Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing,
Speaker 1: My chance to talk with artists, policy makers and performers,
Speaker 1: to hear their stories. What inspires their creations, what decisions
Speaker 1: change their careers, what relationships influenced their work. My guest
Speaker 1: today is actor Viggo Mortenson. He was relatively unknown when
Speaker 1: he appeared in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings
Speaker 1: trilogy as the warrior king Arragorn. Mortenson brought an earthy
Speaker 1: realism to a fantasy world filled with elves and wizards.
Speaker 1: The overwhelmingly successful films changed the course of Mortenson's career
Speaker 1: and he shot to global stardom. His latest film is
Speaker 1: about a very different kind of fantasy. Captain Fantastic is
Speaker 1: the story of a father trying to raise his six
Speaker 1: children outside of conventionality and what happens when that fantasy collapses.
Speaker 1: Mortenson himself was raised on three different continents, and he
Speaker 1: says his own imagination was formed at an early age,
Speaker 1: maybe because when that happens to you, when you're uprooted
Speaker 1: a lot, you your fantasy world becomes a little more intense.
Speaker 1: You know, you replace the friends that you have to
Speaker 1: say goodbye to all the time with maybe imaginary friends.
Speaker 1: Yeah I did. I mean the kids in the movie here,
Speaker 1: they're isolated from other people, that's for sure there, you know,
Speaker 1: as you see at the beginning, they're in the middle
Speaker 1: of the four the youngest of them have never met
Speaker 1: other people, and they're used to just being very self sufficient.
Speaker 1: But yeah, when I was when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: we did move around a lot, and I grew up
Speaker 1: in a sort of multi cultural environment. And maybe that
Speaker 1: what did your dad do? He was he's raised down
Speaker 1: a farm. He's Danish and farm boys sort of self made.
Speaker 1: He he left home during high school. He didn't even
Speaker 1: finish high school. But then he he met my mom,
Speaker 1: who's from the US, was working in Norway, and fell
Speaker 1: in love and got married and he moved here and
Speaker 1: he decided, well, I'm gonna be a businessman. And so
Speaker 1: he taught himself English and somehow got himself into a
Speaker 1: business school here and did four years worth of studying
Speaker 1: two years, you know, very driven when my mom was
Speaker 1: working and supporting himself. And uh, and then when I
Speaker 1: was born in in New York, we moved to South
Speaker 1: America because that's where he got a job and and
Speaker 1: do you have a lot of vivid memories of growing
Speaker 1: up down they're living down there? Yeah, yeah, when I
Speaker 1: was little, we lived in urban settings, and what I said,
Speaker 1: it is and also in the in the country. My dad,
Speaker 1: just like his dad had told him when I was
Speaker 1: very young, my brothers and I all went camping with
Speaker 1: him a lot, went into wild places, hunting, fishing, all that.
Speaker 1: So those things were entirely How many brothers do you
Speaker 1: have too? Are they in the business as well? No,
Speaker 1: they're they studied geology quite different, although they're they're good.
Speaker 1: They're musicians. And I would have felt the youngest one,
Speaker 1: he was sort of very good mimic and um, you know,
Speaker 1: very gifted in that way. And you know, if you
Speaker 1: would have guessed when we were little boys, who if
Speaker 1: one of them is going to be an actor, probably
Speaker 1: would have been him, not me? Right, Yeah, what what
Speaker 1: would they have guessed? You would have been a horse trainer.
Speaker 1: I don't maybe someone who has spent a lot of
Speaker 1: time himself. Probably I was. I mean I had friends,
Speaker 1: not a lot of them. I had a couple of
Speaker 1: good friends. And then maybe because of this itinerant thing,
Speaker 1: but I didn't really I wasn't very social, I guess,
Speaker 1: and I was kind of shy about I mean, I
Speaker 1: would have never imagined trying out for a play or music.
Speaker 1: How did that happen? How did someone who because you
Speaker 1: seem so private and so um. Well, actually I did
Speaker 1: have one experience. I was junior high or so. Once
Speaker 1: we moved to the United States. A friend of mine
Speaker 1: was really into to the idea of becoming an actor,
Speaker 1: and he loved musical and he was just really he
Speaker 1: knew everything about the theater in New York. And he said,
Speaker 1: you gotta try it for this play. It's great. It's
Speaker 1: it's called it was Hello Dolly Triumphant. And I said, what, no,
Speaker 1: I can't you imagine me trying out for Hello. Valley's
Speaker 1: debut is Hello Dolly? Right? And so I go, What
Speaker 1: I gotta do is did you go there and you
Speaker 1: go on the stage and you know, on theitorium and
Speaker 1: then you you just don't give you something to read
Speaker 1: or you bring something to read? I remember who was
Speaker 1: In any case, I went out, very unwillingly, out on
Speaker 1: this stage and there's this, you know, the theater teacher
Speaker 1: and whoever else is there? And uh, I read the
Speaker 1: first paragraph from David Copperfield, or tried to, but every
Speaker 1: three words they say louder louder, and I just would
Speaker 1: shrink and shrink, and I finally just closed the book
Speaker 1: and ran off. And that was my only foray other
Speaker 1: than I think when I in Argentina when I was
Speaker 1: like six, they put me in a play Georgia the Dragon,
Speaker 1: and that was the ass End of the Dragon. It
Speaker 1: was just a gray suit felters, Hello Dolly, or the
Speaker 1: ass End of the Dragons. It sounds like my career.
Speaker 1: And so how does it begin for you? Meaning the
Speaker 1: person who was shy in private and likes to spend
Speaker 1: time with himself, how does he cross that divide? Well,
Speaker 1: at I guess the relatively late as something like that.
Speaker 1: Where were you then? I was in I was in Denmark. Well,
Speaker 1: I have a lot of family that our cousins and stuff.
Speaker 1: And I had a girl that I liked there and
Speaker 1: I had different jobs, you know, pretty you know, like
Speaker 1: manual labor kind of jobs, factory dog worker. Best one
Speaker 1: was selling flowers on the street. That was nice. And uh,
Speaker 1: I always like to see movies, my mom when I
Speaker 1: was little. You should take me to pretty grown up movies.
Speaker 1: You know, I remember Dr Schivago or to see you know,
Speaker 1: these long movies with intermissions been her Lawrence of Arabia,
Speaker 1: and I love that. I love the experience of seeing
Speaker 1: the movies with her and through her and talking with
Speaker 1: her in the intermission. And of course he'd also maybe
Speaker 1: get a piece of chocolate and the intermission that was
Speaker 1: not bad. And but the whole she really was into
Speaker 1: that and has she been. You know, she was typical
Speaker 1: mom from our parents generation, meaning that she's the one
Speaker 1: you saw all the time. And your dad would leave
Speaker 1: early and come home late, and you might see him
Speaker 1: at dinner, but more likely maybe not, maybe not even
Speaker 1: to be tucked in and then but you see him
Speaker 1: on the weekend. Uh, my dad is my mom passed
Speaker 1: away last year? And where were she at the end?
Speaker 1: And back where she was from Watertown Young It's no,
Speaker 1: it's funny you say that. You said Watertown because my family,
Speaker 1: my mother's family from Syracuse and we spent a lot
Speaker 1: of time up in uh last guy, Watertown, Lake, Ontario,
Speaker 1: Selkirk Shores, Sandy Pond. My whole childhood was in that
Speaker 1: early it's beautiful area anyway, Yeah, and so you wouldn't
Speaker 1: see your dad, and I wouldn't that so much. But
Speaker 1: did you rather take the other boys to the movies? Too?
