These are iconic photographer Andy Gotts’ best celebrity portraits (and you can get them here)
He’s taken more photos than Annie Leibovitz, David Bailey and Lord Snowdon combined. These are the best, with the stories behind the shots
Andy Gotts has taken more photographs of A-List celebrities than Annie Leibovitz, David Bailey and Lord Snowdon combined — and he owes it all to a chance encounter.
Almost three decades ago, Joss Ackland took a punt on Gotts as a wedding photographer. This assignment led to the opportunity to shoot Greta Scacchi. And then Scacchi suggested someone else, who suggested someone else, who suggested someone else… The rest, as they say, is history.
"He owes it all to a chance encounter..."
“So Dustin Hoffman introduced me to Brad Pitt.” Gotts says (we have skipped a few steps here.) “Brad suggested Clooney. Clooney recommends me to Julia Roberts. Julia introduces Susan Sarandon. Susan said I should shoot Paul Newman…”.
In the years since, Gotts has ricocheted between hundreds of celebrity kitchens, hotel suites, lake houses (there was an incident at Lake Como, in fact, that almost did for George Clooney’s pet duck) private jets, walled gardens, living rooms and film set trailers. Along the way, he has taken some of the most striking portraits imaginable — always on his own, never with an entourage; with the minimum of kit and the minimum of fuss. One Shot Gotts, the one man band.
Many of these remarkable works have never been seen before. So take a look below, for here are the photographer’s favourites, his stories behind the shots, and where to buy the prints…
Kate Moss
There’s a few people you meet who you want to be exactly as you’ve always imagined them. I went to Kate Moss’s house at 10.30 in the morning, and she answered the door with a glass of white wine and a cigarette in her hand. That’s exactly how you want to be greeted by Kate Moss.
When you meet her, she’s so normal. She’s been photographed a million times, and retouched a million times. But with this shoot she knew it was going to be unedited — and she didn’t care one bit. She liked that. She knew she had wrinkles and spots and stretch marks. She looks her age, which is great. I don’t want Kate Moss to look 20. I want her to look in her 40s — that’s the reality. Maybe you can see furrow lines and crow’s feet and a bruise. But that’s all her.
"When you meet her, she’s so normal..."
I want in 100 years time for people to look back on this photograph and say — on this day in history Kate Moss really looked liked that.
She loves these. There’s a side of her that knows the public aren’t stupid. They know what’s real and what isn’t. This is real. With these shots, Kate can see the face her daughter sees every day. I love that.
Clint Eastwood
I was after Clint for so long. He wouldn’t allow me to even entertain the idea of doing a shoot. I couldn’t understand why — everyone had told me he was a very sweet guy who was very happy to give people time. So after three years of trying I thought there must be a reason. One day I was shooting Morgan Freeman, who had done a movie with him recently, and I asked him why Clint wouldn’t let me shoot him.
Morgan said: “He hates meeting new people. He said. He’s quite deaf. And unless you speak to him in a certain way to him he can’t hear you — and he hates to give away that he has this fault, a human problem.” But Morgan put in a word for me, and eventually Clint gave me some time.
I had been waiting and wishing for so long at that point that I knew precisely what I wanted. I could close my eyes and see the photo. I had dreamed about that photo.
My first memory of the day is driving down to his house in Carmel and seeing Doris Day prune a hedge. It’s like a twilight zone episode — everyone you saw was a movie star doing a mundane job. At this moment, I saw three people who’d won oscars going about their day. Joan Fontaine was in jogging bottoms walking in her garden, Doris Day was on an upturned beer crate pruning a hedge.
"I was after Clint for so long...."
Clint’s got one of these faces — he’s done so many movies outdoors and his life is so active that his face is so beautifully weathered. That’s what I love. We did this rembrandt style lighting and it picks up on the contours of the face so wonderfully.
So I got to his house and I set everything up. I had been dreaming of it for so long, so I knew exactly how I wanted the light to be, and how I wanted his face to be. He was very smiley and happy most of the time, but I said to him — I want Dirty Harry. I don’t want a happy grandad. And the second he squinted that was it. Hit the shutter once and we were done.
Then I had hours with him — hours to talk, to ask questions, to just be in his home and be his friend for a day. We shot a bit more, he made food, we spoke about everything and nothing.
He had his piano there. In between rolls of film and conversations he’d go over to the piano and play some jazz. It was almost like an alcoholic that needs a drink. He’d have to get up and play the piano.
I was so nervous before. I thought that if I didn’t get the shot straight away, something might happen — his phone might ring, there might some emergency, he might have to leave. I just thought to myself, all I want is this one shot. Once I’d got it, the house could have burned down and I wouldn’t have minded.
Charlize Theron
Not all shoots pan out as you expect. This is a case in point. I knew Charlize had a great personality, and was a happy, vivacious, fun person — someone who loved life.
