VINCENT SPANO ON CREATOR WITH PETER O'TOOLE

Peter O'Toole with Vincent Spano in the 1985 science comedy CREATOR

You would think by the poster and promotions that CREATOR, a quirky romantic comedy starring the late Peter O’Toole as a neurotic university scientist who yearns to clone his deceased wife, would center mostly on his friendship turned budding romance with Mariel Hemingway, who he uses to plant the seed, as it were, and eventually falls for… 

But the real co-star is sidekick Vincent Spano as Boris, a creative student that O’Toole’s Dr. Harry Wolper hires, works side by side with, and eventually helps connect to gorgeous co-ed Barbara, played by Virginia Madsen… 

Spano showers with Madsen

You’ve appeared with a lot of beautiful actresses, but the one time I was the most jealous is the shower scene with Virginia Madsen… 

We all knew that scene was gonna be a lotta fun from the script… Because the way it was written. It was a lot of fun… And Jeremy Levin was a tremendous writer… And director… He went on to direct DON JUAN DeMARCO. The kind of situation in the shower was a perk, on top of it being a really funny, well-written scene… But Virginia was a trouper and I think both of us had fond memories of working on that film with Peter O’Toole.

What was it like acting with the legendary Peter O’Toole? 

Can you imagine? I was such a big fan of his… I was twenty-one years old… I watched all his films knowing I was gonna work with him, but then I stopped myself… I had to take him down off this pedestal... To work with him as a person and just be the character, and relate to him as the character and not this God of Acting, both stage and film… LAWRENCE OF ARABIA was like, whew!

But we got along real well… I would sit in his trailer a lot… A lot… We became really good friends. He would tell this young boy all these great stories about his childhood, growing up in Ireland… About what happened in England during World War II… The whole story about being cast in LAWRENCE OF ARABIA and his relationship with David Lean… It was just great…What can I say?

Peter O'Toole with Vincent Spano