Hello, I'm Krestey Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive.

For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

The program was originally broadcast in 1999, and the presenter was Sue Lolly. My castaway this week is an actor in a range of important roles he's demonstrated a

versatility and breadth of talent which has attracted the admiration of Hollywood and

the London stage alike. He calls the theatre his base camp and in

classic roles including a much acclaimed hamlet he secured it safely. Beyond this

as the psychopathic Nazi in Schindler's list as the passionate count in the English

patient and as the fraudulent academic in Quiz Show he's shown that he knows how to be

a star as well. The eldest of six children, his decision to become an actor, didn't

crystallize until quite late, but that's proved no obstacle to his success. Of acting, he says,

I like the hideawayness of it.

I've often thought that I feel more secure in a part than I do in everyday life.

He is Rafe Fines.

It's all happened quite quickly, Rafe.

The films one mentions in conjunction with your name have all been made in in the 1990s

Was Schindler's list the big break the one that made you bankable as they say? Yes, I suppose it must have been I had in fact done one

television film playing T. E. Lawrence and a version of Wothering Heights which

didn't go down particularly well.

And I think at that time I thought I'd blown it, that's it.

It's not, I'm going to go back to the theatre and

it's not going to work for me on film.

And then I was asked to meet Stephen.

...