Gromit’s better half has a title role at 84

“I am flattered by the attention I have received recently,” remarks Peter Sallis. “I am an old man, so it comes as a nice surprise.”

At 84, Sallis finally has his first starring role in a feature film: “Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit,” which opens Wednesday.

“It is the first time I have had the title role in anything,” says the charming British actor, whose career spans six decades. In the stop-motion animation film from England’s Aardman Animations (“Chicken Run”), Sallis supplies the voice of Wallace, the eccentric, cheese-loving inventor who lives with his loyal -- and brilliant -- canine companion, named Gromit.

Sallis has played the role of the absent-minded Wallace in all three acclaimed short films directed by Nick Park, including “A Grand Day Out” and the Oscar-winning “The Wrong Trousers” and “A Close Shave.”

In their first feature film, directed by Park and Steve Box, Wallace and Gromit are enjoying great success with their pest-control company, Anti-Pesto, which has been humanely capturing rabbits that have invaded their town’s garden on the eve of the annual Giant Vegetable Competition. But the intrepid duo runs into some “hare”-raising problems when they encounter a mammoth bunny that is terrorizing the community by munching everything in sight.

Park was still a student at the National Film and Television School in Beaconsfield, England, when he contacted Sallis’ agent in 1983. “He asked for me go out to record the voice for a cartoon film,” recalls Sallis.

(Park told Sallis he chose him because he liked the “noise” his voice makes in Sallis’ role as Clegg in the BBC sitcom “Last of the Summer Wine,” which is the longest-running sitcom on record at 33 seasons.)

“We just sat down and we had the microphone between us,” recalls Sallis. “He didn’t have any models to show me. He did have a storyboard. I recorded it line by line. The interesting thing was this guy was about 23 and I was just in my 60s and had been acting since just after the war and he was telling me how to do [the voice]. It was really charming. I thought, ‘This guy knows exactly what he wants.’ ”

Sallis didn’t hear from Park again until 1989. By that time, Park had graduated from school and was ensconced at Aardman. “It took him six years to finish ‘A Grand Day Out,’ ” says Sallis. “It was the first time I had seen it. I couldn’t get over that Gromit hadn’t a mouth. It’s no wonder he doesn’t speak because he doesn’t have a mouth!”

Wallace may be a cheese fanatic -- he had a special fondness for Wensleydale in the film shorts and enjoys Stinking Bishop in the movie -- but Sallis doesn’t touch the stuff. “I stay off of it” because of cholesterol, he says.

And unlike Wallace, he doesn’t own any dogs.

“But I like dogs. I love Gromit because he gets me my breakfast. He is the brain of the family. He is much cleverer than Wallace.”