Speaker 1: Were just you? I mean later we all went with
Speaker 1: her sometimes, but there was I don't know, I had
Speaker 1: a special connection with the movies through my mom. I'm
Speaker 1: not saying more than my brothers. You'd have to ask somebody.
Speaker 1: That's my recollection. I mean, I think what I was
Speaker 1: saying about her generation is had she not been a
Speaker 1: at home mom, I think she would have probably tried
Speaker 1: acting because she was. She was outgoing and very beautiful,
Speaker 1: and and she knew and cared a lot about movies.
Speaker 1: And Uh my first started out in called so what
Speaker 1: have you been doing? Uh? What do you what do
Speaker 1: you try out for this week? And I'd say, well,
Speaker 1: I'm just saying, Who's who wrote the script? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I just they just gave me four pages. It's just
Speaker 1: I got like three lines. So what are you gonna
Speaker 1: how are you gonna play it? I go, I don't
Speaker 1: even have the part yet. I gotta go in and
Speaker 1: I got you know, who's the director? You know who's
Speaker 1: in it? Were a tie or no tie? Didn't do
Speaker 1: a tie? Yeah? You know you mustache fake mustache when
Speaker 1: you know whatever, all this stuff should he has a
Speaker 1: patch on his eye. And if I'd say, well, I
Speaker 1: think the director's name is and I would say, oh, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's not very good, but you never know, it's a
Speaker 1: part good, you know, and like, and I just and
Speaker 1: I stopped sort of telling her so much unless I
Speaker 1: had the part and then we could talk. But because
Speaker 1: because it's very irritating now, of course I realized she
Speaker 1: really cared. One of the most enjoyable experiences I've had
Speaker 1: in recent years. And then boom business was. There was
Speaker 1: one year it's like this, as you know, it's a crapshoot,
Speaker 1: the thing with awards and nominations, and then when you're
Speaker 1: not meant it, well, this year they got it right.
Speaker 1: This year's no I knew it was kind of yeah.
Speaker 1: There was one year I got nominated for all the
Speaker 1: sort of the SAG and the Golden Globes and the
Speaker 1: Oscars and all those in one and uh so I
Speaker 1: said to my mom, do you want to go too?
Speaker 1: I think there's a there's a strike, so Golden Globes
Speaker 1: are canceled, there's no ceremony, but the SAG Awards were
Speaker 1: coming up. I said that could be nice. I think
Speaker 1: it's tables and it's like more relaxed. Do you want
Speaker 1: to go? Mom? Sure? Of course. I was waiting. I
Speaker 1: thought you'd never asked. I said, well, I've never been
Speaker 1: nominated before. She goes, okay, well, yes I'll go, Um,
Speaker 1: I will, I will. I'm gonna get a new dress
Speaker 1: or a pant suit or something. I said, well, whatever
Speaker 1: you want. Do you want some help? No, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: that's something that's my area. And I said fine, So
Speaker 1: she got her things. She flew down. At that point,
Speaker 1: she was living in in northern Idaho, where I was lived.
Speaker 1: She had moved there and lived near my brother and
Speaker 1: a long story, but so she came down the Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: I picked up the airport. We came the day before,
Speaker 1: and we hung out and talked. She had lots of questions,
Speaker 1: but who's gonna be there? I don't know, mom, And
Speaker 1: and then who else is nominated? And and then I
Speaker 1: told her who was nominated? She goes, oh, he did that?
Speaker 1: And he did that. She was like encyclopedia. And then
Speaker 1: we go to the thing, and you know, there's this
Speaker 1: red carpet thing. I said, well, I gotta talk to
Speaker 1: these journalists on the way in and then if you
Speaker 1: don't mind, no, I'll just stand out here and watch
Speaker 1: and see how you do. I'm like, okay, it was
Speaker 1: kind of I knew she was behind. So she watches
Speaker 1: and uh, we walk in and then she's muttering, oh,
Speaker 1: you did okay, except for that one lady, you seem
Speaker 1: like you didn't like her. I said, well, the questions
Speaker 1: were condemn it doesn't matter. You gotta polite to all
Speaker 1: of them. I'm like, yeah, okay. So we sit down
Speaker 1: and then it is tables and uh, and she immediately goes, oh,
Speaker 1: that's and all the older actors and people that I
Speaker 1: didn't know who they were. She knew exactly who they were.
Speaker 1: He was in this, and he was in that, in everything,
Speaker 1: and MAT's John Travolta. I go, yes, it is. He goes,
Speaker 1: excuse me, and she gets up and she goes and
Speaker 1: just just talking to him, and she did that all night.
Speaker 1: It was. It was great. It was it was a fantasy.
Speaker 1: I loved it, and she loved it, and she she
Speaker 1: had a really good time. And uh, they asked I
Speaker 1: had been asked. I've never done this to present one
Speaker 1: of the awards at night, which is a nerve racking thing.
Speaker 1: I was like, I'd rather just learn it. I don't know,
Speaker 1: you should read the things. I don't know what it
Speaker 1: was best supporting actress, I think, And um, yeah, there
Speaker 1: was a sort of gentle critique of my delivery when
Speaker 1: I came back to the table. You know, it's just
Speaker 1: like that kind of night. But I left a lot.
Speaker 1: It was wonderful and I wish I wish I had
Speaker 1: been nominated before that, just so that I could have
Speaker 1: taken my mom wonderful. I took my mom to quite
Speaker 1: a few premiers. You liked that, and uh or either
Speaker 1: took her or she attended, you know. Sometimes once I
Speaker 1: wasn't you know, like if I couldn't be at the
Speaker 1: one in New York City, she would come down Syracuse.
Speaker 1: But there was one that was really fun. It was
Speaker 1: I did a movie called Hidalgo, which I love that movie,
Speaker 1: I said, And it was mar Sharif, isn't it. And
Speaker 1: of course when she took me when I was little
Speaker 1: to see Ductor and Lawrence Arabia and so she, I mean,
Speaker 1: she had a I think she had a crush on
Speaker 1: him like back then and maybe her whole life. I
Speaker 1: don't know, and she came with my stepdad. You know,
Speaker 1: you look a little like O more at this time
Speaker 1: of day, I kind of looked like a little bit.
Speaker 1: It's weird. So in the morning, Uh, yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1: She Uh, she came with my stepdad and uh. It
Speaker 1: was kind of a crazy premiere in l A. I
Speaker 1: actually came down the red carpet on the horse was reining,
Speaker 1: and they were like, don't don't gallop because if you
Speaker 1: slide under a bus and you and the horse get hurt,
Speaker 1: and and if you get hurt, they added, really the
Speaker 1: ps um that would be terrible for us, and you
Speaker 1: know the insurance. I don't know. I don't know, so
Speaker 1: don't worry. I'll just trot in. So I did, and
Speaker 1: the photographers were kind of shocked, and I wrote up
Speaker 1: right up to him and and they started asking questions
Speaker 1: as I don't know, I asked him, and it was
Speaker 1: kind of just silly like that. And my mom's there,
Speaker 1: you know, my stepdad beaming, and uh. I get off
Speaker 1: the horse and I walk over to her and then
Speaker 1: I spot Omar and I go, I look, mom, as
Speaker 1: you guys that's him, And I said, well you can
Speaker 1: you want to meet him. No, no, no, I go, yeah,
Speaker 1: come on. And I had told Omar that my mom
Speaker 1: really was into him, you know, when the shooting and
Speaker 1: he just like put on the swab gentleman. He was
Speaker 1: suddenly looked like from ninety three. And he comes over
Speaker 1: and he takes her hands so gently, just never removing
Speaker 1: his eyes from hers, and kissed her hands so slowly.
