Taggart actor Alex Norton on why he wants to turn spotlight on acclaimed Scottish film director Bill Douglas

Actor Alex Norton describes the ­opportunity to work with acclaimed film director Bill Douglas as a dream come true.

The Two Doors Down and Taggart star worked with the filmmaker in what turned out to be Bill’s last film, Comrades, in 1986.

The Midlothian director died five years later from cancer, aged just 57, and, despite making only four movies in his career, interest in his work continues to grow more than three decades after his death.

Alex features in a new ­documentary, Bill Douglas: My Best Friend, which receives its UK premiere at Glasgow Film Festival next month.

‘Bill Douglas should’ve been revered’

Speaking to The Sunday Post, the actor said: “I think Bill is one of Scotland’s outstanding film directors. He should have been revered.

“He was well known and admired by film buffs but, as far as box office, he made art films and there’s never money in that.”

Bill Douglas came to the fore with his acclaimed series of autobiographical films in the 1970s – My Childhood, My Ain Folk and My Way Home.

Alex said: “I’d watched his trilogy and they blew me away, I hadn’t seen anything like them. I thought he was the bee’s knees, so the opportunity to be in one of his films was a dream come true.

“Working with him on Comrades, which was about the Tolpuddle Martyrs, was an extraordinary experience. I’ve never worked with anyone like him before or since.”

© David Appleby/Film Four/Nffc

While Alex features in the new documentary, he is not the main voice. Instead, Bill’s story is told through the eyes of his lifelong companion and best friend, Peter Jewell.

The two men came from different backgrounds – Bill was born into poverty in Newcraighall, Midlothian, in 1934, and Peter had a more comfortable upbringing in Devon – but they instantly hit it off when they met during National Service in Egypt in the 1950s.

“There was a cinema at our camp, the Astra, and we were both film fans, so we would often go together to watch films,” Peter said. “In Bill’s film, My Way Home, the two characters, Jamie and Robert – based on us – queued to see the Marilyn Monroe film, Niagara, which is ­something that happened.

“I was demobbed before Bill, but he sent me a letter, which I still have, saying it would be a pity to lose touch and we should meet up again later. If he hadn’t done that, I dare say we wouldn’t have remained friends for the next 40 years.”

Memories and movies

The pair later shared a flat together in London and began collecting early and pre-cinema memorabilia, tens of thousands of items that are now part of the Bill Douglas Cinema Museum at Exeter University.

Bill also began experimenting with an 8mm camera gifted to him by Peter, making amateur short films throughout the 1960s, which led to Bill attending film school.

Six of those mini-movies will be shown on a cinema screen for the first time at the Glasgow Short Film Festival next month, with Peter in attendance.

© David Appleby/Film Four/Nffc/Shutterstock

“We made 20 home movies, as I call them,” Peter recalled. “We made them just for fun, with friends and neighbours, to watch together and have a laugh. When I watched them again after 50 years, I was amazed at the diversity; there are no two alike.

“They were never made to be shown to a wider audience, so I don’t know what people will think of them.”

An important part of British movie ­history, they show signs of the flair and attention to detail that would become Bill’s trademark in the likes of Comrades.

Alex remembers meeting Bill for the first time and being taken aback.

“His background isn’t unlike mine, so I expected to meet someone more like me,” he said. “But he was different from that – an urbane, educated, well-spoken man and it took me back a bit, not at all what I expected.”

Bill’s story

Peter is overjoyed to see renewed interest in his friend and hopes it might lead to a biographer writing Bill’s story.

He added: “I started to write a book about my soul friend after he died and I called it See You In The Morning, which was what I said to him each night when he came here to my house for the last three weeks and three days of his life.

“I’d completed eight chapters – it was going to be a dual autobiography with his writing in there as well – but I wrote it on an old Amstrad computer, which is now kaput. I would love to read it again.

“Bill’s reputation seems to be growing more than 30 years after his death. It’s very gratifying. I think the reason why is because the films are bloody good. He had his own ideas of how he wanted to make films and he wasn’t conventional.

“It takes longer for that type of film to be recognised, rather than the entertainment type of film that everyone shouts about but forgets the following year.”

For Alex, a comment Bill made remains dear to him. “Peter told me that Bill said I was his favourite actor,” Alex smiled. “I’ll carry that and frame it in my heart forever. If I never did anything else, I would know Bill Douglas thought of me as his favourite actor and that’s the highest compliment I can think of.”

Bill Douglas: My Best Friend, Glasgow Film Festival, March 8. Bill Douglas: Unseen Super 8, Glasgow Short Film Festival, March 20