattan hotel suite recently. "To make everyone go to the library. I love the organic thing of pen and paper, ink on canvas. I love going down to the library, the feel and smell of books."

Joseph Fiennes doesn't look a bit like a fusty academe. Out of the Elizabethan tights of his two movie roles and into a black suit and neon-blue shirt and necktie, he emits a low-burning sensuality that is neither contemporary nor particularly British. With full lips, penetrating cedar-brown eyes and dark brown hair, there is an air of Italian High Renaissance about him, like a figure in a Raphael fresco.

At 28, he may be the only actor of his generation to have portrayed both William Shakespeare and Jesus Christ ("I know, there is nowhere to go now," he muses). The latter part was in a Royal Shakespeare Company staging of Dennis Potter's controversial "Son of Man" in 1995, adapted from a teleplay that provoked threats of prosecution from the government on charges of blasphemy when it was first aired in 1969.

Winding down from a brain-frying weekend publicity blitz for "Shakespeare in Love," Tom Stoppard's rambunctious imagining of the creation of "Romeo and Juliet," Fiennes' tank of joy is running low. He has been held hostage to three questions: (1) Tell us about the differences between your two current film roles; (2) Tell us about the differences between acting for stage and screen; and (3) Tell us about the differences between you and your famous brother.

At the mention of the Jesus play, Fiennes smiles and turns off his automatic response button. "Part of their success," he says, linking it with his current stint as Shakespeare, "and part of what triggered the kind of rage and fury that surrounded `Son of Man' when it was first produced, is their success in humanizing the mythic icons. Because they live, they breathe, they cry, they are vulnerable."

The warmth and athleticism of his screen persona stand in marked contrast - one can't resist - with the cool, reflective image projected by his brother Ralph. The mild-mannered Fiennes concedes that all of that swordplay and rousting about is a chore for him. "It is a task, especially in a movie. I found the acute concentration one has to achieve over a span of 30 seconds for 15 weeks grueling. But part of Shakespeare's robust physicality [in the movie] was a metaphor for the mercurial brilliance of his brain."

When asked if he is equally uncomfortable having to contend with the nude lovemaking demands of both movies, he responds dryly, "Give me a sword fight any day."

The joy of acting for Fiennes, in great part, is the research - "the chance for me to catch up on my lack of academic background." That said, he kept his excavation of Shakespeare's life to a minimum. "There is next to nothing known about him. You can collect an idea, a profile of the man from his sonnets and his work, and you're astounded because his knowledge was so extensive. But then it's a can of worms because if you look at any of his plays, you don't quite know where his bias lies: his religion - is he a Protestant or a Catholic? - his politics, his sexuality. You can't nail him down.

"I think academics are infuriating. For every expert on Shakespeare there is another one to cancel his theory out. It drives you up the wall. I think the greatest form of finding out the truth is through fantasy."

Joseph Fiennes' propensity for fantasy and pretend may have been fertilized by his gypsy-like upbringing with six brothers and sisters by photographer Mark Fiennes and the late writer and painter Jennifer Lash. They moved 14 times, without a television set, nurturing a family interdependency that flourished through literature, art and the imagination.

"I'm not going to paint a romantic bohemian picture. There were seven mouths to feed, a lot of mess moving house, it was noisy. The dream of living out an idyllic existence with a big family in the country and the reality of clothing and feeding all these children forced us to keep on the road.

"I think what I discovered from an early age was the joy of the written word. I just found that lifeenhancing, that you could hold hands with poets from different centuries, different ages, different backgrounds, and they would take you places that you never really knew or understood existed."

Fiennes was particularly affected by his mother, who died of cancer in 1990. "She was an extraordinary encouragement. As a writer and painter she understood the whole creative process, and nature. She was someone I could talk to on the subject of what inspired this passion in me. That sense of her voice is prevalent in all my work."

The turning point came when a primary school teacher handed him the title role in a school production of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat." The rush of performing stayed with him even as he dropped out of school at 17 to try his hand at art school and working at the Royal National Theatre in backstage jobs finagled by brother Ralph. A three-year acting grant at London's revered Guildhall School of Music and Drama led to two years in repertory with the R.S.C., a six-month stint on the West End in the long-running thriller "The Woman in Black" and a choice role opposite Helen Mirren in "A Month in the Country."

Those were rocky years, during which Fiennes was subsidized by his ex-girlfriend, actress Sara Griffiths. Eventually, the actor bagged his first featured role in a romantic comedy called "Meet Frank, Daniel and Lawrence," which is projected for a May release in the States.

When asked if he has ever felt concern that his famous family name may have given him an unfair leg up, he responds, "It's always a concern. I know other actors, the Cusacks and the Richardsons, a whole host of people who are probably confronted with that same question. It might open the door for you but at the end of the day you have to walk through it and stand on your own two feet. In fact, it might even put more pressure on you. I've been lucky enough that I started out seven years ago, early enough not to feel any comparisons or pressures in that sense."

Even with only a seven-year resume to go by, Fiennes' fans have clogged the Internet with news and gossip of their hero. When he speaks of the legacy of his latest character, William Shakespeare, one can't help but discern a self-referential plea underneath. "At the end of the day, it's his work. He says at the beginning of the Folio, `Look not upon this picture, but look upon the work.' Through the work, I will live. And that's the kind of joy of being an actor."

© 1998-1999 HIPSTAR/ IVANOVBABE