Speaker 1: She was like beat red. And my stepdad I thought
Speaker 1: he was going to knife him. I mean, he was
Speaker 1: so upset. I mean, he's insane, he but he was
Speaker 1: just like I thought, he's gonna have a coortinary And
Speaker 1: it was like a highlight. She was just beaming those
Speaker 1: rest of the night. It was like she'd been given
Speaker 1: some kind of you know, drug or something. I have
Speaker 1: the same thing with my sister. I was doing this
Speaker 1: movie at the Edge with Tony Hopkins, and we were
Speaker 1: in the Canadian wilderness, the bay with the bear in
Speaker 1: the woods there where. It was the best experience I've
Speaker 1: ever had making a film because I worshiped Tony. I
Speaker 1: was just the dream of working with Tony and I thought,
Speaker 1: oh God, would if I ever had that chance. I
Speaker 1: just loved him, and here I was making this film
Speaker 1: and my sister, my older sister who at the time
Speaker 1: I was married, has six children. You know, she's a
Speaker 1: pretty solid citizen. She comes up to Canada and see me. Uh,
Speaker 1: Tony's laying on an air mattress because he'd hurt his
Speaker 1: back and right soon after this he was going to
Speaker 1: boo and shut down for two weeks from the back
Speaker 1: surgery where like go in your neck and fix his
Speaker 1: bones and everything. And he's lying there reading the paper,
Speaker 1: and my sister walks up and I go, Tony, um, like,
Speaker 1: meet my sister, Beth. And Tony stands up, fluffs his clothes,
Speaker 1: and then right like a movie, he like just looks
Speaker 1: up for it, makes out of contact or with and
Speaker 1: says Elizabeth with a great pleasure to meet you, and
Speaker 1: takes her hand and does the same exactly, the slow
Speaker 1: kiss on the hand. And my sister turned red. She
Speaker 1: started like trembling a little bit as she worshiped Tony.
Speaker 1: And I thought, these guys just they got it. May
Speaker 1: she walks away and he's done for the day, right,
Speaker 1: He's totally kill himself doing that now for you, Um,
Speaker 1: you were going to give me the where you crossed
Speaker 1: that line and the and the very quiet, private kid
Speaker 1: goes into the business. Two years old, I started, I
Speaker 1: guess I started looking. I mean i'd seen some on TV,
Speaker 1: but I hadn't really seen many, I mean in Argentine
Speaker 1: and seen Argentine movies because that's what you had down there,
Speaker 1: mostly American movies, like it happens every in the world.
Speaker 1: But but i'd see stuff in Argentine. I mean I
Speaker 1: saw cartoons on TV were from there because they were dubbed.
Speaker 1: And then i got here when I was eleven, and
Speaker 1: I'm like looking at You'll be Bear and you know,
Speaker 1: speed Racer, and said, oh, these are not Argentine either. Actually, yeah,
Speaker 1: in the Batman TV show, you know, with Adam West
Speaker 1: and a lot, I felt you were in the same major.
Speaker 1: It's the same cartoon. Yeah, it's like this, it's all
Speaker 1: on English. What's wrong, you know? And but I hadn't
Speaker 1: been exposed to, let's say, movies from other countries, and
Speaker 1: then from the forties fifties, certainly not silent movies. And
Speaker 1: all of a sudden I started watching lots of Denmark.
Speaker 1: That was the time where I was spending time in
Speaker 1: England and Denmark and different jobs, and and I started
Speaker 1: going to revival movie houses where you'd see a couple
Speaker 1: of different movies a day if he wanted to. And
Speaker 1: I started seeing, you know, movies by Ozu and Brassan
Speaker 1: and Passolini and Dryer and before that. And it was
Speaker 1: an eye opener. And at some point I made the
Speaker 1: transition from being entertained or not, you know, going for
Speaker 1: for just to enjoy myself, to wondering what it was, what,
Speaker 1: what the trick was? I mean, how do they do that?
Speaker 1: How do you How is it that I relate to them?
Speaker 1: And then suddenly I'm crying. I'm sitting in a movie
Speaker 1: theater crying, or that I walk out of the movie
Speaker 1: theater and I'm shocked that I'm in Copenhagen, or that
Speaker 1: I'm in a city and it's daytime. I'm not, you know,
Speaker 1: on this Mongolian plane or something. You're not on the
Speaker 1: raft in the middle of the ocean. Yeah, And I
Speaker 1: was curious about how is that done? And and not
Speaker 1: long after that, I moved to Manhattan from Denmark. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there was a girl I was going out with at
Speaker 1: the time. She went back here and I followed her
Speaker 1: and that didn't work out. But I got here. I
Speaker 1: was with her for a while, and I was curious
Speaker 1: about the acting thing. I wanted to try it, just
Speaker 1: to see, you know, how do you do? How does
Speaker 1: it work? So I I got I got a phone book.
Speaker 1: I looked at the yellow pages. You got to go
Speaker 1: to the theater and try out for the play. But
Speaker 1: what theater? Right? So I'm leafing through and I find
Speaker 1: this thing that says Actor's Repertory Theater, which was a
Speaker 1: really a workshop with Warren Robertson as a teacher, right,
Speaker 1: And so I love Actor's Repertory here that sounds I know.
Speaker 1: Repertory means they could be doing several plays, and maybe
Speaker 1: if I get in the first one, then I do. Okay,
Speaker 1: I could be in other place, and that's probably the place.
Speaker 1: So I call him I and they go Actor's Repertory Theater.
Speaker 1: You know, I, how do you? How do you try
Speaker 1: out for the play? And I go what play? And
Speaker 1: I go, well, you know there are auditions. Sure you
Speaker 1: can come down a fifteen Monday. You can come down.
Speaker 1: You might want to get here a few minutes early
Speaker 1: just to sign in. Okay, what I do? Bring two
Speaker 1: pieces and like two pieces of what? And they said
Speaker 1: two texts? You know? Oh, text and like, you know,
Speaker 1: I go to to to act and they go yes.
Speaker 1: So I had no idea what that meant. So at
Speaker 1: the time, I was reading a collection of short career
Speaker 1: relies on the patients of this woman on that phone point.
Speaker 1: She was very kind to you. E's actina, said Karen
Speaker 1: Blix and the Danish writer. I was reading some short stories.
Speaker 1: There's one in which Jack the Ripper figures and there's
Speaker 1: some dialogue. So I sort of cobbled together the dialogue
Speaker 1: from the short story and made a little monologue out
Speaker 1: of that, and then I found an Irish song, or
Speaker 1: there's an Iri song. I liked old ever song. So
Speaker 1: I came in and I did this weird Jack the
Speaker 1: Ripper monologue and and sang this song and they just
Speaker 1: sat there for a while, looked at each other, and
Speaker 1: they said we'll get back to you. And I that's it.
Speaker 1: You go yep next you know like that. So I
Speaker 1: I went went back home and I thought, well, I
Speaker 1: don't know if that went well or not. And the
Speaker 1: next day they called and they said you can come
Speaker 1: in next Wednesday. Go what's the play and they go,
Speaker 1: there is no play, just come in next Wednesday. Turned
Speaker 1: out it was a theater workshop where you seeing study
Speaker 1: and and acting exercises of Warren Robertson had his His
Speaker 1: approach was kind of a combination of Sandy Meiser and
Speaker 1: actor's studio, you know, since memory and seen study and
Speaker 1: did you like it right away? I did like it? Well.
