Extortion? Nazi clubs? Welcome to Bryan's world

Bryan Singer, the director of X-Men - this summer's much-hyped, much-flocked-to Marvel Comics-inspired blockbuster - would seem to have little of the superhero about him. At his New Jersey high school, he says, kids used to "lock me up in lockers and hang me up by my underwear". And that was just the boys. While he was waiting for the bus one morning, a girl called Mary Ann threw a snowball at his ear. In his own words, young Bryan "freaked out", then rushed home to his dad, who summed up his plight thus: "OK, you've been beaten up by a girl. Now as a result I have to drive you, in the snow, to school. This is pathetic."

Bryan Singer, the director of X-Men - this summer's much-hyped, much-flocked-to Marvel Comics-inspired blockbuster - would seem to have little of the superhero about him. At his New Jersey high school, he says, kids used to "lock me up in lockers and hang me up by my underwear". And that was just the boys. While he was waiting for the bus one morning, a girl called Mary Ann threw a snowball at his ear. In his own words, young Bryan "freaked out", then rushed home to his dad, who summed up his plight thus: "OK, you've been beaten up by a girl. Now as a result I have to drive you, in the snow, to school. This is pathetic."

Poor Singer. He sits before me at the Dorchester hotel - a pretty little thing with rheumy blue eyes and a tissue pressed to his nose, all tucked up in fragrantly preppy grey clothes. He tells me he was picked on at school because he was "not particularly attractive, and maybe because I was different - personally different, strange". And it's all I can do not to pop him on my knee and whisper, in the immortal words of Charlie Brown, "poor sweet baby". But wait. Maybe this is all part of his cunning plan.

Singer's work is full of triumphant weaklings. Cast your mind back to Kevin Spacey's Oscar-winning Verbal Kint in The Usual Suspects. A Bambi-eyed scarecrow of a man, Verbal was a cripple with hidden powers. Ditto Patrick Stewart's wheel-chair bound, telepathic X-Men leader, Charles Xavier. Verbal may have been a psycho killer, Xavier a force for good (his mission: to save mankind from the clutches of murderous mutant, Magneto) - but both have to rely on their wits for protection. And this they do very well. Nuts to tree-trunk thighs or athletic prowess. Mellifluous of voice, bulgy of brain, Verbal and Xavier are patient chess players, ultimately keeping not just one, but a dozen steps, ahead of the competition. Which, when you discover Singer is still only 34, you have to assume he's pretty good at doing, too.

He's got the voice, you see. If you shut your eyes you could mistake him, variously, for a 70-year-old Jimmy Stewart, manic John McEnroe, nebbish Woody Allen or stuttering Elmer Fudd. It's a voice that keeps you guessing - a weapon, of sorts. Fox said it wanted an "outsider" to helm X-Men. As Singer talks you find yourself thinking, so this is how he got himself picked - it's the siren call of the underdog. And yet what are Singer's films about, if not the fact that the underdog - the shivering victim - ain't always the good guy? Trust a few, fear the rest, says the posters for X-Men. Well, naturally, the next question is, should we trust Singer?

Certainly the man's reputation has taken some knocks of late. Trouble stems from 1998's Apt Pupil, which stars Ian McKellen as an old man whose Nazi past is discovered, and exploited, by a precocious, all-American kid called Todd (Brad Renfro). Despite some astonishingly powerful scenes (and a turn from pre- Dawson's Creek Joshua Jackson) it was never going to be a big hit. A schlocky horror show bent on confounding all expectations (an attempt to bake a cat in the oven is played for laughs) it flopped in the States and was released with hardly any publicity at all in Britain. But that was nothing compared to what happened during the shoot.

A group of parents decided their kids - six teenagers used as extras in a shower scene - had been bullied into stripping naked (one mother used the phrase "visually raped"). Five civil suits were filed against Singer and his crew, alleging, along the way, that "some or all of the defendants were known homosexuals, paedophiles or pederasts".

"Without you knowing the full details, it's hard for me to comment on that," says Singer at first, carefully pouring some water into a glass. But he can't resist saying more. "An accusation was made in an attempt to get money from the studio. It was really extortion. The case was thrown out by the judge, because it was absurd, it was bullshit."

Singer resigned himself a long time ago to the "big, common misconception that homosexuals are more prone to molesting kids than heterosexuals - that's normal, it's just paranoid society" but the accusation still hurt. "Children have tremendous power in this area," he says. " The Crucible is all about that, isn't it? If a child points the finger the whole neighbourhood can go after you with a noose."

