SO DID YOU SPOT THE RISING STAR? SOPHIE BARKER ASKED PEOPLE WHO WORKED WITH THE YOUNG FIENNES : ARTS

ADRIAN NOBLE Directed `The Plantagenets', 1989-90, at the RSC Stratford and the Barbican I was doing this nine-and-a-half-to-10-hour epic, The Plantagenets, and looking for a Henry VI, which is an almost uncastable role. I was auditioning, sitting in thebasement of the Barbican, and this man came along and he was quite electrifying. Henry V I is quite unworldly - a very fine creature in a hideous world, and Ralph inhabited that perfectly. And yet in Schindler's List he was very different. He is the mirror of himself: the saintliness of Henry VI can become the grossness of the Nazi.

Working with him was very unusual, because he has a true vocation as an actor. He thinks acting is not about entertaining or about telling a story, both of which it is, but that there is something privileged and responsible in an actor's job. He is a proper actor, not a slob. Folk like that don't always do well.

DI TREVIS Directed `Much Ado About Nothing', 1989, at Stratford I saw him in Six Characters, and asked him to come to Stratford and join the RSC there for Much Ado. He only had a small part, playing Claudio. Once, during a performance, I was standing at the back of the stalls with Genista Mackintosh, who was then part of the administration at Stratford, and I said, "There's your next Hamlet".

Before Schindler's List came out, we met at the National Theatre - he had come to see a play there - and he told me he was making a film for Spielberg. I didn't realise it was Schindler's Ark, the Keneally novel. He is not obvious casting for that. But he was marvellous.

STEPHEN POLIAKOFF Wrote and directed `Playing with Trains', 1990, RSC I did spot him, yes. It didn't need a genius. At the time, he was being tipped as the next Daniel Day-Lewis around the RSC. People were just waiting for it to happen. It took him a while.

He played a supporting role in Playing with Trains. The main parts were all played by younger people, including Simon Russell Beale and Lesley Sharpe, considered to be great prospects at the time. Ralph had just played Henry VI. He was after the part in Playing with Trains even though it was the smallest because he liked it and he had never been in a new play before.

What was interesting was that he played a character part, the civil servant as opposed to the handsome lead, and he was very funny. So it was not surprising to me that he gave such a good performance in Schindler's List.

After Playing with Trains I investigated him for my films, Close My Eyes and Century, but he was not available.

SIMON RUSSELL BEALE Fellow actor in several productions The first time I saw him was as Henry V1, and he was astonishing. I was a rival for the part and he rightly got it.

In Playing with Trains, he was playing a comic part - comedy is certainly not what you associate with Ralphie. He has a wonderfully rarefied and spiritual quality. He is a fantastic man of verse and he was wonderful with Be-rowne's long speeches in Love's La-bour's, which is a structured verse piece.

I am not surprised that he has made it in Hollywood. He has a beautiful face and a fantastic intelligence and that lovely voice. It is not a surprise at all.

OLIVER NEVILLE former principal of Rada, taught Ralph Fiennes in 1984-85

I can't possibly forget him. In many ways he was the perfect student. He was a very civilised young man, terrifically reticent, and wit - a lovely, light sense of humour. He was a worker. If you are going to make it and not be a flash in the pan, you need that. He was very thorough and worked on everything: he was probably the best swordsman Rada ever produced. He could play a great range of parts. I remember in his last year, he played the King of France in All's Well that Ends Well, which is a very difficult part, and he did it brilliantly.