Speaker 1: The main thing was that he encouraged me. Had he
Speaker 1: not yes, had he not said no, there's something. I mean,
Speaker 1: I was probably really doing weird stuff. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: he would say, you're just too fidgety year all over
Speaker 1: the place. I want you to sit on your hands
Speaker 1: and do all that now without moving around so much,
Speaker 1: and he was just I don't I think it was
Speaker 1: probably very crude, but he saw something and he sort
Speaker 1: of eventually recommended me to go meet an agent and stuff.
Speaker 1: And if he hadn't encouraged me, it might have been
Speaker 1: just one more thing I tried. I'm not sure, but uh,
Speaker 1: and I certainly, I mean I got lucky right away
Speaker 1: once I went out for auditions in terms of getting
Speaker 1: to down to the last two guys for parts. But
Speaker 1: I did that about thirty times and I never would
Speaker 1: get it, and I was always shocked. I was like, well,
Speaker 1: I did my best why don't you know? But something
Speaker 1: about it, maybe whatever my mom had inculcated or put
Speaker 1: into me, or maybe just some voice inside you that
Speaker 1: told you, do you need to find out? Stay with it.
Speaker 1: I still was like, I liked that was telling stories
Speaker 1: in the movies. I want to do it. So I
Speaker 1: just stuck with it and eventually got little parts. It's
Speaker 1: probably from me because I'm a slow learner. Um in
Speaker 1: a way. I mean, once I learned something, I'm I'm
Speaker 1: not going to forget it. But the process of auditioning
Speaker 1: many times and seeing how people shoot stuff and how
Speaker 1: you know, tests, screen tests, all kinds of stuff, and
Speaker 1: then getting small parts I'm doing a little theater, little
Speaker 1: TV and small parts of movies. I really learned how
Speaker 1: process works. I got, you know, a couple of good parts,
Speaker 1: very small, like one scene parts, one with Woody Allen
Speaker 1: Purple Rosa Cairo, one with Jonathan Demi Swing Shift. Both
Speaker 1: of those were cut out of the movies. To my
Speaker 1: surprise and my family's when I told him next Friday,
Speaker 1: I'm in the movie, Like, what are you doing in
Speaker 1: I'm in the movie, but I'm not in the movie. Yeah,
Speaker 1: my name is nowhere. Yeah, I promise I made the
Speaker 1: scene with Woody. Yeah. So I was in Search for Tomorrow,
Speaker 1: which was the oldest. Which one did you do? Did
Speaker 1: the doctors before they got but Search Edge well Go
Speaker 1: always called them by one word. When I was on
Speaker 1: Search Edge days, Search was a very old one, and
Speaker 1: I went in. They put me in this white paramedic
Speaker 1: kind of outfit and they said, you guys are gonna
Speaker 1: want it's time. We'll practice just before because it's an
Speaker 1: arrow door and you put the actress on the stretcher,
Speaker 1: then you you can't make like a full turn with
Speaker 1: a stretcher and all I just have that in mind.
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, okay, And then it was like hurry
Speaker 1: up and wait. So I was down there in the
Speaker 1: little cubicle that they put me in in my white outfit,
Speaker 1: and my hair sort of slipped back a little bit,
Speaker 1: and uh, I fell asleep, and all of a sudden
Speaker 1: the bells ringing. It come on, where's Mortonton? And then
Speaker 1: as we had to shoot, I didn't get to rehearse.
Speaker 1: I didn't know what was going on. So the guy goes, well,
Speaker 1: you take the back end, always the ass end of
Speaker 1: the stretcher and just follow where I go, Okay, I
Speaker 1: go fine, fine on half asleep and um backing up,
Speaker 1: I hit the set in the wall. It was it
Speaker 1: was just terrible. I didn't get that call back to
Speaker 1: that one. But Search for Tomorrow I had a good run.
Speaker 1: I was on it for a few months and I
Speaker 1: played a smuggler's kind of mysterious guys. I never find
Speaker 1: out what I keep smuggling. I would ask, and it's
Speaker 1: like too many questions. More what am I smuggling? It's
Speaker 1: not it's contrabands, And I go, well, what what is
Speaker 1: the drugs? Not important? You're just smuggling. The main thing
Speaker 1: is you don't tell anybody. I said I won't and
Speaker 1: they finally, I think got tired of my questions a
Speaker 1: few months because I said, well, why is this? And
Speaker 1: if I'm gonna you know, I had I was in
Speaker 1: the hospital at one point and then I did the
Speaker 1: thing when you tie the sheets together and climb out
Speaker 1: the window, and uh, I don't know. I asked questions
Speaker 1: about where'd all these sheets come from. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: all lives on sheets to pull this off. This knot
Speaker 1: is not strong around the ninth floor, yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: my only one sees that exactly. I said, these knots
Speaker 1: are not strong enough. This is would never hold, you know.
Speaker 1: And they're like, I just throw it out the window
Speaker 1: and jump out yourself out the window. So after so
Speaker 1: many questions, one day I was informed it's the end
Speaker 1: for you. On Wednesday, I said, the end, the end?
Speaker 1: What the end of your employment here? But it's gonna
Speaker 1: be a great scene. And I was a silly scene.
Speaker 1: It was a bar and I was a girl that
Speaker 1: hit me with a breakable glass a picture of beer
Speaker 1: in the forehead and I fall out of shot and
Speaker 1: that was it. And that was it for Vigo Mortenson's
Speaker 1: soap opera career. Coming up, his film career explodes. Take
Speaker 1: a listen to the Here's the Thing Archives. I talked
Speaker 1: with actresses like Debbie Reynolds who remembers living in Hollywood
Speaker 1: during the Golden era. Right across the street was Jimmy
Speaker 1: Stewart and Lucille Ball and everybody was on that one street.
Speaker 1: It was like, let's have a party every night. Listen
Speaker 1: to the full conversation at Here's the Thing Dot Org.
Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to Here's
Speaker 1: the Thing. Vigo Mortenson isn't just an award winning actor.
Speaker 1: He is also an avid writer, artist and publisher. He
Speaker 1: speaks fluent English, Danish, Spanish, and French. But his first
Speaker 1: movie offer was a one day role as an Amish
Speaker 1: farmer speaking German in Peter Weir's film Witness. He wasn't
Speaker 1: sure if he should take it. On the very day
Speaker 1: he was offered the role in Witness. That same day,
Speaker 1: I was offered a part in a Shakespeare in the
Speaker 1: Park production, and I said to my representative, well, obviously
Speaker 1: do the play. I mean, I can work all summer
Speaker 1: and learn stuff. He goes, not so fast. He said,
Speaker 1: you know, for an actor living in New York, and
Speaker 1: you know in the early eighties it wasn't even now,
Speaker 1: but especially then, you don't get that. It's not like
Speaker 1: you had that many shots at being in movies. Um.
Speaker 1: And you're certainly not going to be offered work by
Speaker 1: Peter Weir very often. So take advantage. You can always
Speaker 1: do a play or in New York. Um. So I
Speaker 1: recommend you do that, even if it's only the one day.
