Perhaps Britain’s biggest cult actor, Malcolm McDowell boasts a CV of controversial classics – from 1968’s if… and Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange in 1972, to 1979’s oft-censored sex’n’sadism flick Caligula. More recently, he’s been seen in Rob Zombie’s Halloween movies and TV show Heroes. We caught up with the erstwhile Droog leader at the annual Sitges Film Festival where he was happy to entertain us with some stories about the old ultra-violence in between a few sips of fine vino…

Be honest: do you think you could make A Clockwork Orange today?
I think it’d be impossible if you took that script into a studio and tried to pitch it today…

I can just imagine the pitch: “We want to do a movie about a likeable rapist and murderer…”
Exactly! They’d look at you as if you were a complete nonce! And then throw you out of the building.

The film was blamed for a rise in violent gang cultures. How did you react to that?
It did feel weird when people started to copy it. I remember seeing a gang of Droogs – complete with bowler hats – coming out of a Tube station and thinking, “God, this could get us into some serious trouble…” I guess, in the end, you just have to accept that people really took to the movie. It was extraordinary to be a part of that.

Didn’t your eyes suffer for your art on A Clockwork Orange?
Yes! I scratched my corneas in the scene where they force my eyes open with these lid locks and make me watch violent videos. My eyes were supposed to be anaesthetised – I wasn’t supposed to feel anything. However, I bloody well did feel it when the locks slipped off and tore their way down my eyeballs.

At the Oscars, A Clockwork Orange was nominated for Best Film and Best Director, but it didn’t win either. That had to sting…
Of course it did – I was baffled. But it was an X-rated film and a lot of Academy members refused to see it. If you mention violence, rape and nudity then they don’t want any part of it. They’re puritanical. That’s why a good illness film – featuring the sickness-of-the-month – is a shoe-in. In those days, especially, it was all old Hollywood types running that thing…

What on earth attracted you to the ultra-perverse title role of Caligula?
Well, Gore Vidal wrote the script. He was a pretty good, well-respected writer and Caligula, of course, was notorious – when he took over, he emptied the city’s treasury in just one year! So there must’ve been some really great parties in Rome back then! In one instance they actually brought a complete carcass of a dinosaur from Russia. It’d been frozen and they cut the whole thing out, dragged it to Rome, cooked it and ate it at one of Caligula’s banquets. Now, can you imagine that?

Caligula was financed by Penthouse magazine, which must’ve indicated that it wasn’t exactly going to be an arthouse classic…
Gore Vidal actually said to me, “It’s being funded by this man called Bob Guccione.” I said, “Hmm, isn’t he a pornographer?” “Yes. He’s the guy who prints Penthouse, but just think of him as if he was Warner Bros. He just signs the cheques.” Now, I’ve never met a man as strange and perverse as Bob Guccione. But, you know, there’s no point looking back with any regret. It’s a cult film now, oddly enough.

Is it true that Helen Mirren got involved in Caligula through you?
Yes. I was working with her at the time and I said, “Helen, do you want to come to Rome for 12 weeks? I’ll get you 100,000 dollars.” She said, “Rome, darling? I’d love to!” So I went to the producers and said, “You have to hire Helen Mirren and you have to pay her 100,000.” They said, “What? That’s way too much.” But I put my foot down. Now 100,000 was way more than she ever got at the time…

How on earth can you live with corrupting our Helen like that?
Oh, Helen loves that film! I mean, Dame Helen in a porno – who would’ve thought it? It was fun to have her out in Rome, but I can’t say that the experience lingers as a pleasant one.

Another odd one was 1979’s Time After Time – where you travel through time trying to catch Jack The Ripper…
The stupidest thing an actor can do is fall in love with his leading lady and I did that on Time After Time! It’s a real no-no, but acting opposite me was this extraordinary creature from Arkansas – Mary Steenburgen. We fell in love, had two wonderful children and she’s excellent in the movie. I love Time After Time – more people should see it.

You starred in Rob Zombie’s Halloween remakes as Dr Loomis. Are there any more in the pipeline?
I don’t know where else they can take my character. I suppose I’ll wait and see what the script is like but, honestly, where else can you go after two films? They exhaust these things very quickly. They did seven sequels to the original Halloween, which is insane. I don’t want to be chasing after Michael Myers in another five movies!

Did you get along with Sir Rob?
Oh, he’s great – but I have a funny story about Rob. A friend of mine from Glasgow was over staying with me in LA when I was doing Halloween. She’s in her mid-50s and she went, “Rob Zombie? If I had a name like that I’d change it!” When he first walked in the room, with all these tattoos and his beard, I thought I was meeting Charles Manson!

Your latest role is in Book Of Eli. Care to tell us something about it?
It involves a sacred book and I pop up at in the end of it. I’m the library curator and am very integral to what happens. It’s a small-but-nice role.

Finally, going back to your most famous flick, can you give us your most perverse memory from A Clockwork Orange?
I remember shooting the rape with Adrienne Corri. We’d already lost two actresses for the role – one called in sick and said it was too humiliating – because it involved having to be perched, naked, on Warren Clarke’s (playing Dim the Droog) shoulders for weeks on end while Stanley decided which shot he liked the best.

So I went in one day and there was our new rape victim: Adrienne Corri. She said, “Well Malcolm, you’re about to find out that I’m a real redhead.” She was fantastic. She couldn’t have cared less about being bollock naked and no wonder: she had a great body!

 The Book Of Eli is out on 15 January