King Ralph

Ralph Fiennes is the biggest movie star you've never heard of

British actor Ralph Fiennes has leapfrogged from drama school to the stage to television to the Hollywood big screen with astonishing alacrity. He now finds himself in a precarious and uncomfortable position: hovering on the brink of fame.

When we spoke he was in Poland, finishing up shooting Steven Spielberg's film version of the Thomas Keneally novel Schindler's List. Spielberg's Schindler's List features an international cast and stars Ralph (pronounced Rafe) as Nazi Amon Goeth, opposite Liam Neeson's Oskar Schindler.

"Amon Goeth was a [Nazi] commandant," explained Fiennes. "He was particularly brutal and had a reputation for sadism. Schindler develops a forced friendship with him. They are both black marketeers and they need each other.

From Goeth's point of view, it's a good friendship. But I think for Schindler it's more ambiguous." I asked what the shy young actor drew upon in himself to play such a ruthless character. "It's a leap of imagination playing any evil role," he said. "You're trying to get into their perception of themselves, not everyone else's. Amon Goeth doesn't perceive himself to be a personification of evil. Like lots of SS and Nazi people, he believes in what he is doing."

While making the Spielberg film, he was cast as another corrupt character, although one far less dark, in Quiz Show, also a big-budget period piece, this one directed by Robert Redford and set in the 1950s. Fiennes has a leading role as Charles Van Doren, the clean-cut quiz-show champ who became embroiled in a cheating scandal as a contestant on NBC's Twenty-one show. John Turturro plays Herbert Stempel, the opposing contestant who blows the whistle on Van Doren and the show.

Fiennes is clearly not too comfortable talking to journalists, except when the topic is acting. "The acting process is complex. . . . It's an odd mix of something public that's incredibly private," he says. If these films are successful, Fiennes will have to get accustomed to a lack of privacy. The British press has already begun to herald him as the next Daniel Day-Lewis, and the comparison clearly rankles him. "Comparisons are odious. Each actor is what he is. I'm not the next anyone. I'm just myself,' ' he snaps, before returning to a gentle tone.

Fiennes comes into his blockbuster roles from the other end of the spectrum, having starred in The Baby of Macon, artfilm director Peter Greenaway's new movie. Before acting, he studied painting for a year at Chelsea School of Art. Then he was accepted to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and in 1987, two years after graduating, he was asked to join the company at the National Theatre. From there he was picked up by the Royal Shakespeare Company for two seasons, where he received praise for his Henry VI and Troilus.

Fiennes had a number of parts in various made-for-TV films and the lead as Heathcliff in a Paramount remake of Wuthering Heights, which the studio deemed unreleasable and swept under a rug. The film, which was released in England, received reviews which ran from tepid to bad. ' 'The evidence on screen so far is inconclusive," said one critic. ''On the classical stage, however, he can be astonishing."

It isn't so much a question of whether Fiennes is talented as it is one of his being cast in the right role for his talent to be revealed to its full extent. Even though the publicity machine is creating a palpable whir around him, Fiennes still has both feet planted firmly on the ground. Now that he's finished filming Quiz Show, he has returned to his modest home in South London. But if his career's upward trajectory continues, he may not get to stay there for long.

ELISE MAIBERGER