Derek Jacobi is chatting to the photographer in the living room. His voice is unmistakeable \u2013 rich, buttered, every sentence beautifully parsed and phrased. I\u2019m in the kitchen with his husband, Richard Clifford, who is making coffee. He tells me they have been together 47 years. \u201cWe met when I was 22 and he was 39.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m a child snatcher,\u201d guffaws Jacobi from the lounge.<\/p>\n
While Clifford is an actor and director who has enjoyed some success, Jacobi is a giant of stage and screen, famous for his Hamlets and Lears. Perhaps he is still best known for I, Claudius, the brilliant 1970s TV series in which he played the stammering, disabled Roman emperor with astonishing empathy and sensuality. It was all in the voice. Jacobi could seduce the world with his, as he did with a sublime Cyrano de Bergerac for the Royal Shakespeare Company in the 1980s. Then there are the TV joys of more recent years. In the comedy Vicious, he and Ian McKellen play a savagely barbed but devoted couple, while in the hugely popular Last Tango in Halifax, he enjoys a more tender romance with Anne Reid.<\/p>\n
Clifford brings in the coffee. He\u2019s talking about Trump, Iran and how the world is going to pot. I ask Jacobi if he shares his concerns. \u201cI\u2019m too old and ugly to worry.\u201d Look, I say, this is not the first time I\u2019ve heard you talk about being ugly, you don\u2019t really think that do you?<\/p>\n
\u201cOoh yeassssss,\u201d he says fiercely. \u201cOh, as a kid, yes. A ginger-haired, freckled-faced \u2026\u201d \u201cAcne-ridden,\u201d Clifford adds for good measure.<\/p>\n
\u201cAcne-ridden, east London kid,\u201d Jacobi continues, grateful for the reminder. \u201cYes, absolutely. I can\u2019t look in the mirror.\u201d He says he won\u2019t watch himself on screen. Is that because of the acting or how he looks? \u201cIt\u2019s both. If I were honest, I\u2019d have liked to have been a movie star. I think I can act. But I didn\u2019t have the looks to go with my acting. If I had had the looks as well as my acting ability I think my world would have turned out differently. But I didn\u2019t. And I never wanted to look at myself because I didn\u2019t like what I saw.\u201d Who did he want to look like? \u201cOoh, Rock Hudson.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was all in the voice \u2026 Jacobi as Claudius with Brian Blessed as Augustus in the 1976 TV show I, Claudius. Photograph: Ronald Grant<\/p>\n
Clifford hoots with laughter.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I was growing up he was the film star,\u201d Jacobi says.<\/p>\n
But that may just be a case of wishing for what you haven\u2019t got, I say. He has often said that film work is unchallenging compared with the stage. \u201cYes, absolutely,\u201d he says when I remind him. I think you would have been bored senseless as a movie star, I say. \u201cProbably, but I would have been rich. And, for an East End kid, that matters.\u201d<\/p>\n
Could we take a photo of both of you together, I ask. \u201cNo,\u201d snaps Jacobi. \u201cMe, me, me, me, me,\u201d he says like a greedy child.<\/p>\n
\u201cMe, Myself and I should have been the title of your biography,\u201d Clifford says laconically.<\/p>\n
\u201cWasn\u2019t it?\u201d Jacobi rat-a-tat-tats with practised ease.<\/p>\n
Their house is magnificent \u2013 Edward Beale swirling impasto peonies on the wall, toy chimps belonging to Daisy the Irish terrier on the settee, trompe l\u2019oeil wallpaper disguising a toilet, a summer house in the garden that serves as a cinema and a beautifully carved table that opens up into a couple of boxes. If homes can have a sense of humour, this has got a great one. Clifford unfastens the boxes. One for him, and one for Jacobi. It sums up their different characters, he says. \u201cOne says: \u2018The art in my life, Richard Clifford\u2019. The other says: \u2018My life in art, Derek Jacobi.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Well, I say, maybe it\u2019s time to focus on Clifford rather than his more celebrated husband. After all, he\u2019s directed Jacobi in plays, has worked with the Old Vic, designed their home, is their social secretary and pretty much runs Jacobi\u2019s life.<\/p>\n
A Shakespearean stalwart \u2026 Jacobi in Macbeth at the Barbican theatre in London in 1993. Photograph: Tristram Kenton\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
\u201cBye, Del,\u201d Clifford says, waving him off. His voice is even richer than Jacobi\u2019s \u2013 crystalline, booming, 101% thesp. They make for a fabulous couple \u2013 funny, garrulous, warm, generous, with a hint of claws.<\/p>\n
Has he always been Del to you? \u201cOh, yes. Maggie Smith always called him Del. Or Del Boy. This was before Only Fools and Horses. I only call him Derek when I\u2019m cross.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDel is an east London thing,\u201d says London\u2019s unlikeliest cockney. Jacobi grew up in Leytonstone, the only child of Alfred, who ran a tobacconists-cum-sweet shop, and Daisy, who worked in haberdashery. He was a bright boy, exiled to bed for 18 months when he contracted rheumatic fever at nine. That\u2019s when working-class Derek turned posh. They moved the bedroom to the living room, and he spent all day long listening to radio and watching TV. He returned to school with a new accent and ambition. He wanted to be an actor. Jacobi went on to study history at the University of Cambridge, where he spent much of his time performing the classics.<\/p>\n
By his mid-20s, he was working for the newly created National Theatre at the Old Vic, directed by Laurence Olivier, whom he adored. What was he like? \u201cOh, God. God. He loved the young actors and he nurtured us. Wonderful. Wonderful.\u201d What did he learn most from Olivier? \u201cHumility.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s surprising, I say. It\u2019s not a quality associated with him.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot particularly, no,\u201d Clifford says.<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, certainly with the young members of the company. There was nothing starry about him at all. He would say, \u2018Call me Larry.\u2019\u201d He pauses. \u201cNo way could we call him Larry.\u201d He yelps in horror at the idea. \u201cHe was Sir Laurence.\u201d<\/p>\n
