The movies Tim Roth only made to embarrass his children: “I just got right into it”
If you’re not old enough to have had kids yet, first off congrats, enjoy the endless silent hangovers, extra cash and stress-free holidays, but secondly if you have had any you’ll know, as Tim Roth knows, that what you don’t find out about becoming a parent until a few years in is that deliberately embarrassing your offspring is fucking hilarious.
Quite why that is, given your role as a mother and father is generally to protect the wellbeing of the small people you’ve chosen to bring into the world, who knows, but the fact remains that doing stuff that causes them to cringe uncontrollably is relentlessly entertaining, and Roth will no doubt be aware the fact he is an internationally known movie star only presents more opportunities on a grand scale to do it.
The irony is that when I was a teen, Roth was about as cool as it’s possible to get; the gun-toting diner scenes in Pulp Fiction made sure of that, as was his line “everybody be cool this is a robbery” being used at the start of Fun Lovin’ Criminals’ ‘Scooby Snacks’ that was everywhere in 1996.
It was Quentin Tarantino’s first film, Reservoir Dogs, that first put Roth on the map, and even the tale of how he got the gig as Mr Orange is very cool, Tarantino having seen him in the 1990 film Vincent & Theo and then recruiting Keitel to take Roth to a pub with him to get him sozzled and agree to play the part.
Once that movie had made all of the men in black suits slow-mo walking legends, Roth went back to the UK to continue his TV work until Tarantino brought him back into major movies to hold up that diner with Rosanna Arquette, but this time, the former decided Hollywood was more for him, and he began to make mainstream movies on a regular basis, which paid off in spades almost immediately.
Roth teamed up with Liam Neeson the following year in 1995 to make the historical epic Rob Roy, which was a global hit and earned Roth an Academy Award and Golden Globe nomination for ‘Best Actor’. More big movies followed as the century came to a close, like his thriller with Tupac Shakur, Gridlock’d, and Roth was in demand to do blockbusters too, which he took on for amusing reasons.
He told Interview, “Well, I did films to embarrass my children. I did the Hulk movie, and I did the Planet of the Apes movie. ‘Your dad’s a fucking monkey’, that was going on. I went to an ape movement class, and I thought it was fascinating. So when it came along, I just got right into it. I also had a fantastic stunt double on it, who we used as my double in the Hulk movie, too. He’s an incredible guy.”
Planet of the Apes came out in 2001 and was directed by Tim Burton, co-starring Helena Bonham-Carter (of course) and Mark Wahlberg, which wasn’t a cheap film to make at $100million, but despite mixed reviews, it was a massive hit, bringing in three times that at the box office.
Roth played General Thade, a brutal chimpanzee military commander, which is as ridiculous as it sounds, and 25 years later, after a career encompassing more than 70 films, he is currently starring in the new Peaky Blinders movie, The Immortal Man, with Cillian Murphy. Reviews are excellent for the film, which brings the series, which has run since 2013, to an end.
