Winstone wasn't a leading lad during school days

London (ANI): He might be among the leading characters in the Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull but Ray Winstone was not so good when it came to learning his lines during his school days.

Starting from his first school stage performance as a newspaper-seller in the production of Emil and the Detectives the actor has come a long way in the acting business but his early steps to stardom are a far cry from his now established image as an actor.

Alan Lewin, a pal of Winstone at Edmonton County school in North London and now a housing association boss, has spoken of the actor's approach to school plays. "Ray certainly wasn't a leading lad in those days," Lewin said. "He joined in because it was fun but in terms of the hard graft and learning his lines, he wasn't so good. Obviously he must have got better at that as he got older."

"He always plays the hard guy in his roles now, which is quite interesting because he wasn't particularly like that at school," Alan says. "He wasn't a pushover by any means but that tough character is obviously something he's developed as he got older," he added.