Billy Bob Thornton plays a loving husband and father who has his eyes on the stars in the family drama The Astronaut Farmer from the filmmaking brothers, Michael and Mark Polish. Thornton stars as Charles Farmer, a man who never let go of his dream of being an astronaut, going as far as to build an actual rocket in the barn of his Texas ranch. With the support of his wife (Virginia Madsen), teenage son (Max Thieriot), and two young daughters (Logan and Jasper Polish), Charles makes national headlines as he battles the government for a shot at fulfilling his dreams.
Playing a Really Decent Guy in a Dramatic Film: That’s a change from his last few roles and Thornton said it was refreshing. “The fact of the matter is that I’d done two or three of those comedies in a row since Bad Santa and it was fun and I enjoyed it, but I think that’s plenty. I have the one coming out that I’ve made already called Mr Woodcock and I think that’s going to be probably it for at least a few years, you know, because you want to go and do other things. I knew that I was going to do a drama next, but I figured it was going to more like A Simple Plan or Sling Blade or something like that. I didn’t realize that I was going to get this gem sat in my lap.”
Identifying with the Idealism of His Character: Thornton absolutely could identify with this man who doesn’t want to let go of his dreams. “I mean if anybody in the entertainment business or whatever, as an artist or a sports figure or anything like that, you know you’re a dreamer by nature. So we totally understood characters like this and it was a pretty easy fit, really. A guy from Texas who’s part astronaut/part farmer. He’s a dreamer who’s kind of eccentric and lives in a small town in Texas.”
Reuniting with Bruce Willis: Thornton and Willis team up again onscreen in The Astronaut Farmer, although Thornton didn’t catch the similarity between this movie and Armageddon until filming began. “It had nothing to do with Armageddon. And I know this sounds like I’m making it up, but the truth is we didn’t even think about the Armageddon and Astronaut Farmer connection until he was down there and we were actually shooting. We first talked about it when he was – the first scene we shot with him was the hearing with the FAA and all that, and we’d been up late. We had a great time. He came walking in in the blue suit, you know? And it was just like Keith David in Armageddon, the general. Bruce was wearing the same uniform that Keith David was and it was like, ‘Wait a minute...’ That’s how we started talking about that.
The way the whole thing with Bruce happened is that they wanted a movie star for the part – for the cameo - and they had a few guys on their list. It was a studio thing, not the boys, it was the studio. They knew that I knew Bruce and I said, ‘Well you know, I can call Bruce and see about him. What do you think?’ They said, ‘Yeah call him up.’ I did. He loved the script and said he’d love to come down and do it. “
Researching Rockets and Other Technical Aspects of The Astronaut Farmer: Thornton said that unlike most films, he didn’t do much research for this movie. “It’s not a technical movie,” said Thornton. “This movie is meant for entertainment. This is the kind of movie we grew up loving, because you go in and it’s inspirational and you feel good when you come out. It is like a Field of Dreams or something. It’s The Natural or whatever. This is really what you’re supposed to feel like and it’s not a movie to be… In other words, there’s no need for a lot of scrutiny on this movie because in this time of cynicism, it’s meant to just be one of those movies like they used to show during the Depression.”
Asked why Hollywood doesn’t make a lot of films like The Astronaut Farmer, Thornton replied, “I’ll tell you exactly why. What’s the biggest market? It’s under 25, right? Watch MTV and you will see exactly why they don’t like movies like this – no knock on MTV. See, that’s the advantage of hanging out with you guys, no cameras so I can say, ‘No knock on MTV at all.’”
Getting In and Out of the Spacesuit: Thornton says it had zippers all over the place. “It is the real one. It’s an old Mercury suit. It’s really hard to get into, and the really difficult thing about it is even international superstars have to pee.”
It’s Become a Tradition: Thornton always entertains the crew on every film set at least once by doing a scene using his 'Karl' voice from Sling Blade, and he found time to do so on The Astronaut Farmer set. “Well, yeah. That’s all the extras, but I do that on every movie. On every movie you never know when it’s going to be - it could be in the middle or it could be at the end - but at some point I’m going to do that for the crew. They all expect it now so I have to do it.”
Up Next – Mr Woodcock: The next time we'll see Thornton on the big screen will be in the comedy Mr Woodcock directed by Craig Gillespie and co-starring Seann William Scott and Susan Sarandon. Describing the general tone of the film, Thornton said, “I told somebody earlier in the day it’s sort of like Bad Santa in gym shorts.”
