Alan Cumming has over 27 films to his credit, including a Tony award for Best Actor in a Musical for his role as the sinister Emcee in Sam Mendes' Cabaret on Broadway. These days, Alan is one of the busiest actors in the business. He appears in Sylvester Stallone's "Get Carter" and will be appearing in Robert Rodriguez' upcoming "Spy Kids".

Alan, who once admitted that creating collages eased away stress, manages to flow into each different role so easily that people are left asking the question, "Who is Alan Cumming?" So last April, Velvet sought to find out.

So just who is Alan Cumming? Besides being Scotland's greatest import to Hollywood, Alan Cumming is on his way to being simply just a coming attraction. He's here to stay.

On the big screen, he was most recently seen in Julie Taymor's Titus, opposite Anthony Hopkins and Jessica Lange.

He made his feature film debut in Passing Glory in his final year at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama.

After three years of television and theatre work in Scotland, Alan made his West End debut in 1989 at the Royal Court in The Conquest of the South Pole and was nominated Most Promising Newcomer in that year's Olivier Awards.

He was Olivier nominated for his performance in La Bete at the Lyric Hammersmith and went on to win an Olivier Award for the Royal National Theater Production of Accidental Death of An Anarchist. He garnered an Olivier Award nomination for his work in the London production of Cabaret and also received wide critical acclaim for his performance of Hamlet at the Donmar Warehouse.

Mixing his film and theatre success with a diversity of other work, Alan is also known on the stand-up cabaret circuit as the latter half of the comedy duo Victor and Barry. He has adapted a number of plays for the Royal National Theatre and has directed Bonjour La Bonjour at the Royal National Theatre Studio. He also was the co-writer and star of the cult BBC sitcom The High Life.

Recently, Alan lent his voice to the Devil in the animated series God, the Devil and Bob. One of his most recent films premiered at Universal Studios, where I caught up with the Scottish actor. For the role of the Great Gazoo in The Flintstones Viva Rock Vegas, Alan said, "I like to do things that are different from what I've last done, so if something takes my fancy, I just do it. And this did."

"I am vaguely British, so they asked me to take the part after I read for it, even though I was reading it just for the purposes of reading," Alan said. "At first it was scary for here were people who were asking me to play a part because they just heard me reading it and they thought it was good. And I couldn't remember exactly what I did because it was a lot of off-the-cuff stuff."

Click on the Exclusive Interview and spend Fifteen Minutes with Alan Cumming, or browse through his extensive filmography. Audio clips are also available.

 

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