<\/p>\n
I wish every celebrity were as gloriously unfiltered and rude as Brian Cox.<\/p>\n
Hollywood would be a lot more exciting instead of the navel-gazing snoozefest it\u2019s become.<\/p>\n
In interviews, the vicious \u201cSuccession\u201d star goes to town cruelly slagging off co-workers, other actors and directors. Anybody really. Without fail, the 79-year-old speaks his combative, brutal mind.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It\u2019s pass-the-popcorn entertaining.<\/p>\n
Brian Cox let it rip in a new interview with the Times of London. BACKGRID<\/span><\/p>\n For instance, this week, he told The Times of London<\/a> that Margot Robbie is \u201ctoo beautiful\u201d for the role of Cathy in \u201cWuthering Heights\u201d and mocked her Australian accent. Why? Why not?!<\/p>\n He went on to say that Quentin Tarantino is a bad director of actors: \u201cWhat you see is all Quentin Tarantino.\u201d Who cares that it\u2019s been seven years since Tarantino last directed a movie? Brian\u2019s furious!<\/p>\n In the past, Cox has targeted Johnny Depp, Ian McKellen and even his \u201cSuccession\u201d co-star Jeremy Strong\u2019s method acting.<\/p>\n Some might call him mean. I call him terrific fun.<\/p>\n Because actors, by and large, are now exceedingly vanilla and robotic in public. Phony. Vacuous. Boring. I\u2019m often asked if the best part of my job is speaking to stars. Nope. I actually rank my office\u2019s free air conditioning way above that.\u00a0<\/p>\n Interviewing celebs is a chore, actually. Bold-facers rarely say anything interesting anymore because they live in constant fear of stepping out of bounds or being canceled. Getting them off-script is akin to the surgical extraction of molars.<\/p>\n Cox said Margot Robbie was \u201ctoo beautiful\u201d to play Cathy in \u201cWuthering Heights.\u201d WireImage<\/span><\/p>\n The Hollywood press machine has turned into a forced exercise of empty-headed bullet points and repeated sterile anecotes.<\/p>\n You know the drill. Actors appear on dusty old talk shows, giggle about how much fun it was working with Matthew McConaughey, do a dumb skit and roll the clip.\u00a0<\/p>\n More and more, they go on podcasts hosted by other entertainers and friends who make them sound funny, ask gentle questions about their childhood and, crucially, allow slip-ups to be edited out later.<\/p>\n They are media trained to within an inch of their life and more protected than presidents in a war zone.\u00a0<\/p>\n Bette Davis (right) complained about Joan Crawford (left) to the press. Ronald Grant Archive \/ Mary Evan<\/span><\/p>\n Big mouths used to be essential to showbiz. Most notoriously, Bette Davis went on \u201cThe Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson\u201d to rail against Joan Crawford for scheming her out of an Oscar for \u201cWhat Ever Happened To Baby Jane?\u201d<\/p>\n Joan Rivers made a meal out of ruthlessly mocking the birdbrained famous. Elizabeth Taylor was a favorite target.<\/p>\n Jay Leno, for all his faults, memorably got Hugh Grant to open up about getting caught with a hooker and being arrested in 1995 by asking \u201cWhat the hell were you thinking?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n These days, a subject so dramatic would be a no-go zone. <\/p>\n Diana Rigg famously spoke to the press about her costar Lauren Ambrose skipping Sunday performances.<\/p>\n Broadway\u2019s just as buttoned up with rare, fabulous exceptions. <\/p>\n There was 2018, when Dame Diana Rigg privately complained that her \u201cMy Fair Lady\u201d co-star Lauren Ambrose was taking Sundays off. She then doubled down to The Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m flying the old flag for a generation of actors who performed even when they were at death\u2019s door,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n