Bob Hoskins, R.I.P.
A Note from Lawrence Wright
Bob Hoskins passed away.
He starred in my 2000 movie, Noriega: God's Favorite. He said he had taken the role because it passed the "cold bum test." Whenever he got a new script, he took it to the toilet to read. If he liked it, he read the whole thing, and then he had a cold bum.
Only time he ever got upset with me was when I was holding an umbrella over his head in the harsh sun of the Philippines, where we were filming, and he was attired in a yellow jump suit that I had indicated in the script. "You make me look like fuckin' Winnie the Pooh!" He really did look like that.
He was a wonderful actor and a fine man.
LISTEN: Longform.org Interview at SXSW
Longform.org features Wright on their podcast, during their visit to Austin for SXSW. Features quotes like this gem:
"If I had the chance to interview Osama Bin Laden, should I kill him? It’s a fair question. Suppose we’re having dinner — should I stab him with the bread knife? Do I have a moral obligation to kill him? Or do I have a moral obligation as a reporter to simply hear him?"
You can download the episode [MP3] or visit Longform’s website to hear the interview.
- [6:00] Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief (Knopf • Jan 2013)
- [6:00] The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Knopf • Aug 2006)
- [7:45] The Siege (Twentieth Century Fox • 1998)
- [14:45] "The Apostate" (The New Yorker • Feb 2011)
- [30:15] My Trip to Al-Qaeda (Jigsaw Productions • Apr 2010)