Speaker 1: So I go down. I take the train down to
Speaker 1: to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and I do my first day's work
Speaker 1: and as Luckward, it was very it was fun. It
Speaker 1: was a beautiful place. And at lunch, Peter where It
Speaker 1: comes over and says, you know, you have this big resemblance.
Speaker 1: I'm thinking, well, what are you doing tomorrow? I go,
Speaker 1: I'm going taking the train back to New York. He goes,
Speaker 1: are you doing anything this summer? The rest of the summer?
Speaker 1: Going out now? And he says, uh, well, if you
Speaker 1: wouldn't mind staying, you know, for a few weeks maybe more. Um,
Speaker 1: I think I'm gonna give Alexander good enough, the Amish
Speaker 1: suitor of Kelly McGillis Harrison Ford's rival for for her
Speaker 1: affections in the story. We're gonna give him a younger brother,
Speaker 1: and uh, you just tag along and the scenes he's in,
Speaker 1: You're just watching this rivalry. You're the audience's eyes. I guess,
Speaker 1: and we'll figure it out, okay, And I go sure.
Speaker 1: So that was a good break and it was very professional.
Speaker 1: They always finished on time. Uh, the weather was nice,
Speaker 1: but the cinematographer was brilliant, John cele, the actors were prepared,
Speaker 1: and the director that nobody yelled. It was fun. Anybody
Speaker 1: could go to watch the Russia's The dailies, So it
Speaker 1: was misleading in it. It was misleading because everybody was
Speaker 1: coming on and behaved well and kind to each other,
Speaker 1: and they did good work and they finished on time
Speaker 1: and it was not stressful. So I don't know about
Speaker 1: your experience and my experience. That's very unus. A very
Speaker 1: famous actor. I don't want to speak about anybody, you know,
Speaker 1: without their permission, but told me that he did a
Speaker 1: film that was very tough that way, and the director
Speaker 1: was very very you know, just luxuriating in thirty five
Speaker 1: and forty takes without any real director, you know, without
Speaker 1: any real purpose, and kind of abusive to some of
Speaker 1: the other cast at the very least psychologically, and the
Speaker 1: way he would say things and do things, and it
Speaker 1: was and it was all hum you know, not at
Speaker 1: all what he was used to or preferred. And so
Speaker 1: he just went up to the guy and and rather
Speaker 1: than get angry, he just really said it, like as
Speaker 1: a plea, he said, he said, I just can't work
Speaker 1: like this, and if you want me to do what
Speaker 1: I do, this situation has got to change. I like
Speaker 1: to do sixth or eight takes, you like to do
Speaker 1: thirty takes? Thirty five takes he said, I don't work
Speaker 1: that way. So he said, let's I'm gonna go home
Speaker 1: right and cut out this kind of dressing everybody down
Speaker 1: in front of the crew and crew members. He said,
Speaker 1: we want to speak to somebody, you give them their
Speaker 1: notes privately, don't do it and embarrass them. So the
Speaker 1: point is that the actor said to the director, you
Speaker 1: you guys think about it, and he goes and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go home, and then tomorrow if I come back,
Speaker 1: if you want me to come back, I'm gonna come
Speaker 1: back knowing that it's different. And if I don't come back,
Speaker 1: you're gonna get another actor to play this part. Who's
Speaker 1: gonna put up with when I'm putting up with now
Speaker 1: that I don't want to put up with anymore. He
Speaker 1: just said it really calmly, and what happened, and when
Speaker 1: they the guy changed and just you know was everybody
Speaker 1: was a little bit more. There were times you could
Speaker 1: see the guy was struggling and he didn't change the nature,
Speaker 1: had the power, had the position or the size role
Speaker 1: that he could do that. If you're playing a bit parts,
Speaker 1: you're done, you're out. You know. I think the main thing,
Speaker 1: the most important thing to be apart from just listening. Uh.
Speaker 1: In general, it's good in life too. But for an actor,
Speaker 1: be flexible, you know, once you realize that there's all
Speaker 1: kinds of ways of making movies good and bad, pleasant
Speaker 1: and unpleasant. Um, that doesn't mean you can't do your job.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's more difficult than others. But the best thing
Speaker 1: is to be there's different ways of something like to her.
Speaker 1: Some people don't. Some actors come in and some of
Speaker 1: them are very good, award winning actors. It's a lobby name,
Speaker 1: but they will. They can prepare technically, let's say, in
Speaker 1: front of a mirror. Whatever they do. They know how
Speaker 1: they're gonna the tone line, they know at what moment
Speaker 1: of the scene they're gonna cry or seem to or laugh.
Speaker 1: It's all. There's nothing wrong with it. Um. But that
Speaker 1: means that you're adapting to them, you know. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've tried, but it doesn't you know, just for the
Speaker 1: hell of and there's like they're just impassive because they
Speaker 1: know one of the cameras on them. It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: what the hell you're doing. If you're working that way,
Speaker 1: it's this is what I'm delivering. You guys, adjust to
Speaker 1: me that can work, and that person can do a
Speaker 1: great job. It's just not as much fun because there
Speaker 1: isn't the unknown. There isn't you're not playing together. It's
Speaker 1: not a two way street. And um that works. Uh
Speaker 1: So when you work with something like that, while you
Speaker 1: just deal with it, if you get resentful, then you're
Speaker 1: out of your game. It's like someone trying to psych
Speaker 1: you out on the basketball court or you know, or
Speaker 1: something you can't. If you let that happen, you're you're
Speaker 1: not going to play. Well, what's the movie you did?
Speaker 1: It's the opposite where everybody really really did playoff. It
Speaker 1: was very crackling and very alive with I've been lucky,
Speaker 1: I've been in several I would say Captain fantastic this
Speaker 1: movie that's just come out. Um, that was a great
Speaker 1: experience that the director was calmed. That was very much
Speaker 1: like Peter Ware or like Cronenberg, where everything's done, everybody's
Speaker 1: well prepared, everybody's polite to each other. The director has
Speaker 1: a good sense of humor. Um, they're intelligent enough to
Speaker 1: know that it's good to do everything possible to give
Speaker 1: the actors the idea it's a lie, basically, but to
Speaker 1: give the actor of the idea that there's especially when
Speaker 1: you're working with children. In this movie, you have six
Speaker 1: kids that there's you have all the time in the world.
Speaker 1: It's just fun. It's just there's no pressure and inside
Speaker 1: the directors like freaking out as the son's going down
Speaker 1: and you're an independent movie, have limited budget. It was
Speaker 1: thirty something days thirty it's not bad. But when you
Speaker 1: look at Captain Fantastic, we had a lot of changes
Speaker 1: of locations and all these and some of the kids
Speaker 1: are I mean the kids have limited work hours five
Speaker 1: six hours for the youngest, and it's a longer in
Speaker 1: indie terms. Everybody was you could kind of wrap wrap
Speaker 1: it up in an hour and thirty now you know
Speaker 1: what I mean exactly. And um, so that was a
Speaker 1: good experience. And I mean he he's the captain, He
Speaker 1: or she runs the show and they their example is
Speaker 1: what what guides everyone else? Katherine Hans, Steve's on, very
Speaker 1: good actors, Um, Frank Lan Jela and Doubt, I mean everybody.
Speaker 1: And it was a great group of people, and I
Speaker 1: think Matt selected people who would work that way. I
Speaker 1: was so hoping that there would be an earthquake and
Speaker 1: a beam would come down to crushed lan Jelous character.
Speaker 1: I hated him so much in the movie. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: at the end you kind of realized he's got a point.
