Nicolas Cage recalls ‘obnoxious’ interview with Terry Wogan

‘It was incredibly absurd and irreverent,’ actor said

Nicolas Cage has reflected on his absurd 1990 interview with veteran broadcaster Terry Wogan, in which he somersaulted on stage, threw money into the studio audience, and ripped off his T-shirt.

The actor, 61, had been booked on Wogan’s BBC chat show to promote David Lynch’s romantic crime-thriller Wild at Heart, which won the Palme d’Or at the 1990 Cannes Film Festival.

Speaking to The Guardian, Cage said of the bizarre TV interview: “I remember Terry Wogan was a very nice man and I enjoyed the interview with him, although I thought I was both obnoxious and somewhat wild.

“I guess it’s no secret that I was promoting a movie called Wild at Heart, so I was sort of play acting to that.”

In the film, Nicolas Cage and Laura Dern play Sailor and Lula, a young couple running away from Lula’s controlling mother, who hires a hitman to kill Sailor.

On his decision to wear nothing but a leather jacket for the interview, the actor said: “I remember, as a child, I was in a car, a guy was walking down the street, and he had a leather jacket on and no shirt on underneath. I thought: ‘Well, that’s an interesting look.’

“I don’t know why that came back to me when I went on Terry’s show, but I thought, ‘I’m going to create that look again.’ It was incredibly absurd and irreverent. I don’t have that leather jacket any more.”

Nicolas Cage during his interview with Terry Wogan in 1990 (BBC/Wogan)

Wogan – who died of cancer in 2016, aged 77 – was frequently asked about the peculiar interview before his death but he never commented on the ordeal.

In 2016, Cage told Empire that he didn’t think the broadcaster appreciated his method approach to the interview, stating: “I don’t think Mr Wogan was too amused. ​​But I think later, as his career continued to be as illustrious as it was, he was kind of proud of it too.”

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Wogan’s television career spanned 50 years and included appearances on Eurovision, Children in Need and Wake up to Wogan on BBC Radio 2. He was knighted by the Queen in 2005 for services to broadcasting.