You've got to laugh

After the film, he stayed in contact with Derek's sister Iris, who successfully campaigned to get Bentley's conviction quashed before her death. And he's still close to Trevor Hicks (the campaigning father who lost two daughters in the 1989 tragedy at the Sheffield football stadium) after he played Hicks in Jimmy McGovern's Hillsborough. "Trevor's a friend. He's had quite a profound effect on me. He does on everyone he meets. To have survived that, and then to have been abused by the British judicial system in the way he was. When he was on his knees, he got kicked in the balls by the system. But he won't ever give up fighting."

Last year, Eccleston went back to the theatre to play Jean in a West End production of Miss Julie (another working-class hero, another study of sexual voyeurism), and found he loved the rhythm of stage acting. "Film is a director's medium, whereas on stage I get the final edit. It's also a healthier way of living because you're in one place." I remind him that he's always resisted Shakespeare up to now. "I think I said something a bit stronger than that," he grins.

Rehearsing Hamlet is fascinating, but terrifying, he says. Having never seen a production of the play before, he arrived two weeks before the other actors to do a crash course in technique - a humble gesture for a lead actor. "I understand every word I'm saying, so I hope the audience will." Although it's set in 1920s Eastern Europe, Ian Brown's production is deliberately TV-audience friendly. Along with Eccleston, Brown has cast Brigit Forsyth (Thelma from The Likely Lads) as Gertrude and Maxine Peake (Bubble from Dinnerladies) as Ophelia. The text has been substantially cut ("although the real, real guts are there") and so has Ophelia's hair. Eccleston reveals that Peake has shorn her blonde curls to escape any Pre-Raphaelite cliches in the madness scene. "She's got the same short, dark haircut as me." It is, he admits, a risky undertaking for all concerned. But it may give him the chance to flex his comedic muscles, after all. Eccleston is busy tapping into the dark, gallows humour of the text, and says that he's approaching Hamlet as "an apocalyptic stand-up comic" in the mould of Richard Pryor, Lenny Bruce and Bill Hicks.

As our photo shoot continues, Eccleston becomes engagingly silly, partly to downplay his real seriousness about the role, partly to mask his shyness in front of the camera. We're treated to his impression of Eric Morecambe as Hamlet, and even Les Dawson who once dragged up in Elizabethan dress with a skull. "Oh, oh, oh, Ophelia, you're more than Delia," Eccleston warbles to an appreciative crowd. But the photographer's not convinced. She wants him moodier. "You don't like happy, do you?" grins Eccleston. But you have to admit she has a point. Those cheekbones just weren't made for comedy. E

`28 Days Later' is currently on general release. `Hamlet' runs until 30 November at the West Yorkshire Playhouse, Quarry Hill, Leeds (0113 2137700)

Copyright 2002 Independent Newspapers UK Limited
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.