[thanks Mary A.]

[sorry no screen caps, haven't found a tape clear enough to get good caps from.]

voice-over: England’s favorite romantic lead—Colin Firth—once galloped about Pemberley, the country estate of Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice. But now, he’s inhabiting another country manor with Reese Witherspoon, Rupert Everett and Judi Dench in a sumptuous version of Oscar Wilde’s comedy of manners The Importance of Being Earnest.

Harry Smith: And Colin Firth joins us this morning. Good morning.

[Colin in black shirt top two buttons unbuttoned, black or dark gray trousers, feet looking biggish in black & brown boots, legs crossed, hands folded in lap]

Colin Firth: Good morning.

HS: For those who need remedial Oscar Wilde, we’re going to do a little remedial work here and go through who’s who, alright? You play the first Earnest, who’s really Jack, but he creates Earnest because…

CF: I think I’m with you so far, I mean, I think I’m the main beneficiary of the um, remedial Wilde. Um, he creates Earnest because it’s more fun to be Earnest , Jack’s life is one of duty. He’s burdened with responsibility and is all too earnest, and if he wants to have fun in town, [clears throat], break the rules, be a playboy, it’s better that someone else gets the blame for that, so he creates an unruly bro…brother, Earnest.

HS: So in London, Jack, as Earnest, visits your pal, Algernon, who also decides to become Earnest, because…

CF: Uh, well, he decides to become Earnest because, it’s a role waiting to be fitted into, becomes the same Earnest and he’s uh, out to court my 17-year old ward who dreams of the wicked brother Earnest, and so he wants to fulfill that role for his own um unsavory ends.

HS: Um hum and of course both Earnests end up at Jack’s or Earnest’s country estate (CF[quietly]: that’s right ) with the women they love, neither of whom are interested in marrying Jack or Algernon, but both really want to marry ..

CF: Somebody called Earnest.

HS: Right

CF: Yes, and therein lies the play’s absurdity. The height of your ambition and the height of your romantic dreams lie in this name, you know, which, not wanting to offend anybody by that name, is is not exactly the name with the most lyrical ring to it, and I think it’s exquisite for that reason precisely. Almost every other Oscar Wilde work that I can think of has something very intense at its heart, this tragedy or or melancholy in dark dark secrets and here it’s no more than getting out of boring appointments and covering up the fact that you didn’t pay your food bills, you know, there’s no tragedy and sexual licentiousness really, it’s very very innocent and…

HS: It is riotously funny and a joy to watch. Was it a joy to do?

CF: It was, and I wasn’t sure it was going to be. I think..there’s a very old adage about comedy being a most serious business and it is very hard work and countless times when people watch something you’ve been in and they’ll say it must have been fun, and it wasn’t, it was manual labor, it was a real sweat to get it to look like that much fun because it isn’t a spontaneous process, filming, and to make it look spontaneous is quite arduous. [Behind the scenes clip is shown while Colin keeps talking] But this was the exception that proves the rule. Um, we did make use of the atmosphere on the set. It it we we were able to harness that. It was a fairly unruly atmosphere and um you know a lot of us knew each other very well from a long time and there were a lot of mischievous characters. In fact, I think there wasn’t a single character that didn’t have a mischievous sense of humor, so it was…there were pranks. There were…it was every man for himself, really. It kept things very buoyant and I realized that pitch that we’d reached of banter and just sheer joy on the set. It was something that was maintained when the camera rolled.

HS: You’re a young man but you’ve done a lot onstage and on film. Is there something you’re itching to do, something [Colin shakes his head no] that you’d crawl through molten lava to perform?
[Colin makes the little short no sound, like he did in FP]

CF: No, I often investigate to see if there is. I give it some thought and thinking I am missing something and I should be looking for something like that, and I realize it doesn’t exist. I mean there are short term ambitions that come along. I’ll find a part that grabs me and feel I really want to do that at all costs, but there is no great long term dream or plan and I think possibly the side of me that wanted to be an actor in the first place did so because I enjoy unpredictability that I don’t want to know what’s too far down the road, or around the corner and I probably thrive on that. I thrive on being this sort of, you know, car boot sale, you know, as garage sale as we know it. You lift this up and there’s something underneath it and uh, I find that exhilarating in a way and I like to see what comes.

HS: Well, we really enjoyed seeing you in TIOBE.

CF: Thank you. Thank you.

HS: Thank you so much [for coming in for the interview]

CF: Thank you [Flash of dimple and nod]
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