Speaker 1: You know, he's not all wrong. I mean yeah, one
Speaker 1: of the I mean, one of the things I like
Speaker 1: about the movie is that it it surprises you, it
Speaker 1: subverts your expectations. Just like when I was reading the script,
Speaker 1: I thought, wow, this is good. I have my pencil
Speaker 1: because I know the director want to meet me, so
Speaker 1: I wanted to make my notes, so, you know, and
Speaker 1: I didn't make any notes. I just started reading, and
Speaker 1: the first ten fifteen pages I thought, Okay, I know
Speaker 1: where this is. What this is. It's a kind of
Speaker 1: a sub genre. It's a I guess, liberal utopian fantasy
Speaker 1: story where these are our heroes, are these left wing
Speaker 1: off the good people and their obstacles will be conservative people,
Speaker 1: conservative ideas, and we'll go with them through thick and thin,
Speaker 1: and see how that works. Will probably be funny, and
Speaker 1: convention will be there, right and and then I realized
Speaker 1: it's not that. And you go from thinking was the
Speaker 1: best dad in the world, I feel like a lazy
Speaker 1: bumb you know, watching this family. They're so driven to
Speaker 1: you know, per to achieve physical and intellectual excellence every
Speaker 1: second of the day. It's incredibly devoted father to thinking
Speaker 1: he's a maniac, he's a menace to his children, dangerous,
Speaker 1: and he's you know, the very rigidity that he's so against,
Speaker 1: he's engaging in it inadvertently maybe by being isolating them
Speaker 1: and being so rigorous. And then the characters that you
Speaker 1: think are gonna be you know, like Frank Langelo's character
Speaker 1: and his wife and out, you think they're gonna be
Speaker 1: just bad and so of one note and and in
Speaker 1: reality there they have a point. They and his children
Speaker 1: and circumstances lead the character that I played to to
Speaker 1: realize I'm on the wrong path. And it's it's devastating
Speaker 1: when you, as a parent do what he does. If
Speaker 1: if you give a hundred percent of your time and energy,
Speaker 1: you do everything to to help, you know, curate the
Speaker 1: lives of your your children, to give them best possible start.
Speaker 1: You you're sacrificing everything, and your first impulse is to
Speaker 1: feel like it's all wrong. I'm an idiot, and I
Speaker 1: quit and and then he makes an adjustment. And as
Speaker 1: an audience, I like those stories. Just reading I thought
Speaker 1: this is really good. I was really surprised that closed
Speaker 1: the script and that's amazing. I've made a single note.
Speaker 1: I want to meet Matt Ross, the writer director, for
Speaker 1: a cup of coffee which lasted like four and a
Speaker 1: half hour, talking about being dad everything. You know, politics
Speaker 1: and you are a dad. You have a twenty eight
Speaker 1: year old son, son where he's in Los Angeles? What
Speaker 1: does he do? A musician? He's a writer and he
Speaker 1: also works part time personal press or company publishing house.
Speaker 1: I have that you have? Yeah? Oh cool? You know,
Speaker 1: when I saw the film, it just reminded me that
Speaker 1: I have a daughter who's going to be twenty one
Speaker 1: in October, and and I was not involved in raising
Speaker 1: her as much as I'd like to because I was
Speaker 1: divorced and everything and it was a little complicated. But um,
Speaker 1: and when I watched the film, I realized that, well,
Speaker 1: here's the guy that really wants to raise his kids himself.
Speaker 1: And what I realized watching You is that, yeah, we
Speaker 1: don't raise our children, and we try, we really try.
Speaker 1: We try so hard to superimpose our sensibilities. And here's
Speaker 1: a guy who he really wants to be their father
Speaker 1: in the sense that he's going to determine what gets
Speaker 1: put into the mix and what doesn't. And in the
Speaker 1: world we live in now, especially now, I mean right now,
Speaker 1: that's impossible. How much do we actually raise our children's
Speaker 1: almost ridiculously small technology the world? Yeah, well, I mean
Speaker 1: the meaning I got from the story too, when I
Speaker 1: got from the script, is that it's aspirational. That really
Speaker 1: it's basically to be the perfect parent is impossible, And
Speaker 1: the story isn't showing you something to make you think
Speaker 1: what you should be There hunter percent of time it's
Speaker 1: just whether you're engaged or not. And to know that
Speaker 1: by taking the risk of trying hard, you're gonna make mistakes.
Speaker 1: And then the most important thing is is hopefully realizing
Speaker 1: that and doing something about it and making adjustments. You know,
Speaker 1: being a good dad isn't a static thing. Having a
Speaker 1: good marriage is an a static thing. Neither is a democracy,
Speaker 1: neither is a friendship. You know, tomorrow morning you gotta
Speaker 1: sort of start over, not over, but continue the process
Speaker 1: and make adjustments. And if you don't, it's a game
Speaker 1: that moves as you play, and if you don't move,
Speaker 1: you can't play very well. So scripts for you, how
Speaker 1: does scripts get to you? Was there a mechanism, But
Speaker 1: I think people would be fascinated to know someone who
Speaker 1: has made as many successful films, highly successful films as
Speaker 1: you've had. You're very admired by everybody in the business,
Speaker 1: and you must get inundated with scripts. And is there
Speaker 1: a filter like how do you get a script and say,
Speaker 1: the one you open and the one you read, how
Speaker 1: does it arrive at your home? Well, in that regard,
Speaker 1: I don't like filters at all, and my representative I
Speaker 1: was always known that. So I said, I'll read. I
Speaker 1: will read everything and anything and don't sense or don't
Speaker 1: just send it and read whatever you want to. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't care, but I'm gonna decide if I want
Speaker 1: to do it or not. And sometimes you read and
Speaker 1: most I mean, I think it's been since movies began
Speaker 1: as an art form. Percent or more of things the
Speaker 1: scripts that are written are not original or if they
Speaker 1: start well or maybe there's an okay, con said, it's
Speaker 1: just the structure. It just doesn't work. And most of
Speaker 1: them are really poorly written, not very good ideas. So
Speaker 1: but it does take longer to just to look at everything.
Speaker 1: And so that's a conventional way they come through you know,
Speaker 1: an agent sometimes, but a lot of times people will
Speaker 1: hand me stuff on the street or through a family member,
Speaker 1: and you know, you've probably you know, if somebody said,
Speaker 1: what would you look at this? Or you're going to
Speaker 1: try to avoid it if I can. I know, you're
Speaker 1: going to open the opening of a movie and you're
Speaker 1: doing anything and suddenly goes here and he handed a package,
Speaker 1: and you're like, well, I will look at him and
Speaker 1: I will answer. But it's also like, what the publishing
Speaker 1: house I have? You know, I've announced it. We're not
Speaker 1: taking unsolicited submissions for the for the foreseeable future. We
Speaker 1: have enough projects in the hopper to work on. Why
Speaker 1: did you set up a publishing house? I like books,
Speaker 1: and I like artists. I like writers, and there were
Speaker 1: certain people that I saw ought to be published after
Speaker 1: Lord of the Rings, for me and for what else.
Speaker 1: All of a sudden there was this new I had
Speaker 1: more options as an actor suddenly. I mean people have
Speaker 1: the mistaken impression that as an actor you can choose, Well,
Speaker 1: why didn't you do that? So they enough for Tony
Speaker 1: you can say no, but you can't say yes. They're
Speaker 1: offering it. But people thinking James Bond I'm like, I've
Speaker 1: never heard from the James Bond people and so so um.