But on this occasion, for whatever reason, she was not in the greatest of moods. I don’t know why, and I didn’t ask. But what I like about this shoot is the fact that it is reflective. It’s one thing getting a quirky shot of someone. But getting one of a star being withdrawn, subdued, introspective — that’s a different thing. It’s easy to tell someone to pull a face. It’s much more difficult sometimes to sit back and let the shoot unfold completely naturally.
"She was not in the greatest of moods..."
Whatever was going on with Charlize in this day, it made her very reflective and thoughtful. And I knew I had to play what was in front of me. So I had to capture the mood she was in. They’re very thought provoking shots — there’s feeling, there’s angst, there’s pain.
Henri Cartier-Bresson summed it up beautifully when someone asked him for the definition of photography. In his own very French way, he said: “It’s the decisive moment”. For me, it’s the reflection of your choice — the moment you decided, in that 1/25th of a second, to hit the shutter. My life is spent looking through a viewfinder, waiting for a moment. Sometimes people shoot blank rolls of film waiting for that moment. I just wait, and wait, and wait, and then it happens. And with this shoot with Charlize I captured, at that moment, a new subtle beauty about her.
Robert DeNiro
Bob has done all sorts of movies. In your head, you think of Robert DeNiro and someone like Al Pacino and you think they’re pretty similar stars. But really, Bob has done everything — comedies, quirky films, Meet the Fockers. He was in Rocky and Bullwinkle, for god’s sake. So I knew Bob had a sense of humour. He had a different side to what we usually see.
I shot this at the Dorchester, in this beautiful room in the basement that they use as a spill over bar. As I was waiting for Bob to arrive, I got a call from his agent and he said ”Bob is stuck in traffic. He’s been delayed by an hour. Bob says open up a bar tab, order some food, have some drinks.”
About an hour later, Bob walks into the bar and he’s wearing this navy blazer with gold buttons and a little sailors hat. This was Robert DeNiro, in a packed bar in the Dorchester, in the middle of the day — and not one person noticed him. All anyone saw was this older man in a sailors hat shuffling through the bar. Nobody even looked up from their chateaubriand.,
"Not one person noticed him..."
Bob came and sat next to me and put his arm around me. And he started talking to me like he’d known me all his life. He said: “I’m so sorry for being late. I’ve had an awful journey and I’ve just taken a phone call and my wife’s not in a good way. She’s not happy.”
We sat at the bar, and I knew he wasn’t in a great mood. Somehow, I ended up doing a card trick. I know rude jokes and I can do a few magic tricks: I always have cards in my pocket just in case. It tends to relax people on shoots. I did this one trick with Bob, and it absolutely blew him away. He was hypnotised from that moment on. It was like I’d given him LSD or something.
We went downstairs and took a few shots, and then we started talking about celebrity impressions. I said to him “do you get miffed when you people hear people do the same old impression of you: ‘you talkin’ to me’, that kind of thing?” He said: “I don’t mind it. But have you seen Al Pacino do an impression of me?”
And then all of a sudden he started doing this really overly articulated version of himself. He was doing an impression of Pacino doing an impression of him. He did it for a few seconds, and i knew we were on to something. I hit the shutter and we got these shots That is the shot that really sums him up. That’s the side of Bob I wanted.,
Pierce Brosnan
The first time I shot Piers was in 2001, and we stayed in touch for a long time after that. Then in 2016 I met him on the set of Save the Arctic, and I noticed instantly how his face had changed in those 15 years. Piers had become more human. He still had an incredible face, but this was 15 years of living well. He had wrinkles and bags and liver spots, and I found that fascinating.
This was taken not long after his house had burned down, and he was renting a house in Malibu. Turning up to the shoot was like being greeted by an old friend. Piers was so used to people asking for the Bond look — cool, suave, smouldering. But he knew I wanted something different. So he started pulling these brilliant faces and being himself.
"He had wrinkles and bags and liver spots, and I found that fascinating..."
No magazine would ever want these as their cover — they all tend to want the same thing. But Piers wanted to give me a great shot. And he did. You would never see shots like this anywhere. Now, I’m going to wave my flag here. I think I have lit these so well, even if I say so myself. I think I’ve done a good job to light these, knowing that they will not be touched or edited afterwards. He looks marvellous.
It made me think. What is a photo shoot? It’s what a photographer brings to the shoot combined with what the talent brings. It’s true and it’s not true. There has to be a line where the star brings so much and I bring so much, and then we meet in the middle. And that area in the middle is where photographs like this happen. That’s the magic.
Heath Ledger & Matt Damon
I was in Prague, on set, and the brief was to do some portraits for Matt Damon. His was filming Brothers Grimm at the time. Matt came in, and he sat there chain smoking, which surprised me, but I thought it was interesting. I wanted my iconic hard man pictures — this is Jason Bourne after all. Within about three reels I knew I’d got what I wanted.
