"The Krays" is rated R for violence, sex, male nudity, profanity, drugs and homosexuality.

— THE KEMP BROTHERS are not twins, though they play twin brothers in "The Krays."

In a telephone interview from their New York hotel suite during a promotion tour, the Kemps agreed that making the movie helped them better understand the special relationship twins must have.

The film marks the first starring roles for Gary and Martin Kemp, though between them they have some 30 TV and movie credits. They are best known, however, as musicians, having founded the British rock group Spandau Ballet.

Martin said there was never any question about which Kemp brother would play which Kray brother. "There wasn't really. It all sort of fell into place. Everybody said Gary should play Ronnie and I should play Reggie. I think it comes down to the way their relationship compares to ours, in the way Ronnie seemed to be the older of the two twins. And, obviously, Gary's 30 and I'm 28 — so it all fell into place."

Gary added, "As an actor you have to do a lot of self-analysis. You have to know about yourself to distort yourself. We asked a lot of questions of each other, asked a lot of truths. We wanted to know what it's really like to be brothers. We wanted to know what it's like to be twins, especially the sibling rivalry part of it. We don't really feel that. We like to see each other succeed."

Martin says, "We were just offered (`The Krays') because they wanted them to be played by brothers and there are very few acting brothers, much less London cockney boys. So they came to us and we screen tested and they just offered it to us."

The Kemps have always been quite close and agree that making the movie brought them even closer. "You can't compare the two, though, not really," Martin said. "Being twins has to be something really special. It doesn't compare to being brothers at all."

"What made us nervous," Gary said, "was (that) these characters are so well-known (in England). There's no film footage, but people have fixed images of them in their minds. They're larger than life, folklore.

"Meeting Ronnie (Kray in the Broadmoor prison) helped to give me confidence. I think he's been told for the last 20 years a movie would be made, but he never asked to read the script and he was very free with information. He told me explicitly how he felt after he killed George Cornell, and I used that in the movie."

Gary said he got so into the role that when he finished the film he went on the road for four months with Spandau Ballet to exorcise the character.