Speaker 1: I just thought, well, I'll use the money and more
Speaker 1: than that, the notoriety that I suddenly have as a
Speaker 1: result of the success of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Speaker 1: I'll established this publishing house and to help it the
Speaker 1: first year, I'll put out a book maybe two of
Speaker 1: my own photographs, things, poems, and then that will lead
Speaker 1: them to the other things on the website. And I
Speaker 1: enjoy it. I think it must be like directing. I
Speaker 1: suppose in the sense that you're enabling other people. You're
Speaker 1: you're facilitating their their way of looking things. I'm curious
Speaker 1: as to, uh, you do um Carlito with Brian who
Speaker 1: I love, and you do g I Jane, you do
Speaker 1: the Psycho remake, You do a bunch of things when
Speaker 1: you arrive where it's Peter Jackson directed the first film
Speaker 1: as well, right, And when Jackson contect you, where are
Speaker 1: you out in your career? At that point, we're on
Speaker 1: the threshold of doing the biggest movies you've ever made.
Speaker 1: It's I had just finished my hand movie that ended
Speaker 1: up being called Twenty eight Days, and I had driven
Speaker 1: I bought a pickup truck, and I had driven across
Speaker 1: the country with my son, who was eleven at the time.
Speaker 1: We had this great road trip where he made a map.
Speaker 1: He drew a map in the United States, and he said,
Speaker 1: I said, well, let's decide the route rather than going
Speaker 1: straight across the country to California, where we were living
Speaker 1: at the time, I said, what places should we go?
Speaker 1: I said, well, how about grace Land, Okay, we made
Speaker 1: that dot on the map, and then how about where
Speaker 1: Mom's families from Michael. That would be near Chicago. And
Speaker 1: then well how about you know uncle Michael, because that's Tucson, Okay,
Speaker 1: And how about this, and how about Yeah, So there
Speaker 1: was all these places all over so we did. I said, well,
Speaker 1: this is what the line looks like. It's like this
Speaker 1: stock exactly crashing, falling, going up and down north south,
Speaker 1: north south, but always sort of more or less working westward.
Speaker 1: And we got back from that school starts and I
Speaker 1: was up in Idaho actually when I got this phone
Speaker 1: call and uh, somebody said, we would like you to
Speaker 1: come and do this movie. And I so I just
Speaker 1: got back when my son and school started, and I
Speaker 1: haven't I don't haven't read that book. I don't know
Speaker 1: anything about it, and you're guys are already shooting it
Speaker 1: was to replace an actor, which was also an awkward thing,
Speaker 1: and um who was deemed to be too young for
Speaker 1: the role, and I should I don't know. My son
Speaker 1: heard me talking about it and he he said, the
Speaker 1: Lord of the Rings knew what it was from his
Speaker 1: friends and he dream and I'd read The Hobbit years
Speaker 1: before in high school, but I didn't know anything. But
Speaker 1: Lord Rings, I I just knew it was this big,
Speaker 1: huge book. And he said, what's the character? And I go,
Speaker 1: that's the guy I don't have some guys in the
Speaker 1: woods and he's got you know, some little people and
Speaker 1: he's guiding around and he know that's a strider. I
Speaker 1: don't know. Yeah right, and he goes and he becomes
Speaker 1: the king. I go, he does? He goes, yeah your yeah,
Speaker 1: And I go, you should do that. I got, well,
Speaker 1: but it's a long you know, I don't haven't read it,
Speaker 1: and they've been rehearsing for months and all the stuff
Speaker 1: from Elvish and sword play and whatnot. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's it's just sometimes you gotta admit you're not the writer.
Speaker 1: Guy for the job. Whatever this I don't know. So
Speaker 1: I hung up, But I thought about it, and he
Speaker 1: was very for it. Maybe I would have done it
Speaker 1: on my own anyway, but I was curious, and also
Speaker 1: on the phone, They're going, it'd be easy, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean, you will be done by December. Here it's October.
Speaker 1: I go, that's good. December of next year. Actually, I'm
Speaker 1: like it, so so I said. I eventually said yes,
Speaker 1: and that's how that worked out. It was great. That
Speaker 1: was a good experience. I really like that. I was
Speaker 1: there's something I was thinking about earlier that yesterday. I
Speaker 1: did this, uh, sort of like a public forum R
Speaker 1: time some where you're speaking in from an audio. Been
Speaker 1: asked exactly, and they asked me a question. I was
Speaker 1: curious how you felt? Was? They said? Do you feel
Speaker 1: that the movies you do or choose to do or
Speaker 1: accept that they need to be about something in terms socially?
Speaker 1: Do they have to be for the better good or
Speaker 1: they have to promote you know, I suppose politically or
Speaker 1: ideologically something positive in your opinion, I said, I thought
Speaker 1: about I said, no, I don't think that I find
Speaker 1: movies that are message movies to not be very effective
Speaker 1: dramas or comedies or anything. They're just not interesting to me.
Speaker 1: Movies like Captain Fantastic right, the movies that actually indirectly
Speaker 1: without intending to make you think about communication problems, which
Speaker 1: we have many in this country right now. That's great
Speaker 1: because you're thinking you can apply it. Okay, Well, people
Speaker 1: aren't talking, and if you don't talk and you're isolated
Speaker 1: in your groups because of ideology, race, whatever, it's a problem.
Speaker 1: You gotta talk, you gotta work it out. You're gonna
Speaker 1: have to be flexible. Uh, that's how I like it.
Speaker 1: But I don't message movies. No, I said, um, but
Speaker 1: what I was thinking and the subject went onto something else.
Speaker 1: What I I would have said, if we talked about
Speaker 1: it further, was that you know, I've I've heard the
Speaker 1: thing that you've probably heard before. When you're an actor,
Speaker 1: when did you keep your masha? What do you know?
Speaker 1: I said, Well, why doesn't a football player or an actor,
Speaker 1: or a dentist or anybody and any part of the
Speaker 1: country have a right to say anything it's supposed to be?
Speaker 1: You know, if you you can't expect your politicians to
Speaker 1: have a civil discourse, informed discourse, to be honest and
Speaker 1: to communicate better across the aisle or or with citizens.
Speaker 1: If you don't do it, example has to come from below,
Speaker 1: not from from above. Now, Um, it's interesting to me
Speaker 1: when I think about you, is you know you're this
Speaker 1: very chiseled leading man and you've got this warmth and
Speaker 1: this passion, this beauty to you in the current film
Speaker 1: and Captain Fantastic, but in other films, you know, you're
Speaker 1: this anxiety is tough. History of Violence was a tough movie.
Speaker 1: And um, do you find when you make a film
Speaker 1: like that is some kind of a state you have
Speaker 1: to enter to play one or the other? Do you
Speaker 1: have to empty yourself out and get into the beauty
Speaker 1: zone and the love zone to do Captain Fantastic? And
Speaker 1: you need to drink nineteen espressos and be in your
Speaker 1: room watching Scarface on DVD when you step off to
Speaker 1: go shoot people in the movie. I mean, I you
Speaker 1: know the other question that's sort of like that that
Speaker 1: people say, well, what happens? How do you get rid
Speaker 1: of the character? You know when you go home at
Speaker 1: night or when you're done shooting. And I'm the opposite,
Speaker 1: how do you get into the character? I mean, my
Speaker 1: job as I see it is, I gotta take on
Speaker 1: the point of view, understand it and like it, believe
Speaker 1: in the point of view of a character and playing
Speaker 1: And I've played some characters that I wouldn't want to
Speaker 1: meet on the street, but and that I disagree with
Speaker 1: their point of view personally. But my job is to
Speaker 1: get into it. It's kind of the make believe that
Speaker 1: you do without even thinking as a child, but as
Speaker 1: an adult you have to work at it. And I
Speaker 1: find that endlessly interesting. It's like traveling mentally in your imagination.
