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Since Auto Focus, a dark side has come out more in your characters. Do you see that? Are you looking to explore that more?
“There’s a sex addict in all of my characters. No, you know that was a very fortunate movie for me to get to work with Paul Schrader. A really interesting film. I don’t know how it affected things so much. It certainly affected certain opportunities that broke open. I think maybe the barriers of what I was being offered a little bit, it expanded the range of stuff maybe a little bit more. So, in that way, it had a really big bearing. In terms of my choice, you know I think it’s still the same job. It’s just, ‘Read the script, who’s participating?’, the director’s always an important thing. ‘What’s the basis of what it is you’re doing?’ I don’t know. Those kinds of criteria…”
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Spoiler Alert – This question and answer is best read after you’ve seen the film.
Your character chooses not to act on the information he uncovers. How did you feel about that when you read the script?
“I liked it. I read it and first I was kind of like, ‘No, gee, I got a problem with this.’ And then it was like, ‘You know what? That really is the way that it is.’ I think an audience watches the movie and they want him to stand up and say, ‘I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore.’ And he never does. You think, ‘Well, where is the Norma Rae moment?’ But then you say, ‘Oh, that’s kind of only in the movies.’ This is in some ways a more truthful assessment of that kind of person than you could ever ask to find. I thought it was pretty brave of Rick to kind of throw him in to lead the charge, and then just have him disappear. I really did. I think it makes it pretty powerful proclamation about that kind of guy.
There are a lot of people out there that might have some moral questions or ambiguity about what it is they do, or who they serve? Or what kind of industry they’re in? And at the end of the day, they have a family and you have a wife and kids and you obligations and, obviously, that’s what people serve. That’s one of the things about the book. It says: are the individuals answering to the corporation or is the corporation answering to the individuals? That line is less clear than ever. Kris Kristofferson telling me [doing a Kristofferson impression], ‘It’s the mega-machine!’ I can’t go as low as him, but you know what I’m talking about.”
