We were very sad to hear the news that the great Canadian actor, Donald Sutherland, has died at the age of 88 after a long illness. He was the star of well over 100 films including Don’t Look Now, Kelly’s Heroes, M.A.S.H and The Hunger Games, but Kate Bush fans will of course always remember Donald for his appearance in the Cloudbusting video in 1985, playing the role of Wilhelm Reich. We send our condolences to his family and friends. A brilliant actor.
Donald spoke about making the video with Dazed in 2015: “Barry Richardson, who was the hairdresser on Nic Roeg’s Don’t Look Now, asked me if I’d do a music video with Kate Bush. I told him no and we went on to other conversations. A couple of days later there was a knock on my door. I lived in the Savoy Hotel (in London). On the river. Suite 312. I loved it there. So cosseted. So private. Only the floor butler rang the door. I opened it. There was no one there. I heard a voice saying hello and I looked down. Standing down there was a very small Kate Bush. Barry had told her where I lived. What can you do? She wanted to explain what her video was about. I let her in. She sat down, said some stuff.
All I heard was ‘Wilhelm Reich’. I’d taken an underground copy of his The Mass Psychology of Fascism with me when I went to film (Bernardo) Bertolucci’s Novecento in Parma. Reich’s work informed the psychological foundations of Attila Mellanchini, the character Bernardo had cast me to play. Everything about Reich echoed through me. He was there then and now he was here. Sitting across from me in the person of the very eloquent Kate Bush. Synchronicity. Perfect. She talked some more. I said OK and we made ‘Cloudbusting’. She’s wonderful, Kate Bush. Wonderful. I love that I did it. (What do I remember) about doing it? I remember being in the car and the hill and them taking me, taking Reich, away and looking back through the back window of the car and seeing her, seeing Reich’s son Peter, standing there.“
In 1985 interviews (and ever since) Kate expressed her delight and good fortune at having secured Donald to play the part in her film: “When we were thinking about someone to play the part of the father, we just sort of instantly came up with Donald Sutherland, and everyone laughed, because it’s like, you know, he’s one of the greatest actors in the world, really, and we jokingly thought “yeah, yeah wouldn’t it be great.” So we did actually approach his agent, who immediately said no, he couldn’t because he’s just too busy. But a friend of ours knew a friend of his, who asked him, and he gave us three days of his time in between shooting two other films. And I still can’t believe he did it.
It was a wonderful thing for him to do, give us that time. Made it a very, very special thing for me…I still can’t get over the fact that he did it! It was great! It means a lot to people that someone who is supposedly so famous and inaccessible makes the effort to make themselves accessible for such a little project. I was extremely moved by the fact that he did it; it meant a tremendous amount to me. And to work with him – Jesus, I thought I would never have the luck. I was his co-star! Ridiculous!…He puts out such an energy of sensitivity to the situation that I just had to re-act to him. He was – As far as I was concerned, whenever we were shooting, he *was* my dad. He’s wonderful.”
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