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Choose sex

There should, by rights, have been six grimacing faces staring out of the orange, black and white poster for Trainspotting. Tommy (the nice one, the innocent, who never made it through the night) alias Kevin McKidd, chose life. He went to Tunisia with his girlfriend instead of posing with Begbie, Diane, Renton, Sick Boy and Spud.

"I am still kicking myself over my stupidity," says McKidd. "Of course nobody knew how big that film would be, and I had promised my girlfriend this holiday whenever we finished filming. We'd booked it, flights and all, so we just went off and I missed the photo-shoot for the ad. Now it's one of those archetypal student posters, and I'm not on it."

His absence from the poster was to become a metaphor for his life, post-Trainspotting; McKidd was resting for a year. But that was just a momentary glitch in a film career that is now very much back on track. From a series of smaller supporting and cameo roles, in three films directed by Gillies MacKinnon - Regeneration, Small Faces and the recently released Hideous Kinky - he has moved on to the lead part in Bedrooms and Hallways. McKidd plays Leo, sexually ambiguous, and a catalyst at the centre of an intricate web of relationships. It's a cute title.

McKidd is in mischievous form as he explains with a wide grin how sex may take place in bedrooms but the decision to make love is often taken in hallways. "It's brilliant, and the best thing is it's a film about people in their twenties trying to choose what their whole life is about, who they are, and that entails dealing with their sexuality. It's fun, but at the same time, it makes you think."

It's the closing gala dinner of the Dinard Film Festival, Brittany, held in the town's casino high above the windswept beaches of this charming seaside resort. McKidd has swept in from London, where he is appearing in a play with Diana Rigg. Despite the copious quantities of French Bordeaux consumed over dinner, he is in a boisterous mood.

In search of a quiet corner we disentangle ourselves from the mass of tightly-arranged tables and make our way through an eclectic assortment of directors, producers, actors and celebs (including Stephen Fry and Julie Walters). McKidd is friendspotting and perhaps potential employer spotting as he nods and smiles in acknowledgement. Gillies Mackinnon proffers a hearty Scottish handshake and laughingly teases with "och, you're no away to speak to him?"

"It's easy being slotted into the young actor mould," says McKidd, "but I'm not interested in doing just the young, blond, juvenile lead, because I'm not that good looking." He reaches for another glass of wine and looks thoughtful. "I am only 25 you know," he offers helpfully, as if that answers his dilemma.

His easy, infectious laugh betrays a touch of self-mockery and beneath the curly mop of golden hair his eyes reveal a sense of serious determination. There's much to endear you to this new potential star in the Scottish firmament and we joke and exchange anecdotes about Scottish drama schools and the business in general.

While McKidd may prefer not to be typecast as the handsome, juvenile lead (everyone has their cross to bear) that's the way casting directors have perceived him thus far, and on leaving Queen Margaret College, Edinburgh in 1994, John McGrath immediately cast him for a stage production of Neil Gunn's The Silver Darlings.

"He wanted someone young, with blond hair and from the north of Scotland," he shrugs modestly. "I looked the part and I come from Elgin." This theatre debut led to Gillies MacKinnon snapping him up immediately to play Malky in Small Faces, his film about Glasgow gang warfare in the Sixties.

Then along came the role of Tommy in the now legendary Trainspotting. McKidd was as surprised as everyone else with the film's success and acknowledges that it opened a door of opportunity within the business.

"If I hadn't done Trainspotting, people would just have seen this teuchter and not seen past that. I got rid of a lot of preconceptions about who I am and it's given me a shout and opened a few doors."

One such door to have opened was the title role in the recent Almeida production of Racine's Britannicus, the classic French revenge tragedy in which Diana Rigg played his mother, Agrippina. Set in modern dress, with a new translation by Robert David Macdonald of the Citizens, McKidd was directed by Jonathan Kent who, he says, has really stretched his work.

"The part of Britannicus is far removed from my Scottish accent and I speak in BBC English. There's a real stigma when people just see you as a Scottish actor, rather than an actor who happens to come from Scotland."

Britannicus is not the hero of the play but the focus and cornerstone. McKidd plays him as innocent but clear-eyed, "a golden boy" with his pride and dignity bruised but intact. The production played in London for a couple of months in the autumn before transferring to New York for a limited run in January of this year.

And now in marked contrast, golden boy takes on the central role of Leo in Bedrooms and Hallways. The plot quite simply is this: Sally breaks up with Brendan. Darren is crazy about Jeremy. Leo falls in love with Brendan, but he's also attracted to Sally (played by Jennifer Ehle).

"It was great. I really enjoyed that part. The whole film gears around Leo, who at the start is very much gay, yet becomes involved again with his very first girlfriend. What I liked about the story is that it makes you realise that all your preconceived ideas about your own sexuality and any preconceived ideas about how you lead your life are not necessarily the way you have to do things."