So should I call you Sir Derek? \u201cNo!\u201d Another horrified yelp. \u201cSir Del Boy. Good heavens, no.\u201d I tell him Ben Kingsley insisted I called him Sir Ben. \u201cOh God.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018I have two glasses of white wine for lunch and then a little siesta\u2019 \u2026\u00a0Derek Jacobi. Photograph: David Levene\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
\u201cI called him Sir Ken Bingsley once,\u201d Clifford chimes in. On purpose? \u201cYes. It\u2019s shaming. Shaming. You shouldn\u2019t behave like that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Has Jacobi worked with Kingsley? \u201cNo. No, I don\u2019t think I have. If I have, I\u2019ve mercifully forgotten.\u201d That silver tongue can be razor-sharp.<\/p>\n
Has he always got on with people he\u2019s worked with? \u201cMercifully, I have forgotten the bad times. Genuinely. I must have had them, but too infrequently for them to be in the front of my memory.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve had difficult directors,\u201d Clifford says, gently nudging him. \u201cJohn Dexter.\u201d In his autobiography, The Honourable Beast, Dexter wrote of his \u2018fury for perfection\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cJohn Dexter was hateful,\u201d Jacobi says. \u201cHis method was to bludgeon a performance out of an actor. He directed me in lots of things at the National. I was terrified of Dexter. I don\u2019t think he would have got away with it today.\u201d<\/p>\n
Was he the only one who terrified performances out of you? \u201cBill [William] Gaskill, who was also at the National, was slightly cleverer, but just as nasty.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jacobi also tried his hand at directing. But, as he\u2019s quick to admit, he wasn\u2019t a natural. \u201cThe best part was showing them what I thought they should do, and getting up and doing it. So, no. I suppose I\u2019m not a director.\u201d He directed Kenneth Branagh in Hamlet. \u201cEvery time I gave Ken a note I demonstrated it.\u201d Was he good at taking notes from you? \u201cYes, he was very generous with me. He said: \u2018Tell me what you want and I\u2019ll try to do it.\u2019 But I think Ken might have gone away and stuck pins in effigies of me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018He\u2019s much better at life than me\u2019 \u2026 Jacobi with his husband, Richard Clifford, at their home. Photograph: David Levene\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
\u201cDel hasn\u2019t directed since then,\u201d Clifford says, grinning.<\/p>\n
Jacobi\u2019s memoir is called As Luck Would Have It, and he repeatedly tells me how lucky he has been in life \u2013 his job, his success, Clifford, his parents. \u201cMy life has been full of fortunate incidents. I had the most glorious parents who gave me everything they could.\u201d He starts to weep. \u201cAnd now I\u2019m going to burst out crying,\u201d he says apologetically.<\/p>\n
Does he cry a lot? \u201cActors\u2019 gift,\u201d he says with a smile. Humans cry a lot too, I say. \u201cActors are humans,\u201d he shoots back.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know. Miaowwww,\u201d Clifford says.<\/p>\n
At the age of 21, Jacobi told his mother he was gay. It was an unusual and brave move at the time. His mother said she knew, and insisted it was a stage he was going through.<\/p>\n
Clifford had a small part in Russell T Davies\u2019s devastating Aids drama It\u2019s A Sin, set in the 1980s. I ask them what life was like in that decade. \u201cWe lost so many friends. It was terrifying,\u201d Clifford says. \u201cWhen young people die it\u2019s so shocking. And you think of your own mortality.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a terrible plague time we lived through,\u201d Jacobi says. \u201cIt was like we were being punished for some reason.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clifford: \u201cWell, only that we were told it was a gay thing, but of course it wasn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jacobi: \u201cGay plague, yes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018I say, I went to bed with him twice\u2019 \u2026 Jacobi as Francis Bacon and Daniel Craig as his lover George Dyer in 1998\u2019s Love is the Devil. Photograph: Ronald Grant<\/p>\n
Was he frightened that he might get infected? \u201cNo. I don\u2019t know why, but I wasn\u2019t,\u201d Jacobi says. \u201cI think that\u2019s because we didn\u2019t play around. That was safe,\u201d Clifford says.<\/p>\n
Jacobi, who had a near-photographic memory, announced in 2022 he was retiring from live theatre because he was struggling to remember lines. But he\u2019s not entirely quit the stage. He and Clifford now do a two-man show in which Clifford quizzes him about his life, and fills in the gaps when they appear. As for TV and movies, he\u2019s still very much available for work.<\/p>\n
One of his best roles was as artist Francis Bacon<\/a> in the 1998 John Maybury biopic Love is the Devil. Jacobi\u2019s Bacon is masochistic (his lover George Dyer, played by Daniel Craig, whips him and stubs cigarettes out on him), cruel, permanently pissed, supremely sardonic and cursed with self-loathing.<\/p>\n At the time of filming, Jacobi was pushing 60 and Craig was 30. Jacobi tells me that he and Reid, who was also cast as an older lover of a character played by Craig in the 2003 film The Mother, compete about how many times they have slept with the actor who went on to be James Bond. \u201cAnnie says, I went to bed with Daniel Craig. And I say, I went to bed with him twice.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n In his latest film, Moss and Freud<\/a>, Jacobi plays Bacon\u2019s contemporary Lucian Freud, a man just as solipsistic. The movie is about the unlikely friendship between Kate Moss and the painter, who can transform from tender to tempestuous in seconds.<\/p>\n