Douglas shocked at Gekko inspiration

Michael Douglas is surprised people looked up to his ‘Wall Street’ character Gordon Gekko.

The 66-year-old actor – who played the villainous investment banker in the original 1987 movie and its 2010 follow-up ‘Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps’ – continues to be “shocked” when he is told people went into economics because of the character, who winds up in prison at the first of the first film.

He said: “I was always shocked when so many people who saw Wall Street said that I (Gekko) was the person who influenced them and inspired them to go into investment banking. I’d say to people, ‘Well, I was the villain,’ and they would say, ‘No, no, no’, they didn’t see me that way, so it was all very seductive I guess.”

Michael worked with director Oliver Stone on both projects, but he reveals it was easier the second time around because he could take “abuse”.

He joked: “I’m in a very different position from the position I was in before. I can take his abuse much better now. He’s a tough guy, very talented; he has great respect for actors, but he’s definitely tough.”