05 July 2023 , 15:22
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Ray Winstone has taken up labouring work as the Sexy Beast star enjoys the simple life at his home in Sicily amid the Hollywood writers' strike.
The Cockney actor, 66, has also finally quit smoking after 44 years on what he calls the “oilies” – oily rag being rhyming slang for 'fag' or cigarette.
He started smoking after marrying wife Elaine, now 63, in 1979, while working on the film Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains alongside Sex Pistol Steve Jones and Paul Simonon of The Clash.
But he gave up earlier this year after realising he was not enjoying the habit – admitting he had never done it properly anyway.
Ray said: “I gave up smoking about five or six months ago. One day I just bought a packet of cigarettes and I lit one up and went, ‘What are you doing? I don’t even enjoy this’. I just threw them away, and I feel so much better for it. I loved an oily didn’t I?
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Ray in Sexy Beast (Kanzaman/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock)“I started smoking on a film. I’d just got married. Maybe that’s got something to do with it? Don’t let Elaine hear me say that.
“I had to chain smoke in a film with the Sex Pistols and The Clash...that’s where I started, really. But I bum-suck them. I never really took them down, I wasn’t a proper smoker in a way. A bit like cigar smoking.”
The star is now further improving his health and fitness with some manual labour near his Italian mountaintop hideaway while acting work runs short during the Hollywood writers’ strike.
He said: “I’ve been doing a bit of labouring out here, a bit of graft. I hurt my back a couple of years ago, so I’ve been building my back up a little bit.
Ray was a long-term smoker (Roland Leon Daily Mirror)“There’s a writers' strike on at the moment, so that’s affecting a hell of a lot of stuff in my game. I’ve just been having a bit of time off. I’m just enjoying being lazy. It’s fine.”
Ray, who co-founded Integral Sports Management with his friend Gary Pettit, said he loves his simple life in Sicily. He told the Pound for Pound podcast: “Here, I sit out at night. I’m at the top of the mountain and all you can see is the stars.
“At night you turn all the lights off and I’ve got a little telly outside and I watch the telly and have a drink outside. I’m here on my own at the moment. Don’t tell no one, though, in case someone comes up and robs me. I’ve got a great big bat with me and all that.
“But it’s lovely. I sit outside and all you hear is wild animals.”