Bob Hoskins was robbed at the Cannes Film Festival. But he's too nice a guy to get off-color about it.

Not that there aren't a few salty words the brilliant North London-born Cockney actor could muster if he wanted.

What he lost at Cannes earlier this year was a best actor prize that should have been guaranteed him for his magnificent work in Atom Egoyan's "Felicia's Journey." Instead, to boos from the audience, the Palm went to first-time, non-professional actor Emmanuel Schott, mutely playing a slow-witted provincial cop in Bruno Dumont's powerful "L'Humanite."

As novelist William Trevor's fascinating character Joseph Hilditch -- a seemingly warmhearted Midlands Birmingham catering manager who is a secret serial killer -- Hoskins gives one of the performances of his life, while helping first-time film actress Elaine Cassidy to heights of her own. Subtle where Hoskins is often explosive, genteel where he's usually rough, Hilditch was a beautifully observed and complex monster, a soft-spoken fiend who videotapes his victims before killing them with kindness and who takes over the life of helpless Irish pilgrim Felicia (Cassidy).

The Cannes decision was a disgrace. But Hoskins, after all, is an accidental actor himself: a lower-class Bury St. Edmunds bloke who fell into the profession by chance when he was mistakenly asked to read for the lead in a play, "The Feather Pluckers," while accompanying a friend to auditions. Hoskins won the lead, got great notices and an agent, and since then has easily navigated a career that includes legendary work on stage (as Nathan Detroit in "Guys and Dolls"), movies ("The Long Good Friday," "Mona Lisa," "Who Framed Roger Rabbit") and on TV (in the original "Pennies From Heaven" and as Iago to Anthony Hopkins' Moor in the peerless BBC "Othello").

Now there is "Felicia's Journey," which surely will get better treatment from other juries.

Hoskins can project such volcanic machismo and rage (as with his signature role, the hyperbolic mob boss Harold of "Long Good Friday") that it's a surprise to note how small (5 feet 6 inches), considerate and gentle he is in person. You can still see (and hear) the old North Londoner though -- especially when he launches into one of the many expletive-laced flights we've had to delete here.

One cannot properly imagine or convey this actor or his rhythm and soul without that most popular of all Anglo-Saxon four-letter words. When he uses them, Hoskins can make those four letters, like all his roles, ring with truth and humor.

Q: How do you research a part like Hilditch?

Hoskins: I didn't. I didn't research it at all.

Q: You just leapt into his skin?

Hoskins: Working with Atom is extraordinary, so intense. We worked it out that the only way I could play Hilditch was by playing two people at the same time.

Q: The man Joseph and the child Joey?

Hoskins: Yeah. Joey . . . Joseph is the surface. Joey is inside him . . . He is a bit difficult, because to start off, he's a pacifist. He's not a Satan. He doesn't like hurting people. He's asexual. So he doesn't get any joy, any sexual thing, from (killing) these girls.

Q: What does he get his pleasure from?

Hoskins: Serving. Serving. Serving. Like, in the videos with his mother (a TV gourmet cook played by Egoyan's wife, Arsenee Khanjian). Her world is her show. And the only way he can be part of her world is to serve her. And be a nice boy.

Q: Did you have lots of rehearsal on "Felicia's Journey"?

Hoskins: No, we didn't. About a week's preparation. And then they went off to Ireland to film the Irish bits. And then they came back . . . Pretty nerve-racking, as you can imagine. I've only ever worked once before that character-intensive. And that was with (director) Jonathan Miller, as Iago, with "Othello." I actually lived in (Miller's) house! (Laughs)

Q: How did you interpret Iago?

Hoskins: I approached it as a sort of sharp-talking thug. I saw him as a thug.

Q: Why does he hate Othello?

Hoskins: Because he's black.

Q: Racism?

Hoskins: Oh, yeah, There's racism. There's also . . . if you look at the structure of the play, all Othello's lines are poetry. All Iago's lines are prose. His language is quite guttural . . . He's a social psychopath. And he's got that kind of thing driving him where nothing is ever good enough. So he says "(forget) it." He'll (just) create trouble. That's him.

It's also terrible jealousy. Like: "Who is this guy? Look at him. He's the boss . . . I should be the boss."

Q: Was it hard to keep the part of Hilditch in control?

Hoskins: It was a very interesting challenge. It was like building a house with all matchsticks and no glue. He could fall apart at any time. The thing about Hilditch is that he's a victim. Felicia is a victim to his kindness. He's a victim to Felicia's innocence.

Q: What do you like doing more, film or stage?

Hoskins: I like all of it. It's a very different technique. To work with an audience is great, to get that actual response: I think an actor should go back on the stage every now and again, to reassess what he's doing. The last thing I did on stage, 17 years ago I did "Guys and Dolls." Nathan Detroit, the National (Theatre). And I didn't go back until two years ago . . . The things, the tricks, the little things that you play off -- as you get older, they change. So you've got to reassess yourself. Act your age . . . And the only way you can do that is in front of a live audience.

Q: Your best stage part?

Hoskins: The best experience I ever had on stage was in "Guys and Dolls." We were at the National (the Royal National Theatre of Great Britain). And there's the posh row, you know: the furs, the minks, the tiaras, the diamond sort of row. It was right in front, but about three back. And I came in and said, "(expletive)!" Because at the time there were big protests about doing "Guys and Dolls" at the National. People were saying the National is for classics (only).

"Guys and Dolls" ain't a (expletive) classic? What are you talking about? But anyway, the (backstage people) said: "There's a dame in the front row. Watch out: She's out to protest!"

So I got the company together and said: "Right! Aim the show at her. Aim the whole (expletive) show at her." And we did. Cosh! By the end of the show this old dame was up with her (expletive) mink stole up in the air: She was gone. We had her! If we can crack you, darling, we can crack anybody!

Q: What was your background before acting?

Hoskins: I didn't get on in school very well. (North London.) I was very popular with the kids. I was always a sort of popular kid. But the teachers didn't (take) to me that much. I had one teacher, Mr. Jones -- I sometimes see him now, have a drink with him -- he taught me to read books. Put me onto literature.

I left school, went to an office, I was a porter at Covent Garden, I was in the Norwegian Merchant Navy for two weeks, I was a plumber's mate, I was a window cleaner. I studied for three years to be an accountant, got halfway through and said "(expletive), I'm turning into all the people I hate!"

Q: Were there actors who influenced you at the beginning?

Hoskins: Michael Caine! He opened the doors for all the chaps. Because they didn't have working-class types before, in lead roles. I started and everybody said you've got to take elocution lessons and fencing lessons.

Then I realized that acting, that drama, is about private moments that they don't see. And what you need to play these private moments is an emotional honesty, which men haven't got. Women do. But men are not emotionally honest. Men are usually easygoing nice guys or they're (expletive) off; one of the two. But women have it. Typical example: I actually learned to act by watching women, especially my mom. They've got this incredible emotional honesty. It's got nothing to do with femininity, It's just an honesty.

Q: What was your best acting experience in movies?

Hoskins: "The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne" (1987) with Maggie Smith. You see, I was (coming off a tough period) and I thought: "I'll just follow Maggie." I thought I'd just watch her. We started the scenes. And she said, "Darling, I'm not a horse, and you're not a carriage. Pull your own weight, darling. We're in this film to work together. Come on." And after that, we ate the (expletive) scenery together, you know what I mean?

Copyright 1999 Chicago Tribune