Date: 26th NOV 2025
Where: PJ’s Brasserie Chelsea
On the upper floor of PJ’s Brasserie in Chelsea, British playwright and actor Steven Berkoff spoke to an intimate crowd about his career on stage and on film in a dinner-discussion hosted by Matthew Steeple of Steeple Times.
Steven spoke for roughly 90mins and covered his early childhood, his passion for theatre and capped the event with an anecdote from his role as General Orlov in Octopussy.
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“I met Barbara Broccoli in London because they were looking for a Russian villain and I’m very good at accents. I can do any accent, Scottish, Itlaian, French, Irish, anything you like.
Barbara wanted to meet me, she said,
“By the way, when I was in LA, I saw your play Greek, and I really liked it.”
I said thank you Barbara. Nice to have met you. And I got the part because she liked the play.
When it came to filming Octopussy, I don’t have many anecdotes but I do remember my scene with Roger. We’re in the carriage. I was going through my lines that day. I couldn’t remember them. There was Roger Moore an international star. I got some stage fright. I had another hour to learn these lines. I was doing these exercises. I was so scared. Then a knock on the door and it was the stage manager.
“oh excuse me Mr Berkoff, the director sends his apologies we’re running behind. Would you mind if we do your scene tomorrow morning?”
I said thank God, he’s looked down on me.
I had a good sleep. I wasn’t so stressed about the lines. I got in the carriage. I delivered my lines perfectly, and Roger couldn’t remember his lines. I was so intense. And I kept so staring at him. Now I was feeling strong and powerful again, He had to record his dialogue line by line, word by word, with multiple cuts.” – STEVEN BERKOFF
