Anton Yelchin Chose ‘Like Crazy’ Over Real-Life Love: “You either commit to one thing or another, and I always pick movies”

"You lose your life when you enter this world. It was like I forgot what my life was."

It’s rare when an actor sits down for an interview and lets you into their personal world.  Usually keeping a safe distance, actor Anton Yelchin seems to have dropped his guard in a recent interview with Moviefone.  Could it be the the magic of Like Crazy from director Drake Doremus?

Discarding the traditional script, Doremus shepards Yelchin in his latest venture as an American boy living with the emotional ups and downs of a long distance relationship with his English girlfriend.  Something Yelchin is familiar with, refreshingly honest about, and truly sad over.

“You lose your life when you enter this world. It was like I forgot what my life was. At the time — my girlfriend and I are no longer together — she and I saw each other once during that whole month. It still makes me sad, but you either commit to one thing or another, and I always pick movies. It’s my life; I don’t know what that says about me, but movies are what I love. So I saw her once, and I remember going “Whoa…” It’s a weird f-cking thing when you think in your head “That’s who you are. You’re my girlfriend. I love you. You’re funny, smart, cool, and sexy.” I forgot all those things. I didn’t even remember what it was like to sleep with her because I was in this world the whole time. I was Jacob.”  

Working without a script, and relying on improv only Yelchin also shared that the cast wasn’t “told anything. The takes would last 12-15 minutes, often until the camera’s sensor burned out. There were many times when I forgot that they were even filming.”

The raw love tale did manage to take an emotional toll on the actor after filming for only a month.  “Once we wrapped, I was like — we’re done with this thing. We filmed for a month, tops, but it felt like years. They age, and get progressively more broken by this thing. I felt drained, like I worked six months.”

Like Crazy, with Yelchin, Felicity Jones and Jennifer Lawrence, is playing in select cities.

1 thought on “Anton Yelchin Chose ‘Like Crazy’ Over Real-Life Love: “You either commit to one thing or another, and I always pick movies””

  1. Andrea St Clair via Facebook

    That’s really sort of sad. 🙁 Probably one of the reasons I’d prefer to be a successful actor at a less huge of a scale… that’s too big of a sacrifice (love.)

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