The supreme irony is that in Apt Pupil we see a kindly, possibly gay male teacher threaten to expose Todd's corruption, only to be told by the boy that if he does so, he'll accuse the teacher of trying to molest him ("I'm gonna tell them you did something to me"). "You can't do that Todd," says the dazed teacher, before seeing the blank determination in the kid's eyes. He decides to back down.

"It's almost a funny coincidence," admits Singer, "I remember shooting that last scene and thinking here's a thing..." Then he shakes his head, as if shooing away such frivolity. "It is interesting, but not when you've lived it. Not when someone points a finger at you and your life and the media, if only for a moment, listen and the gossip starts. I'm friends with Steven Spielberg [ Jaws is Singer's favourite film] and people are always trying to sue him... So I've got used to that sort of thing now. Back then I was relatively young in my career, so it was much more traumatic."

Singer, quite justifiably, sees himself as a victim of the whole affair. But that said, he's under no illusions about his own capacity for "evil". He shifts in his seat. "I'll be honest - when I was a kid we had German neighbours. I feel awkward even saying this, but we had a Nazi club because we thought the images were so neat. And those leather suits...." He gives a sensual wriggle. "I made a little armband and drew a swastika with a crayon and rushed off to show my mum."

He pauses and rolls his eyes. "The lecture I got. At first I resented it, 'cos she really was mean, but little by little I understood. I have that history in my family - my family history was wiped out," he swipes the air with his arm, "during the Holocaust. The point is, me and my friends knew all about the six million Jews - we were always hearing about that number. But, until that point, it didn't mean anything to us."

X-Men, of course, begins in a concentration camp and is greatly concerned with the link between young people, sex and persecution. It's no coincidence that so much of the plot focuses on a teenager (Rogue), newly alive to her sexuality. Singer particularly enjoyed directing the "orgasmic" scene between she and Wolverine ("she's in a night gown, he's got his shirt off - it's a very animal kind of thing, not the sort of thing that normally appears in a movie rated PG-13"). And it's no coincidence that it's Rogue who Magneto chooses to involve in his fascistic anti-fascist plans. Whatever else, then, Singer hasn't been frightened off his favourite themes. A more appropriate slogan for the posters would be "trust no one, not even yourself".

At this point, the PR woman comes in, with a peppermint tea for Singer. He's just about to lay the teabag down on a magazine when he spots Jude Law on the cover. "Hang on, I don't want to stain Jude's face - he's great, isn't he?"

You have to wonder, though, what Fox makes of all this dark stuff bubbling through a kids' movie, and wonder, too, what got left out ("you have to choose your battles" is all Singer will say). Certainly, there seems to be a question mark over Singer's future with the franchise. Singer gushes that he "loves the idea that there's so much more coming" with X-Men and yet when I ask if he'll be directing the sequels his voice goes flat: "I don't know." Surely it would be weird to have someone else take over though? "Yeah, I agree, but I have to talk to the studio about it."

In an attempt to disperse this sudden gloom, I ask about his parents (now divorced). How do they respond to their only child's controversial work? It turns out they're pretty keen - but are basically just relieved he made it to college. "I visited my father's office just before he retired" says Singer, grinning , "and I'd got a bit of fame by this point. The walls were completely bare except for a Xeroxed copy of my college diploma."

On top of everything else, it seems, Singer was a poor student. But as he fills me in on this new area of disaster, I realise it's not pity he's after, but empathy. "The important thing to remember," he says, smile widening, "is that I was a really annoying kid. I used to write these stories all the time and I remember being in a maths class when I was about seven. I had the audacity to go up to the teacher and ask her how to spell a word - I think it was catapult - and she spelt it instinctively, but then she was like, 'hey, you're supposed to be doing maths'"

He's warming to his theme. "Kids were always threatening to do me serious harm, but I once had a teacher threaten me, too. My parents had to go up to the school about it". He pauses for thought, then says "Actually, the whole thing reminded me of the scene between Todd and the teacher," before quickly adding, "not that it was a sexual threat." I'm a little confused - the teacher in Apt Pupil doesn't ever make a sexual threat. Or is Singer implying that he in turn threatened the teacher? I can't get him to elaborate - which, in a sense, makes it the perfect Bryan Singer story: no good guys, no bad guys, just ambiguity and conflict.

"I don't remember the incident very well," says Singer softly, "because I have this amazing ability to put bad things out of my head." An amazing ability to put bad things out of his head and into his films. I guess you might even call it a super power. But I doubt if he would.