In his new film Master And Commander,Russell Crowe plays a daring Naval Captain in the Napoleonic wars. The handsome actor came face to face with a modern day Vice Admiral, however, when Prince Charles turned out for the UK premiere of the swashbuckling flick.
Among the honorary positions Charles holds are Naval Vice Admiral, Army Major-General and Air Vice-Marshal. But he opted to wear a simple dinner suit, rather than one of his uniforms, when he came along to meet Russell and his pregnant wife Danielle Spencer at the screening.
And it seems the Australian hunk is not a natural sailor, as he had to overcome a tendency to get seasick in order to make the movie. "I did quite a lot of work at the beginning of the film getting on every boat I could," he said. "Somewhere in there, I do not remember when, probably about 270 miles south-west of Fiji, I said 'I'm not getting seasick, I don't think it's bothering me any more'."
It's a good thing that Russell did manage to find his sea legs, as the production was no place for lovers of terra firma. "We were soaked, we were absolutely soaked for about 11 days," revealed his co-star James D'Arcy. "They had massive dump tanks, which were like big barrels on a slide. They opened themselves up and you saw the water about half a second before it came."
"I have to say that the costumes were not exactly water resistant so once you were wet at about nine o'clock in the morning, that was it. You just stayed wet for the rest of the day."
Other celebs who came along to the Leicester Square screening included Jerry Hall, Bill Wyman, violinist Vanessa Mae and actor Richard E Grant.
Photo: © Alphapress.com
Photo: © Alphapress.com
