Steven Berkoff Quotes
A knighthood would be a bit too much. An OBE or an MBE or whatever they are called, one of those would be more elegant.
Greenstreet, Rosanna. "Q&A: Steven Berkoff." The Guardian, 14 Aug. 2010.
He felt that he couldn’t explain why he was awarded the medal so it would be a continuous source of embarrassment. An iconoclastic individual, Berg turned down the medal, apparently the only person to have ever done so. His exploits for which he was recognized included photographing Tokyo Harbor and determining that the Nazi’s were no far advanced in the development of the atomic bomb. He was the agent who was to assassinate Werner Heisenberg the German nuclear physicist if there was any significant progress towards a working bomb. He determined that is was not necessary by pretending to be a European scientist and actually interviewing Heisenberg and many other European scientists in Nazi occupied Europe.
He had and has since accepted awards and honors from professional organizations who honor their colleagues for their accomplishments. However, he objected to government granting honors in fields where a government was not competent, and worse, it harkened back to the nobility and titles of Europe before democracy. In his view, it is the people who should judge the government’s achievement and competence and not the other way around which he believes is fundamentally undemocratic. In America, although we hate titles, we have many honors bestowed on civilians by government. The Medal of Freedom for example and the Medals the government gives for nuclear and other science achievements.
Leslie Steven Berkoff is a British actor, author, playwright, theatre practitioner, and theatre director. As a film actor, he is best known for his performances in villainous roles, including the portrayals of General Orlov in the James Bond film Octopussy (1983), Victor Maitland in Beverly Hills Cop (1984), Lt. Col Podovsky in Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985) and Adolf Hitler in the TV mini-series War and Remembrance (1988—1989).
