Talking Tricky: Alan Cox, 'Frost/Nixon'

IT'S NOT SURPRISING that the British-born, American-dwelling Cox moves easily between screen ("Ladies in Lavender," "John Adams") and stage ("Translations," "Passion Play"): He's the scion of ubiquitous, versatile Scottish character actor Brian Cox. Known for his versatility, the younger Cox is currently summoning up celeb journo David Frost circa 1977. That's when the playboy/talking head famously conducted a series of intense interviews with disgraced former president Richard Nixon, in the process extracting the closest thing to a confession anyone ever got out of Tricky Dick.

» EXPRESS: Why reconsider the Nixon era now? How have Americans changed since then?
» COX: I've heard it said that it was a moment when people become more cynical. With the Nixon presidency, people got a wake-up call to hold their presidents responsible and to keep them in check. So, yes, I think that the ethics of the presidency are very much at the forefront of people's minds these days.

» EXPRESS: What's it like as a Brit, immersing yourself in this American story?
» COX: Well, I remember when I saw it on Broadway, I was sort of like getting a compressed history lesson about the Nixon administration. Now that I'm in the show, I know much more, but to be honest, I'm still a bit confused.

» EXPRESS: How'd you prepare for the role?
» COX: I put the audio of the interviews on my iPod and watched a bunch of Frost's old performances on YouTube. What's funny is that even watching him now — he works for Al Jazeera — he's still got that same desire to make conversation approachable. His skill is to open people up.

» EXPRESS: The power — and limits — of the media loom large in this play. Why was Frost able to get to Nixon when others couldn't?
» COX: It's funny. I think Nixon was in the government just as the media and television became much more a fact in everyone's lives. I think he tried to work with them. So it's almost ironic that someone trying to cooperate with the mass media was brought down by a newspaper!Then, in the interviews, Frost realized the importance of the close-up. In the moment when Nixon breaks, [Frost's] great scoop is for the cameras to pan to Nixon's face as he puts questions in his mouth.

» EXPRESS: Frost was known as both an entertainer and a journalist. Do we have a current-day equivalent?
» COX: Well, Frost started out as a kind of a Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert — a satirist out to outline the humbuggery of the day. This was a time when people respected the powers that be. He was famously anti-establishment like them.

» EXPRESS: So do you think we'll see a Couric-Palin sequel sometime soon?
» COX: Well, you could argue that those interviews did more damage to Palin than anything else. Maybe?

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Photo courtesy Carol Rosegg