Got to Be Real

Casting the national tour of Frost/Nixon, which began its six-month run earlier this month in Des Moines, Iowa, was a challenge. Not only do the two stars have to play iconic real-life figures Richard M. Nixon and Sir David Frost, but they have to “compete” with three-time Tony Award winner Frank Langella and Michael Sheen, who not only originated the roles on Broadway, but will appear in the upcoming film version to be released in December. But rest assured, these meaty roles are in the very capable hands of two superb actors, Stacy Keach and Alan Cox. TheaterMania spoke with the two men during a rehearsal break.

THEATERMANIA: Did you actually ever meet President Nixon?
STACY KEACH: I never had the privilege or the honor, and yet I feel like I know him very well by now. Interestingly enough, my best friend in college was one of the people responsible for the publishing of his memoirs and he met him 50 times and has pictures of him all over his apartment. Nixon was also very good friends with Swifty Lazar, whom I know, and I had the great pleasure of speaking with his friend Frank Gannon on the phone not too long ago.

TM: In what ways are you trying to capture Nixon’s look or voice?
SK: We’re doing a wig; that is all. However, I went through the entire process of designing a nose, an upper lip, contact lenses, eyebrows, teeth — and then I threw it all out because I looked nothing like him. And the real point is to capture the essence of the man; the soul of the guy, and that’s really what we’ve been focusing on.

TM: Were you concerned about following in Frank Langella’s footsteps?
SK: I was apprehensive at first. I even said to someone, “I’m going to be living in his shadow all the time.” But it’s almost like doing a Shakespearean play, and many a great actor has played Hamlet, or King Lear, or Richard III. So I think of Nixon as another one of those characters. I’m very happy to be doing him.

TM: What are the comparisons in playing Nixon to playing LBJ in MacBird 40 years ago?
SK: It’s a very very different play! MacBird was a satire — a composite of Johnson and the Scottish King with some other elements of Shakespeare thrown in. This play reflects history enough in terms of its accuracy, so much so that it behooves the actor to do a considerable amount of research. Obviously the first thing that we did was look at the 1977 interviews. But I have not revisited them in recent weeks because I’ve been trying to find my own specific interpretation of the character. I’ve also been reading a lot of books about Nixon. Of course, so much is written about him that I suspect that during the course of the run, I still won’t get to the end of all of the material.

TM: What did you learn, either from the research or the script, about Nixon that surprised you?
SK: Peter Morgan has done some fascinating things in terms of revealing certain aspects of his character that I was unaware of, such as Nixon’s tremendous self-consciousness about small talk. He was very uncomfortable with people. He even states in the play that it’s an irony that he chose a life which hinged on being liked by people. He says he thinks he’s better suited to a life of intellectual thought and debate, and that maybe Frost should have been the politician and he the interviewer. I also think he felt that, no matter how high he got in his elected office, he would still not have respect, which is what he really wanted.

TM: Do you find any similarities between Nixon and King Lear, whom you played recently and will again next year?
SK: Our director, Michael Grandage, said to me when I first met him “You have an advantage over Frank because he hasn’t played Lear yet.” He thought that Nixon was very Lear-like in the way that Peter has depicted him, and I see the same blindness, and the hunger for power, and the need for duplicity in both. So, yes, I feel very strongly that if any Shakespearean character is close to Nixon, it’s definitely Lear.

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THEATERMANIA: Have you ever met Sir David?
ALAN COX: No. I saw him once when he was introducing a celebrity auction, but that’s the closest I’ve actually come to him in the flesh.

TM: Were you aware of him growing up?
AC: Oh very much so, yes, he’s this iconic figure in England. Of course, people have mixed reactions to him. I think people are a bit suspicious of him because of his celebrity and his courting of publicity, but doing research into him, I discovered he’s incredibly hard working, and he’s been incredibly prolific in the business of TV journalism.

TM: What kind of research beyond the play have you done for your characterization?
AC: I studied his voice as one would approach a dialect. I even went and studied with a fantastic dialect coach in London and we broke down the idiosyncrasies of his speech. I actually had the Nixon interviews on my iPod whenever I went running.

TM: Have you ever had any desire be a Frost-like kind of entertainer, even though your father, Brian Cox, is a renowned actor?
AC: Not really. I’ve done a couple of emcee-type of jobs, and I like the challenge of being spontaneous and keeping the ball up in the air. But ultimately, I like plays and I like scripts.

TM: What has it been like working so far with Stacy?
AC: Fantastic. We worked together before in London on a radio play based on a Booth Talkington story called “The Plutocrat.” Plus, my dad and Stacy went to drama school at the same time, so he’s been around ever since I was growing up. I remember he even came backstage after I did Translations on Broadway last year; and this was before either of us knew that we were going to be doing this show together. So when I got the phone call from my agent in March saying that the national tour of Frost/Nixon was being put together and that Stacy was playing Richard Nixon, I said “Well, throw my hat into the ring please. If it’s up for grabs, I’ll grab at it.”

TM: Have you ever done this kind of big American tour before?
AC: Never. I’ve been to South Dakota and I’ve worked in Chicago, but my major relationship has been with the polarities of Los Angeles and New York. To be able to investigate America is very exciting to me.