I didn't want to be there too much. I didn't think that I should be there.
Did you discuss the character with James Garner?
Here's the thing: I mean, I can't play a young James Garner.
Here's the difference, when James walks on set, women literally look like
they're on drugs and no work gets done and they're all laughing a lot and
you try to talk to them and they show you their teeth. So he has kind of a
thing that I don't have and I didn't want to try and play that. So we sort
of decided that I'd just be a character in the story as opposed to trying
to play a young James.
Do you have a great love in your life?
(Laughing) No.
Do you believe in that kind of movie romance?
It's not been my experience, to be honest. But maybe. I hear
it's possible.
Did you believe in the relationship between these two characters?
Yeah. More than anything, I thought that I liked the idea of
playing a character that was so different from the other characters that
I've played, who knew what he wanted, and had a kind of sense of clarity
about himself and about where he stood. I think that I've been playing a
lot of confused characters, which I tend to relate to a lot more than someone
like this.
Do you think director Nick Cassavetes filtered this film through his parents’ relationship, and did he talk about that at all?
He did, yeah. He was very close to both of them and really in
love with their love. So, yeah. Nick is like the main actor in this movie.
He wanted to make it. He believed in this. He thinks that it's real. He's just
very passionate about it and I think that in his experience, he felt that
he was around something like this when he grew up.
Did you have to workout for this role?
Yeah. We shot the last part of the film first. It's no
“Raging Bull” or anything, but I tried to put on as much weight as I could
just because I had a character who builds a house on his own and survives the
fires of war and I thought that he should really appear stronger than he
was in the beginning of the film. Then we took a break and I lost some
weight.
How did you do it?
Steroids. No. I ate a lot and worked out.
After playing the romantic lead in “The Notebook,” do you feel like you’ve done this so you won’t play this type of role again any time soon?
I think that I'd wait a while. This was something that I
really wanted to try and thought that it was important for me to do
something like this. I don't really want to do any one kind of thing. I
kind of feel like I want to do as many things that I can for as long as I
can. I feel like this was certainly an important experience and now I'll
move on.
How was working with Sam Shepard?
That was a treat.
Do you know all of his plays?
Yes. And I'm a big fan of Sam's and I think that one of the
best performances that I've ever seen is Sam in “Days of Heaven.” I
actually sort of used that as kind of a model for Noah, the way that Sam
was in that film, that kind of quiet strength. So yeah, it was a real treat
to get to work with him. He's just a really great guy. He's amazing because
he'll be outside working on his golf swing and then he'll do the scene and
he'll just do the most natural thing. He just forces you to be natural.
There's no acting allowed, really.
PAGE 3: Ryan Gosling on Mickey Mouse Memories, Acting, and "Stay"
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:
"The Notebook" World Premiere Coverage
"The Notebook" Credits, Trailers and Interviews
