"If you're a movie star, you get the girl, you lose the girl, and then you get her back," Caine said.
"But if you're a character like me, you lose the girl, then you get another one, then you get another one, then you lose them all, then you lose your life. It's all very different. And it's fascinating for me."
He continued: "It's [being] a movie actor, as opposed to movie star. And I remember when it happened to me. A producer sent me a script, and I sent it back and said, 'The part's too small. I don't want to play it'.
"And he sent it back and said, 'I didn't want you to play the lover; I wanted you to play the father'. And I thought, oh my god. I rushed in the bathroom, had a look in the mirror, and there wasn't the lover looking at me: There was the father."
Caine gained international fame for his roles in hit films like Alfie and The Italian Job, and later won two Academy Awards for Hannah and Her Sisters and The Cider House Rules.
It’s not like I’m counting or anything….OK, maybe I am, but we’re just 15 days away from the release the hugely-anticipated finale in Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, ‘The Dark Knight Rises.’ With that, Empire has posted a new interview with Sir Michael Caine – who’s marking his fifth collaboration with Nolan on the film – to talk all things ‘The Dark Knight Rises.’ Throughout Nolan’s Series, Michael Caine has portrayed Alfred, Bruce Wayne’s loyal butler, guardian, father figure, and above all, friend. Over the course of ‘Batman Begins’ and ‘The Dark Knight,’ Alfred has been an integral part of Bruce Wayne/Batman’s inner circle alongside Morgan Freeman’s Lucius Fox and Gary Oldman’s Commissioner Gordon. Commenting on his experience working with Christopher Nolan, Michael Caine reveals, “It’s fabulous. And of course, one of the greatest talents of a director is casting. I once said to John Huston when I was working with him on The Man Who Would Be King, “what is the talent of a director?” He said “casting”, and you look at the cast of actors that Chris has got. It’s absolutely wonderful every time. And this one, Dark Knight Rises, is no exception. He’s got one of my favourite new young British actors, Tom Hardy, who I saw on television a couple of years ago and I went, “who the bloody hell is that?” And he’s proved me right.”
On the topic of the huge scope of ‘The Dark Knight Rises,’ Michael Caine shed some light on his experience making it, “For me, it was incredible because the great thing about it was – and the secret of the success of this picture as opposed to those massive blockbusters out there – is the stunts and special effects are real. There is very, very little computer generated imaging in it. All these other ones you see a million people marching towards you, you know they’ve photographed ten and just kept doubling it up and up and up. In ours, when the stuntman falls off the roof, it’s a real man falling off the roof and hitting the bottom. And I think that is very important. It’s very human and I suppose the class of acting is a little better… For a start both Batman and the butler are Oscar-winners! (laughs). Gary Oldman, who’s the chief of police, nearly became one himself, do you see what I mean? So it’s a very high standard of acting, and a very high standard of reality. That’s the secret of that series, for me.”
Sir Michael Caine: “In my life I’ve always been so fortunate”
He's 78 years old, but movie legend Sir Michael Caine says lots of things in life make him feel years younger.
They include his grandchildren, his beautiful wife Shakira, his astonishing film career... and never looking at his own reflection.
“I don’t feel very old, but I never look in a mirror so I always think I’m about 38,” he laughs.
Forty years after marrying Shakira, Michael says they are as happy as the day they met.
He first saw the Miss World finalist in a TV ad for Maxwell House coffee. He was a bit of a playboy at the time with lots of girlfriends, but was instantly smitten.
Devoted... Michael and wife Shakira have been married for 40 years
He was about to fly out to Brazil to find her... until a mutual pal told him she lived a mile from him in London.
The friend gave him her number and they’ve been together ever since.
And at 65, Shakira is still amazingly beautiful.
“You should have seen her when she was 24,” he says.
“Oh we’re so romantic. We go off on little honeymoons. Every now and again we go off to a lovely hotel called the George V in Paris and have a weekend honeymoon away from everybody.
“Paris is our city. We always do the quote from Casablanca... Humphrey Bogart to Ingrid Bergman, she was saying goodbye and he says, ‘We’ll always have Paris.’ And that’s us two.”
Hardman.. Caine in Get Carter in 1971
Triple Oscar winner Michael, born Maurice Micklewhite into an impoverished family in Rotherhithe, South London, drifted to Paris as a young man.
“I know the city so well. I went there when I was very young and broke. I wound up selling frites on the streets on a hotdog stand.
“I made very good frites actually. And then I went back wealthier and wealthier and was able to stay in nicer and nicer places and to eat at all the great restaurants.”
You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off.. Caine in The Italian Job
After complaining that his two daughters were slow to give him grandchildren, Sir Michael and Shakira have recently acquired three, and he couldn’t be happier about it.
“I was 75 and suddenly got three grandchildren. My youngest daughter had a son and the next year she had twins. I’ve got two boys and a girl, so it’s perfect.
“You don’t quite know how wonderful it is until you get them. And then you become completely besotted with them.
“I am, and my wife is even worse. I’m just like the grandchildren now, playing Ben on the iPad. It’s great, fantastic.”
Sir Michael, who has appeared in some of the most memorable British movies of all time, has had one of the longest careers in the industry.
But of all his roles – from breakthrough part Lt Gonville Bromhead in 1964’s Zulu to the title character in 2009’s Harry Brown – it’s as Alfred Pennyworth, the Butler in Batman, that he’s most recognised for.
Dark Knight... with Christian Bale as Alfred Pennyworth in Batman
“There was a funny incident a little while ago,” he says. “I was walking along Piccadilly in London and there was a group of 12 Japanese teenagers.
“They all saw me and went nuts. They were all pointing at me and getting little bits of paper out saying, ‘Can we have your autograph?’ And I said, ‘What film have you seen me in?’ And they said, ‘You’re Alfred, Batman.’
“Tiny little Japanese girls and they all knew who I was. Isn’t that great?”
