Night owl
This is the third feature from director
James Gray (Little Odessa) who re-teams up with Joaquin
Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg (they starred in his second feature
The Yards). Here they play brothers who lead very different
lives in late 1980's New York. Joseph (Wahlberg) is a cop, like
their father (Robert Duvall) and proud of it. Bobby (Phoenix)
manages a nightclub frequented by the Russian mafia, who are at
the centre of a series of cop slayings. When Joseph gets shot
(by the Russians) Bobby begins to re-evaluate his life and what
he sees doesn't make him happy. Despite a cast that includes Wahlberg
and Duvall, this is Phoenix' film. This is a young actor who can
seemingly do no wrong. Walk the Line brought his talents to a
wider audience and here he doesn't disappoint. Watching his transformation
in the film is one of its delights. He is astonishingly adept
with a quiet intensity that has earned him comparisons with Brando
and Pacino. It's not over the top praise and yet there is something
about the actor that suggests he has barely begun to scratch the
surface when it comes to his talent. Gaynor Flynn sat
down with the actor at the Cannes International Film Festival,
and found a young actor who was charming, funny and surprisingly
shy.
You
always seem to choose difficult material. Does it have a lasting
impact on you?
I've decided to be honest for all actors. When
you hear about actors taking things home and affecting them it's
really just an attempt to get nominated and the truth is that
I think very rarely, any time you read an interview its always
like 'I had nightmares'. But I think you take stuff home like
the way you will take home the work of today. You're not going
to lose sleep over it, you're not going to obsess over it but
it might pop up like oh I forgot to ask that question do you know
what I mean. So you go home and think oh I wish I had played it
like that, but you still function and live your life. Maybe its
just me, maybe some actors do take it home. I've been doing it
long enough as well and in some ways it's an awkward admission,
but it certainly is not a science but you kind of know what you're
doing at some point.
Has that changed over the years? Did it use
to affect you more when you were younger?
No I don't think so. I think its important for
me to show up on set feeling whatever you're supposed to be feeling.
It should be already germinating and starting to form. I couldn't
say that I show up on set kind of ready for a scene but its certainly
there and when you're coming in and doing a scene where you're
angry with everybody I'm certainly not the person who would come
in and say hello to everybody and then action and then wham I'm
there. I'm going to be in that angry space or depressed state
or whatever, so anyone that's around me might think oh he's really
affected by it but it's just acting. Acting is just a grand manipulation
that's all you're doing. Maybe I should go back to like 'oh yes
I take it home and it affects me' because it makes it sound more
serious.
So you're not a method actor although sometimes
you're made out to be one?
No I'm not method. But I do enjoy if we do the
fight scene like in the movie where I find out the Russians are
behind the shooting and Jumbo tells me about it, it was like 20
degrees out and you're just shaking with cold and you have a few
hours before the light comes up to make this thing and I wanted
to feel like that. I didn't want to be set in my trailer having
tea all nice and warm. I'm not incapable of doing that. I can't
just come out and do it, so I have to be out there the whole night
f**king freezing and going through it in my head but ultimately
there's not much of a difference between me and the person who
just sat in their trailer because whatever it takes you know.
It doesn't mean I'm any more serious or I'm better or anything
like that. It actually means I'm less talented and I don't have
a f**king clue right because they at least know what they want
to do and how to achieve it. I'm out there swinging blindly and
freezing my ass off.
This
is a story about brotherly love, is that what resonated with you
when you read it?
Yeah, but we had to work on that a lot because
it was a dynamic that James [Gray, the director] knew very well
and as he says he mind's his own personal life but that dynamic
wasn't initially working. And we went back and forth and after
a week of working switched it to where we were step brothers and
thought it would be more affective as step brothers and it was
like that for a month and then James called me one day and said
the step brother thing is not working for me and I said I agree
so it was interesting because it's the most I've ever been involved
with a director or writer during preparation, I've done long preparation
on my own but it's the first time I've been involved with the
writer/director and that was a pretty amazing experience.
Can you talk about working with Robert Duvall?
He's the Jedi Master. There were a couple of times
where I said to James that I'm completely out of my league and
just write me out of the scene, he's too good I can't work with
him. It really was amazing to work with Duvall. I've never had
that experience with an actor who was so solid. I mean he could
not be thrown and James knew he had someone so solid that he could
try anything in a scene and he knew that whatever happened Duvall
would take it and digest it and make it part of the scene and
that's really hard to do. I've worked with a lot of actors like
when you get into an improv situation where the other actors are
throwing you not only different lines but different actions and
its hard. One day James had one of the actors say something to
piss Robert off and Duvall goes, do you want to be the chief of
police? And he grabs his gun and slams it on the table. You be
chief. And I remember sitting there and being stunned because
I was thinking why are you hitting me but he was Burt Gusinsky
the chief of police and that was that and that's pretty amazing
to witness.
Did you learn any tricks from him?
I wasn't aware of any tricks that he did, that's
why he's so good because if he is doing any tricks or if he pulls
any kind of technique that he's developed you're not aware of
it so I didn't know. I asked him for some advice but he wouldn't
give me any.
Do people treat you differently now after the
success of Walk the Line?
No. Not really.
So you don't get better scripts now or anything
like that?
No. I read once and I don't know who said it but
they said the quality doesn't change; it's the quantity [that]
changes so you just get more s**t.
You
gave up acting at one time and walked away and you came back.
Have you ever thought about walking away again?
Every time. Every time. Well look not to be dramatic
about it but in some ways its tough you know because when you
start out there is a truth to the saying ignorance is bliss. There's
really something about your first movie, and I yearn for the feeling
of like the first time I made a movie and I didn't know about
press and I didn't know about anything that went into it at all.
And I just simply was there and excited about everything from
the wardrobe and to get into this other world. Inevitably after
a while I think why you really have to start choosing things that
will consistently draw you in is after when you've been doing
it for a while you can start to look at a project and go, f**k
me I have to wear this fucking jacket? Or you start thinking oh
that's three weeks of night shoots its going to be f**king cold
without that jacket and I don't want to think that way. That's
why you have to stop and not work for a while because I notice
that actors that have been doing it for a long time it seems at
some point you can tell they have the same wardrobe and makeup
people because they always kind of look the same. They have their
comfortable look and that's just a sign that they don't really
want to work but they want the money. I never wanted to do that
you know. But I'm sure I will.
What would you say is the biggest misconception
about you?
I don't know I guess it kind of depends. I guess
compared to some actors in films in which it is just a job I do
think I take it seriously and I do want an intense feeling from
acting because I dislike the process so much that it isn't really
worth it unless its going to give me a powerful sock in the gut.
If its not going to require an immense amount of work and this
is not that it just needs to be painful, it can be on the joyous
side as well, but whatever it is you want to experience it to
the full or else its not worth it, because the majority of our
time on set is filled with bullshit that has absolutely nothing
to do with the scene or what your doing. It has to do with people
adjusting an eyebrow hair and changing clothes and all these kinds
of things and very little to do with those great moments between
action and cut.
Gaynor Flynn
