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interview
“If I open one door, I like to open the next one as well, just to see what happens.”
world class
Steve Coogan talks to Garth Pearce about his big Hollywood break as Jules Verne’s Phileas Fogg
Photo main: Steve Coogan as Phileas Fogg; opposite page: as Alan Partridge; Steve Coogan with Cecile de France and Jackie Chan on the set of Around The World In Eighty Days; and in 24hr Par ty People
Steve Coogan has let his hair grow long and his hopes grow high as he is now being pitched around Hollywood as “the new Peter Sellers.”
It is thanks to his lead role of Phileas Fogg in the lavish remake of Around The World In 80 Days. The comic actor, best known for playing embarrassing radio host Alan Partridge has recently fin-
ished filming the lead in the $70 million movie.
“They tell me I am becoming the alternative choice to Hugh Grant,” says Coogan, without his tongue too firmly in his cheek. “I am someone new, so far as Hollywood is concerned. Even Steve Martin looked me up.
“He said: ‘I just wanted to meet you – I love your stuff. If you want
to do a TV series, I’ve got a come- dy I would like to produce.’ It was bizarre, because I have been a huge fan of his for years.
“I told him: ‘It is not just your early stuff, either’ – which got a laugh. He started quoting lines to me from my own material. I could hardly believe it, but those kind of things have been happening recently.”
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