Suddenly there was a bang in the corridor, and this huge “oh fuck”. I could hear people laughing outside. The next moment, Heath ledger bursts through the door looking very embarrassed. He’d wandered straight into our shoot. Matt says “what the fuck have you done?” And Heath says: “I just fell over outside. Can I hide out in here for a bit?”
"The next moment, Heath ledger bursts through the door looking very embarrassed..."
So I say fine, and Heath stands behind me and we keep shooting. All of a sudden, these paper towels begin to fly over my head and hit Matt. Then a chair flies over, then parts of the set. And before I know it, Heath has crept around me and jumped into the frame and photobombed a whole reel.
It was like two four-year-olds at a wedding. They were giggling, and laughing, and you can see the bond these two had — they’d only known each other for a couple of months, but you can see how friendly they are. It was an incredible couple of minutes.
Then I got came from the shoot, and I went to another job and another one, and I completely forgot about the reel. It was lost. A few years later, after Heath died, I spilled something on my camera bag and had to buy a new one. And I was fishing through the pockets and I found this reel of film inside. It was undeveloped. I had no idea what it was. And then it all came back.
I made three copies of the reel — I sent one to Matt, one to Heath’s parents, and kept one for myself, which you can see here. It’s just the most beautiful set. I think Heath would have loved to have seen it.
Paul Newman
There were some people who were on my wishlist for such a long time, and I thought I’d never, ever interview. Paul was one of those people. This was shot in 2004. Paul knew he had cancer at that point, but it was manageable. I visited him at his house, and from the moment he came to the door he was everything and more you’d want in a human being. He was the most humble, honest, beautiful, friendly, vivacious guy I’d ever met.
When we were shooting, he was wearing this very big chunky ring on his finger. It was a ring he’d won for winning a race a few months earlier. He was 83, and he was ill at that point. But he was still racing. It was Paul Newman, as you’d always hoped he’d be.
At one point, Paul got this elastic band out of his pocket and started putting it up his nose. And he was pulling it out like a bogey, and started pulling these funny faces. The elastic band looked a bit odd, so I said “get rid of that, but keep the faces.” And that’s how we got these shots.
"He was 83, and he was ill at that point. But he was still racing..."
I knew he was ill, and I knew he was tired. But he asked me to stay, and I was with him for 7 hours, even though we wrapped the shoot in 20 minutes. By the end of the day I was one of his clan — I’d been at his home with all his family, in the middle of all these family conversations and jokes and arguments.
I was just sitting on his sofa, talking to him, and asking him about his films. One of my favourite movies is The Sting, and I said to him: “listen, is there ever going to be another Newman-Redford combination?” And slowly he pointed to this big bundle of papers on his desk, and he said to me something I won’t forget. ”Son, that might be the swan song.” I shot him one more time, and then he passed away. When I heard it I knew there was a film that could have been made and now never would be. One more movie. One last ride.
I’ll never forget it. “Son, that might be the swan song.” There’s a few moments of my life that will stick in my head. And that three or four second on that shoot is number one. If I could bottle a feeling and give it a sniff — at the times when I really need it, when things aren’t going as you’d like, in those low moments — that would be what I’d bottle. That was the moment of my life.
Harrison Ford
Harrison is an enigma. Lots of people warned me about working with him. When I said I was going to shoot Harrison Ford, a lot of my peers said: “Watch out. He’s a tricky one. He doesn’t like doing interviews. He hates being shot. He’s always grumpy.”
On this day, he turned up to the hotel by himself. He was very polite when he came into the room, and I was still setting up. So he just sat there and waited and got his phone out, and started emailing on his phone. I got behind my camera, and I was ready to go, and he was still sitting on the stool on his phone.
So I said suddenly, in the silence of the room: “Mr Ford. I hear you’re an areshole.” And he just stopped in his tracks and looked slowly up at me and said: ”Pardon?!”
"So I said suddenly, in the silence of the room: “Mr Ford. I hear you’re an areshole...”
I said: “I’ve heard you’re really hard work, and have a kind of social incapability of talking to people.”
And he just softened and said. “People think I’m a shit. They always have done. But the thing is I just get bored. I go to a junket, and get asked the same question 20 times, and there’s only so much I can say. So people paint me as an arsehole.”
We started shooting and we did a few straight reels. And I asked him: “would you like to have some fun and pull some faces.” And he said: “In 35 years no one’s asked me that. But I guess I’d love to.”
So we did 20 shots of him pulling these faces. Then he just opened up. We started talking about old aircraft and his passion for flying, and he was about to go off and fly an old bi-plane. Suddenly he changed, and he was having fun.
He loves Planes, archeology, carpentry. I don’t think people ever ask him what he’s interested in. That’s maybe why we never see this side of Harrison. That’s why I absolutely love these shots.
This article was taken from the Jul/Aug 2018 issue of Gentleman’s Journal. To subscribe and read the full feature, click here…
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