There’s a very specific sort of personality that Ray Winstone brings to a production, and it’s a testament to his ability that not once has he ever felt like he’s been typecast, pigeonholed, or stuffed into a box he won’t be able to break out of.
After all, the actor has been working solidly for more than 45 years and has touched base with almost everything cinema has to offer, whether it’s awards-baiting prestige dramas and effects-heavy blockbusters or razor-sharp comedies and hard-boiled crime thrillers.
He must be doing something right if he’s been drafted in by the likes of Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Jonathan Glazer, and Robert Zemeckis, with the industry’s most celebrated cockney relying on his gruff and grizzled persona to keep him gainfully employed.
One of Winstone’s favourite movies is Scorsese’s seminal boxing drama Raging Bull, which boasts Robert De Niro on jaw-dropping form as Jake LaMotta, a performance that won him an Academy Award for ‘Best Actor’ and endures as one of the greatest turns ever given by any actor on-screen.
With that in mind, it’s not difficult to imagine the typically-stoic performer going red in the cheeks when a filmmaker compared him directly to De Niro, even if the production they worked on together isn’t on the same playing field as Raging Bull in any way, shape, or form.
“Ray Winstone is amazing, just amazing,” director Antoine Fuqua said to the BBC after his first encounter with the star on the set of big budget historical epic King Arthur. “The guy’s just like the De Niro of England. He’s Robert De Niro here, and he should be seen in the States more.”
The sweeping period piece came as part of the craze birthed by Ridley Scott’s Gladiator, a time when the subgenre became more popular than it had in decades. Like many of the spiritual successors, though, it was far from being a runaway success even if a box office tally of just over $200million wasn’t too bad all things considered given the $120m budget.
It was also Winstone’s first role in a costly slice of Stateside escapism, although he had dipped his toes into similar waters right beforehand after appearing in Anthony Minghella’s expansive war drama Cold Mountain. Playing the role of Arthurian warrior Bors, the part admittedly didn’t require a great deal more from the actor than doing his usual shtick of bellowing loudly, busting a few heads, and generally projecting a sense of intimidation.
Still, regardless of how mundane King Arthur proved to be in execution, Fuqua was so impressed with Winstone that he compared him to one of cinema’s greatest-ever actors. It definitely is not Raging Bull, but it was a feather in the cap nonetheless.