Speaker 1: So and getting into it, yeah, I mean, I naturally gravitate,
Speaker 1: and I when I played Sigmund Freud and a dangerous method.
Speaker 1: But I just read everything that I had read of
Speaker 1: his and everything I hadn't read, essays and things about him, biographies,
Speaker 1: And I went to Vienna and I spent some time
Speaker 1: walking around. I went to places he was meant to
Speaker 1: have walked to all the time, cafes I went to.
Speaker 1: I found books that I knew from research that he
Speaker 1: had in his library. I found addition, you know, it's
Speaker 1: just a whole and maybe none of that has ever
Speaker 1: seen in the movie, but for me it makes me
Speaker 1: feel like I've turned over stone and in the process
Speaker 1: of this, this sack that I feel with all these
Speaker 1: odd things, you never know what they are, even objects
Speaker 1: that maybe get used in the movie, learning how he's
Speaker 1: trying to copy his handwriting, all these things that you
Speaker 1: don't really have to do. But it's my getting ready.
Speaker 1: It's a fun part. And if I'm playing a dark
Speaker 1: kind of character, like you said, I take an interest,
Speaker 1: I might try to meet people like that or go
Speaker 1: to places they'd go to and just naturally not trying to.
Speaker 1: You couldn't get into a mindset. That doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go home and shoot somebody, yeah, or punch
Speaker 1: some pregnant woman in the belly or something, you know,
Speaker 1: just for fun. You know. I'm just I've actually did
Speaker 1: that in the movie Pregnant woman in the belly in
Speaker 1: the movie, and found out she was speaking well, she
Speaker 1: had a fake foam pattern. She was pretending to be pregnant,
Speaker 1: which is why I kicked her. I knew, I knew
Speaker 1: she was faking. Oh my god, it must have been
Speaker 1: a horrible moment. It was a horrible moment of the
Speaker 1: I hated doing it, but my character could see through.
Speaker 1: He could tell she wasn't really pregnant by the way
Speaker 1: she was faking in this movie. But away, So, the
Speaker 1: last thing I want to say to you is what
Speaker 1: someone I admire Cronenberg endlessly. I love his films. He's
Speaker 1: such a great, great movie maker, and I love, uh
Speaker 1: those three films, and two in particular really be I mean,
Speaker 1: just a history of violence. It was just such a
Speaker 1: such an incredibly gripping movie, and ed and Hurt and
Speaker 1: all these real and guys that are really just these
Speaker 1: very people. You can't take their eyes. The three of
Speaker 1: you together, it was like this Mount Rushmore. And he's
Speaker 1: really really interesting guys in movies. And um, what does
Speaker 1: he do for you? What's something you like about Cronenberg?
Speaker 1: And how does he help you as a director when
Speaker 1: you work with somebody like that. Well, he's not a
Speaker 1: director that next to rehearse, but he's very careful and
Speaker 1: very good at casting. Um, he's open to anybody's ideas.
Speaker 1: He's a saying, mature, sensible director. Um. So we developed
Speaker 1: a shorthand right away and share kind of I think
Speaker 1: it's a similar of humor, similar interest in literature and movies.
Speaker 1: And we didn't need to talk much about you know
Speaker 1: I would do a take and he might say I'm
Speaker 1: happy if you aren't doing another one. I say, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, I'll do a lot of takes.
Speaker 1: I like it. But if that's another thing about being flexible.
Speaker 1: Some directors, some schedules only allow for a take or two.
Speaker 1: And what I've quickly realized with him is that, you know,
Speaker 1: let's say, in that character history of violence, it's very subtle.
Speaker 1: Some of the transitions were because he's pretending to be
Speaker 1: someone else for years, so much so that he almost
Speaker 1: believes it. And so there's almost a sorta schizophrenic situation
Speaker 1: he has. And it's not a clean he doesn't suddenly
Speaker 1: go from one guy don another. There's some little back
Speaker 1: and forth. You know, he's on the edge of that,
Speaker 1: and some of that's very subtle, and it's mostly non verbal,
Speaker 1: when he's just a look in the eye or just
Speaker 1: a glance and he's like, oh, he's becoming that other character,
Speaker 1: is peaking through that other person his real self or
Speaker 1: one of his real selves. And you know, I realized
Speaker 1: right away, like I did the thing I said, well,
Speaker 1: you know, I wasn't. I didn't. It's not something said
Speaker 1: I just he goes Now. I saw it. I thought,
Speaker 1: so you need a director who sees the thing, know
Speaker 1: how to read you. Yeah, and all of you know,
Speaker 1: and takes care of it in the editing room. Um
Speaker 1: So when he said I was do Eastern Promises, I thought,
Speaker 1: sure it would be great. I was doubtful about the
Speaker 1: third one. He said, Siegmund Freud. I said, that's a stretch.
Speaker 1: I don't I don't think any other director would have
Speaker 1: said play that. But it's him. So in the end, well,
Speaker 1: he hasn't steered me wrong so far. I want to
Speaker 1: finish by saying, you've played a lot of great roles
Speaker 1: as a result of your looks, and you know, masculinity
Speaker 1: and intensity, not just you know, your fear physical features,
Speaker 1: but your whole essence. And but to be on film
Speaker 1: and just exist on film and to respond and this
Speaker 1: film really breathes. This movie is beautiful and breathe. The
Speaker 1: moment for me, and I'm not even assuming this is
Speaker 1: was there for you, but the moment I thought, said
Speaker 1: Langella at one point in the film, two thirds into
Speaker 1: the film, where he's just like suggesting you're crazy, You're nuts.
Speaker 1: And what I loved about you was that you really
Speaker 1: what I got from you was you were like, maybe
Speaker 1: I am You sat there and go, oh my god,
Speaker 1: maybe I am crazy, And that was one of the
Speaker 1: most beautiful moments in the movie, that little interlude was saying,
Speaker 1: oh God, maybe they're right. Yeah, maybe I am crazy,
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm mentally ill. I love I love characters that
Speaker 1: that take you on that journey, and I love movies that,
Speaker 1: as an audience mean you're sitting here and then they
Speaker 1: really make you think I'm doing it wrong. I mean
Speaker 1: as a dad or just as a human better all wrong.
Speaker 1: I'm lazy, I don't I've treated people. I gotta call
Speaker 1: my mom right away or I guys can talk to
Speaker 1: my chill learner. I've got to make up for that
Speaker 1: thing I did. Or why did I choose this profession?
Speaker 1: Why what's wrong with me? I'm so lacking in and
Speaker 1: integrity and effort and commitment. And you know, movies that
Speaker 1: make you doubt everything, make you wake up and think
Speaker 1: everything I've done is wrong, even for a moment, then
Speaker 1: of course you have to hopefully you can get it
Speaker 1: together and to make some adjustments. That's that's a great
Speaker 1: service that a movie story can do for you. I
Speaker 1: watched a screening of Captain Fantastic and I encourage you
Speaker 1: to see it too. It's playing in theaters now. This
Speaker 1: is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to Here's the Thing,
Speaker 1: M