The American director, Rose Troche, specifically sought a straight actor to play Leo. "I didn't want a camp, cloney kind of guy. It was very important that he was just as comfortable on screen with women as with men. When we saw Kevin, we knew he had the look and the skill to bring out the complex and important questions associated with sexual identity."

Of course sexual exploration is never off our TV screens whether it's four Prada clad girls enjoying Sex and the City, or three lads investigating what it is to be Queer as Folk. Following the same gender-bending track, Robert Farrar, who wrote the screenplay for Bedrooms and Hallways, says the story was an act of self-revelation. "I wanted to explore the whole theme of masculinity and gay identity. I wanted to create a world in which characters swap sexual identities and forget all that divisive ghetto-ised stuff about either being gay or being straight. We are open to make choices and it's not confined to rigid stereotypes."

If the Nineties have meant anything, it's that sexual politics have finally come of age, when Mel B can proudly declare that of course she'd snog a woman if she fancied her, and Kevin Kline's schoolteacher character, outed on national television in In and Out, can be a box office hit in America.

Bedrooms and Hallways co-stars Simon Callow as Keith, the leader of the men's group, involved in wild-man bonding weekends. Harriet Walter is his feminist wife, Sybil.

"I identified immediately with Leo's quest for romantic fulfilment, so I couldn't resist the part," says McKidd. "He reminded me very much of myself in certain ways. Leo is someone who doesn't take risks, who has complete control of his life but isn't happy. Then when he takes a proactive step, by admitting he fancies Brendan at the men's group, everything careers out of control and suddenly all those boxes he'd put his life into are split apart. The film takes sexual identity and our notions of gender one step into the future."

McKidd's future would certainly appear bright. He cuts a confident dash and profile with his honed physique and chiselled jaw. Yet, dressed in designer black and delicately nursing the remnants of red Bordeaux, he confesses to pangs of rampant insecurity, wrestling with the paradigm, common amongst professional actors, of success equals failure. He talks of the turmoil and angst that grips him every time the phone rings.

"I don't know if I could say I'm taking it all in my stride. In fact I'm absolutely shitting myself every time I take on a new job. I just wish I knew how to cope with it better and learn to accept the work as it comes. At the moment I think I expect too much of myself."

And he's not the only one, having recently finished work on Mike Leigh's latest film project, Untitled 1998. Leigh, notorious for his improvisational methods of putting actors through the gears at a gruelling and demanding pace, commands the respect of a drill sergeant, entrusted with a willing cast of artistic souls. The passing out of this particular project, in customary Leigh style, is shrouded with the determination of a military secret and McKidd has been trained well. A loyal disciple to Leigh's artistic process, he would not be drawn to reveal further details - suffice to say it's set in London around 1885 and has something to do with Gilbert and Sullivan.

"It was brilliant, just amazing to work with Mike Leigh. It's difficult to describe working with him because so much of the script is improvised. You learn such a lot as an actor. I mean what is amazing about Mike is that he pushes you right to the end of your possible limit. Most of us have a safety zone and you don't go past it. He says: 'No, I want you to go on. Stand as if you were right on the edge of the cliffs. See what happens when you are right at the limit, to the extent that you don't feel comfortable'. That's what's so unique about being directed by him. You really feel on the edge but at the same time there is a structure, created by him, so you do feel safe.

"The thing is with other films I know what my performance will look like but with this, I don't have a clue, because when you're acting with him, your mind is not on how you look, it's absolutely trying to be in the moment for as long as you possibly can be."

McKidd is now determined to keep working at improving his acting and would consider turning down future film work for more stage work.

"British film is fantastic just now, but because there's so little finance, you only get three days rehearsal. You're not learning anything about your acting, giving out but not improving anything. After a bit, you think, 'Come on, I'm running on empty here'. So when the Almeida part came along I grabbed at it and I hope over the next few years to go back into theatre."

At the moment he's resting again and looking at film scripts. After all, he can take it easy; he's come a long way fast in what is often a viper-infested business. Yet there's still a hint of highland reserve about him and, starring roles aside, he believes he will always be the local lad back home, an Elgin loonie.

"I don't think any actor could ask for more, you know. I am only 25 so I don't know it all," says McKidd. "I mean I haven't been married and done a lot in life yet. I just want to do my bloody best."

Amid the sound of roulette tables and the background din of the casino in Dinard, there is an intrinsic pause, while he ruffles his blond locks reflectively and adds: "Mind you, that's if I ever do anything again. You never know in this business!"

From above, a French voice, sensorial in tone, is heard calling what we instinctively know to be, "place your bets please, place you bets."

Bedrooms and Hallways is released on April 9

Sunday Herald 7 March 1999

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