ALFRED MOLINA PULLS HIS OWN HOAX

Alfred Molina stars in The Hoax, the true story of writer Clifford Irving who bilked his publishing company for thousands of dollars in advance money claiming he had the inside skinny to write a biography on the reclusive Howard Hughes. Alfred plays his best friend and partner in crime researcher Dick Suskind.

Alfred has never been the victim of a hoax in real life but admits he tried to pull one over on the casting director to get the role of Cezar in Ladyhawke.

“I have to admit I have told the occasional white lie to get a job. I remember once being asked if I could ride a horse and I said, ‘yes, no problem,’ and I’d never been on a horse in my life. I arrived on the set on the first day of this film, I got the job and I arrived on the first day and they gave me this horse and I got up on this horse and I was terrified because this horse was a bit sort of frisky and get moving. And I was absolutely terrified and the stunt coordinator spotted me and said, ‘you’ve never been on a horse have you?’ and I said, ‘no,’ and he said, ‘get off, just get off.’”

Luckily Alfred pulled it off and even got hired years later by director Richard Donner for Maverick.

“In the end I didn’t have to do much riding. The director was very sweet. He employed me again after that many years later. I think he’d forgotten about that but at the time he was pretty pissed off.”

This summer Alfred is busy in television doing a TNT miniseries The Company and Shakespeare’s As You Like It directed by Kenneth Branagh for HBO.