Show People: The strong silent type: 39. Iain Glen

NOT MANY actors six years out of drama school have climbed into bed with Charlotte Rampling (in Paris by Night), sulked at Sigourney Weaver (Gorillas in the Mist) and discovered the source of the Nile (Mountains of the Moon). This summer Iain Glen's Aufidius in Coriolanus proved a threatening adversary - in terms of reviews - to the show's star, Kenneth Branagh. And now he makes his first stab (since panto at Birmingham Rep, that is) at a character in a comedy.

Or rather two characters in a comedy. The role is that of young Marlow in Oliver Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer, and according to Glen, the character has a split personality. 'With a woman of sophistication, class and modesty and refinement, I become a totally tongue-tied buffoon. I can't even look her straight in the face. But with women of a different class - of a lower order, shall we say - I can't restrain my libido. I try to bed them as soon as possible.'

The show is directed by Peter Wood for the Chichester Festival Theatre. Glen says Wood told the cast the audience were buying a ticket to 2 1/2 hours of the 18th century; they wanted to be transported. For some of the Chichester audience, this journey won't be very long, but those who make it will find themselves in reassuringly familiar surroundings: Dennis Quilley plays the father of the beautiful girl, Jean Boht (from Bread) is his wife and Jonathon Morris (also from Bread) is the trouble-maker who leads Glen astray.

I met Glen in the distinctly libido-less atmosphere of the theatre clubroom, the day of the technical rehearsal. He was restless. 'You get to a period in rehearsal where you'd like an audience. Especially with a comedy, when you get used to what each other is doing and it doesn't seem quite so funny. There's a silence now that shrouds each run-through.'

There's also a silence that shrouds our conversation. Glen expresses a healthy dislike of 'crapping on' about himself. The alternative, unfortunately, is to gush about colleagues. As he heaps praise on Wood, Branagh and Judi Dench, I get the feeling that neither of us is really listening to what he's saying. He looks so familiar. It's partly because of The Fear, the Euston Films series about a north London yuppie racketeer, which plastered his face around Underground stations a few years ago. But it's also because the Action Man jaw, the earnest eyebrows and crinkled forehead keep reminding me of Paddy Ashdown.

Ask Glen a simple question about himself, like how old he is, and he breaks out in hesitations. 'Ummm . . . I . . . am . . . 30, 31, 31.' Ask a more involved question, such as whether he would like to work in Hollywood, and the discomfort becomes positively baroque. This is the answer on tape: 'But um, but er, no, so, I mean, it, I don't, I don't think, but it was um . . . no, yes . . . no, I mean, I mean it was just um, not, er . . . it suits, it suits some, some actors.' You work it out. Was that a yes or a no? It's hard not to like an actor who so obviously prefers to work with other people's lines.

The son of the managing director of the Scottish Investment Trust, Glen was educated ('for ever') at the Edinburgh Academy before going to Aberdeen University. He has two elder brothers. One is artistic director at Dundee Rep; the other works for Warburg's, the merchant bank. Two years through his English course at Aberdeen, Glen was at the Edinburgh Festival playing Max in Bent when he was told he had to retake an exam. Then a review came out saying his Max was better than Ian McKellen's. Glen never went back. It's a mark of his singlemindedness that although he was already earning professional money as an actor in Taggart and elsewhere, he went on to do three years at Rada, where his classmates included Imogen Stubbs, Jane Horrocks and Ralph Fiennes.

In the six years since, Glen has never been out of work. His tall, febrile frame exerts a commanding stage presence. Directors praise his stillness, his confidence and his clarity of thought. Hamish, his brother in Dundee, says that he quickly mastered 'a steely-eyed, detached quality that equals menace', but his technique has now sharpened to the point where 'emotionally and psychologically, he can turn on a sixpence'.

Glen got married two weeks ago, but hasn't had time for a honeymoon. His wife is not complaining: she is Susannah Harker, a busy actress herself (Mattie in House of Cards), and also in She Stoops to Conquer, as Miss Hardcastle. They have most of their scenes together: it's Glen she's stooping to conquer.

They did take one day off rehearsals. 'Susie had two performances of Venus Observed on the Saturday. Then we travelled up to Edinburgh on the Sunday, were married on the Monday by my uncle who's a Presbyterian minister, and went back into rehearsal on the Tuesday.' Luvvies and marriage, it seems, go together like a horse and carriage.

'She Stoops to Conquer' is previewing now, opens Wed (0243-781312).

(Photograph omitted)