| He was to find that, for him, the cure was so straightforward as to make a mockery of his 25 years of suffering. He turned to Dr. Marisa Viegas, a Harley Street hypnotherapist and a close friend. After four sessions with Viegas, Lawson began to feel the constant buzz of anxiety and fear loosen its grip. He felt re-energized and found himself beginning to write scripts for short films. It sounds like a miracle cure, a rather bathetic, not to say convenient, coda to so many years of darkness. "I know," he laughs. "Tell me about it! It took four weeks, there were no drugs involved and I was extremely lucky. It felt like a process of mental mending. Marisa described it as allowing your subconscious to re-file itself. Also I followed her advice, I became very pensive and quiet and tried to let a lot of stuff in my mind unblock itself. And it's been fantastic. "I’m much more levelled now. I make sure I enjoy myself. I also attended some workshops by Jack Black, the motivational speaker, and those were very helpful. I suppose the secret, banal as it may sound, is to ensure that everything is positive: use positive vocabulary, don't hang around with negative people. "Gradually train your subconscious to feel that way. There's no big mystical deal going on. I was lucky because was treated by a remarkable, very direct practitioner, to whom I owe a great deal, but anyone can do something similar." And this, says Lawson, is why he has decided to speak out: to make the point that if he can overcome depression, anybody can. "Like I say, depression is so common now, and part of this new philosophy I have is that it might help others to be positive themselves, by being upfront about what I went through. "It was a nightmare that I didn't really want to wake up from because I thought that, without the intensity of the depression, there might be an intensity missing from my work. Total rubbish, of course. The secret, if there is one, is to live in the present, thaf’s what I've learnt. The past is gone. You can't do much about the future. There's just here and now. And that's good enough for me." _________________________________________________________________________________ A stage for Lawson's views On Ewan McGregor: Ewan is what I'd call a precocious talent. Very similar to Albert Finney, who made it at 24, as Ewan has, then went on to do even more. He's very centred as a person and that allows him to be fearless as to how he's seen on screen. People ask if I get tired of having my name yoked to his so much and, honestly, the answer is no. We've always been very close, so it's just a natural progression. Our relationship is a very easy one, a lot of laughs. Its very nice, very gratifying. We're working on a film set in Scotland, a sort of rock'n'roll road movie, written with him in mind. On The Fabulous Bagel Boys: It’s at the opposite end of the spectrum from most cop shows, which is what attracted me to it. In terms of crime, the local superintendent wants a murder case, but he never gets it. In the show, my brother runs a Jewish deli, so there's a whole cultural side to the programme that has never been explored before, in Scotland at least. I've always been fascinated by Jewish culture but there's always a danger of getting these things wrong and offending people. So I went to a synagogue on the southside one Saturday morning and it was like walking into the Middle East. Very convivial, very open. The rabbi was from Brooklyn, his kids were running about. I don't play the character as particularly Jewish. It was important to me not to do some oy vey nonsense with lots of shrugging. On Star Wars: The Star Wars films were one of the least important jobs I've ever done, but in terms of response it has covered more than anything else. I just don't get it. Why would anybody want to write and say: “What a great performance." There was no performance! I sat in a chair, that’s all. It was acting by numbers, it's ludicrous really. I met a guy in an American bar five years ago who told me I'd changed his life, all that. Hello, is there anybody in there? I'm not remotely interested in doing the convention circuit. There were other actors involved who make a lot of money out of it, selling their autographs. I mean, guys who were never seen, guys who wore masks! Apparently my signature is one of the most valuable, because I so rarely sign Star Wars stuff. There are dolls of me floating around. I find it bewildering and slightly irritating. It has no relevance to me whatsoever, none. |