The adventures of Sir Peter Ustinov

What impressed you about South Africa's establishment of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission as an alternative to conducting criminal trials of people who'd committed atrocities during apartheid?

One feels in the courtroom how very different the proceeding is when it's done under the chairmanship of an archbishop [Desmond Tutu] compared to what it would be under the chairmanship of a judge. Tutu said, "Without the truth we can't make a fresh start." And by doing it the way they did, they probably got better mileage out of these idiots. That's why I put South Africa at the conclusion on the show. I really believe that if the millennium is going to work, it's going to be due to the ratio between how much we are allowed to forget and how much we are incited to remember. The whole of Northern Ireland, Kosovo, the Middle East -- all that is based on incitement to remember.

Archbishop Tutu talks about it being pragmatic not to seek retribution, but the approach was also a Christian one -- turn the other cheek, though in this case also seek some accountability. Did you find it ironic how both sides applied Christianity to such different ends?

When I met with Tutu I said, "I'm a little surprised that both you and the Afrikaners took Christianity to be their guiding light and yet your interpretation of it seems rather different. Theirs seems to be a bit more pharisaical than yours is in that they seem to be saying, 'Thank you, God, for making us different from them. But if there's any way we can help them, you only have to send us a signal.' [Laughs.] Yet your form of worship is much more choreographic and symphonic."

And he said, "You mustn't be too hard on the Afrikaners. They are in the position of a minority people surrounded by a stronger majority. And because they have selfish needs, they regard themselves as the chosen people. And after all, it's not the first time that this has happened," he said with the faintest grin. It was interesting comment because it was taking a kind of risk and at the same time being very perspicacious -- and very generous.

Certainly more generous than Twain, who called their forebears "profoundly ignorant, dull, obstinate, bigoted."

Indeed. Tutu's a delightful character. He told me, "I never saw a light. I never thought of the church as a vocation. I went in because I thought it was the one place where a black boy could be on equal terms with a white one. And it was only once I was inside that I began to believe."

Did your meeting with the 97-year-old widow of Hendrik Verwoerd, the architect of apartheid, feel as peculiar in person as it looked on camera?

I must say our visit to old Mrs. Verwoerd proved what Tutu was saying. She came out of her house, and I put out my arm and she searched for the arm and then the eagle had landed. Ah, I was in such pain as these bony fingers dug into my skin. Then she sits down. "No blacks, only whites."

This is in Orania, the segregated area some Afrikaners are trying to develop into a separate state?

Yes.

By contrast, Robben Island, once a notorious prison, has been so transformed that you see it as a positive metaphor for the new South Africa. What fascinated you so much about the place?

One had doubts about the way things are going in the new South Africa. Robben Island is a pretty island off the coast with a wonderful view. It's made for luxury, yet it had a fearful penitentiary. But it's no longer a prison; it's a place of pilgrimage. People go to cell No. 5, which was Mandela's, and they meditate and talk.

The extraordinary thing is that among the guides are people that have settled on Robben Island for good -- ex-political prisoners, ex-criminals and ex-warders. This was a place where savagery was encouraged. One of the punishments for prisoners was to cover them up with sand until only their heads were showing and then pee on them. But then political prisoners like Mandela began cultivating little gardens and beautifying the place. Suddenly everybody joined in, mystified by this. Now, these disparate people are also joining in together. Robben Island is growing into a community based on this terrible place which by their presence is somehow exorcised. There's an example of forgiving and forgetting.

Where has your work for UNICEF taken you?

The most recent mission was to Cambodia, which may be the saddest place I've ever been. Cambodia, I think, is the fault of the West, because Cambodia had more bombs dropped on it than Vietnam. You feel like you're flying over a plucked chicken because the deforestation has been so thorough. And when you get killing on that sort of scale it brings on a habit of killing, so that in a way Pol Pot was almost a logical follow-on to that.

The problems for children are enormous, and what makes you furious is that you can live with acts of God, earthquakes or natural disasters that seem inevitable. But that people do terrible things, deliberately not foreseeing the consequences, putting children at the age of 10 into uniform when they enjoy playing soldiers and perverting their natural tendencies, that's unpardonable.

So, what makes you optimistic about the future?

I don't think there's any alternative to optimism. One skeptical German journalist said to me, "Isn't all you try and do for UNICEF like just like a drop of water on a hot stove?" That's a German expression. I said I honestly think it's a little better than that: "It's a drop of water in the ocean: It doesn't get lost."

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