Liam Neeson stars in 100th film as detective Phillip Marlowe
The veteran actor has confirmed rumours about his next project, as he marks a major career milestone with new movie Marlowe.
Veteran actor Liam Neeson is stepping into the very suave shoes of iconic detective Phillip Marlowe and – surprisingly – confesses they’re rather large ones to fill.
The role’s been inhabited by more than just a few titans of the film industry from Humphrey Bogart to Robert Mitchum and Michael Gambon. Few would quibble Neeson is one of the most accomplished actors in modern Hollywood, and worthy to join the illustrious cohort, but he’s definitely feeling the pressure.
“Yeah – let’s just put it that way – Bogart was magnificent in, I believe it was, 1946, with (his wife) the very lovely Lauren Bacall,” Neeson says, as we chat over Zoom as he looks relaxed in his New York City home office.
“And then there was Elliot Gould and Robert Altman – very, very good actors.”
This latest iteration uses Raymond Chandler’s beloved private eye but takes its plot from another author’s book The Black-Eyed Blonde, a 2015 novel by John Banville.
In this neo-noir crime thriller, Neeson’s Marlowe is hired to find heiress Clare Cavendish’s (Diane Kruger) missing former lover. Directed by Neil Jordan, the stellar ensemble also includes another good pal of Neeson’s – Jessica Lange, Alan Cumming and Danny Huston.
It’s also a major milestone for Neeson’s – his 100th film. Something that the 70-year-old can’t quite wrap his mind around.
“If someone had told me when I was in the theatre in Belfast in 1976 that I’d be sitting in an office in New York that I own and I’d be talking to you about a film – I just would not have believed it,” he says, smiling.
“I’ve just been very lucky. Seriously very, very lucky.”
Neeson and long-time collaborator Jordan watched a series of noir films to prepare for Marlowe, including those adapted from Chandler’s work such as Bogart’s The Big Sleep and Gould’s The Long Goodbye.
But Neeson already had an affinity for the genre. When he was a kid growing up in the north of Ireland, every Sunday afternoon on the family’s old black and white TV, he’d tune into a film noir.
“With John Garfield or Bogart and they always seemed to have a trench coat and a trilby hat,” he recalls.
“It would be raining so there was always that mystique or myth. So when I got the chance to play the role, putting on a 1930s costume – especially putting on that trilby hat – it was like ‘Oh yes, I love it’.”
It’s also a bit of a sneak peek behind the glamour of the heady days of 1930s Hollywood, and while it oozes Los Angeles, it was largely shot in Spain.
“I used to live in Laurel Canyon in LA,” Neeson says.
“We’re shooting some of these scenes in Barcelona, but, you know, I could have sworn I was in Laurel Canyon or Mulholland Drive. It was great.
“And then all the driving shots – it looks like we are going through LA. I mean, what they can do now with computer technology – it’s just amazing.”
Neeson quit smoking some 28 years ago, but Marlowe is forever lighting up or putting out a cigarette. Fortunately, they were herbal.
“Tobacco was my drug – so I did love sucking on them and even still got a kick from the herbal ones.”
Neeson also got a huge kick from his cameo in the final season of Derry Girls – the Netflix comedy set in the ‘90s in the Northern Ireland city of Londonderry (or Derry to the Catholic population). Former flame – the pair dated for five years in the ‘80s – Dame Helen Mirren was instrumental in that role happening.
“About three years ago, she sent me an email asking me ‘Have you seen the show Derry Girls?,” he explains.
“I didn’t know what the f--- she was talking about.
“So I watched it and it was just brilliant and I loved it.”
Neeson was brought up very close to Derry and had visited many times, boxing there as a kid.
“And the 30-year troubles that we went through – they were horrendous, especially in that area,” he says.
“But to see this TV series about these kids just being kids with armoured cars going past – I just loved it.
“I was honoured when they asked me if I would play a Protestant cop.”
Given he’s just added the aforementioned Derry Girls including Saoirse-Monica Jackson, Nicola Coughlan, Louisa Harland to his long list of co-stars, is there anyone he hasn’t had a chance to work with? He’s shares he’s blown away by so many of the up and coming actors, but wishes he had a chance to join forces with legendary Hollywood director Robert Altman – who helmed Marlow’s 1973 turn in The Long Goodbye.
“I met him in a restaurant once,” he recalls.
“I was just passing his table and he was with other people and he just looked up and went “Oh Michael Collins (the Irish freedom fighter Neeson played in the 1996 biographical period drama)’.
“Not ‘I’d like to work you or something’. Or ‘great film’. Just ‘Oh. Michael Collins’.”
Notching up 100 films and a variety of roles from his Oscar-nominated turn as Oskar Schindler in Schindler’s List and Qui-Gon Jinn in the Star Wars franchise to Bryan Mills in Taken, there doesn’t seem to be challenge left for Neeson. Turns out there’s another Derry Girls-esque detour coming up.
“Hmmm – what I will tell you, and we’re hopefully going to shoot it this year, is Paramount Pictures approached me to see if I would be interested in rebooting the Naked Gun,” he shares, confirming the speculation.
Neeson has long been linked to reprising the role of Detective Frank Drebin, played in the original trilogy by Leslie Nielsen, with rumours spreading since 2015.
“I read a script about a week ago – and it’s funny with some silly gags,” he reveals.
“So it’ll either end my career or we’ll just go off on a little dirt road.”
Marlowe is released in cinemas May 18.
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Originally published as Liam Neeson stars in 100th film as detective Phillip Marlowe
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