Tom Hardy Talks ‘Lawless’, ‘Dark Knight’ and Acting: “When I’m working, I have this discipline and I get meaning from it”

Tom Hardy is about to appear in a role that will most likely solidify him as a major star, Bane in The Dark Knight Rises.  While that role easily overshadows anything else Hardy has done, he still  has other projects to promote including Lawless, which also stars Shia LaBeouf, Jessica Chastain, Guy Pearce, and his Dark Knight Rises co-star Gary Oldman.  Hardy spoke to a number of media outlets on the red carpet for Lawless at the Cannes Film Festival about a variety of topics relating to his career.

In Lawless Hardy plays Forrest Bondurant, a Prohibition-era bootlegger whose actions speak louder than his few uttered words.  Hardy admits that playing a quiet character is difficult.  He explains, “These characters are difficult to play because I have a very busy head.  I have inside voices that I have learned to contain.”

Finding those inside voices can be difficult, and Hardy confesses that it takes him some time to locate the character.  He says, “You sit and you dwell and you wait and you read and you think and you meditate.  It takes time to think and ponder, and the work is never done because it just continues. It’s looking for evidence of things.” Read more

Adversity Is Your Friend

Written by David Patrick Green

There’s nothing like life to teach one a lesson.  

Most of us can’t really learn the toughest lessons of life from others.  That’s probably because some of life’s lessons can’t simply be witnessed or recounted.  They have to be experienced.  You need to have the emotional muscle memory to keep you from making the same mistake twice.  You just hope that the experience you have that teaches you the lesson isn’t injurious…or worse.  Like in the case of drinking and driving.  I grew up in a time when it was quite common to drink and drive.  We all knew it was wrong but the consequences weren’t made clear enough to deter us.  I lost a couple of people to drinking and driving and had a few close calls myself.  Those were my lessons and they were very impactful.  The same can be said about acting experiences.  You need to make your own mistakes.  Acting is a very emotionally driven activity.  Actors are both naturally emotional (or may become that way) and take their craft personally.  We are also continually drawing off our emotions for our work and we have to create emotions that may never have existed within us before.  It is a demanding business.  Read more

SXSW Interview: Matthew Lillard Talks About Making His Directorial Debut With ‘Fat Kid Rules The World’

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 19:05 — 13.1MB)

Matthew Lillard makes his directorial debut with the charming new film, Fat Kid Rules the World.

It’s the story of Troy Billings (Jacob Wysocki), who at seventeen is overweight and suicidal. As the poor kid is about to jump in front of a bus, he’s saved by Marcus (Matt O’Leary), a high school dropout and street musician. The two become friends when Marcus asks the musically challenged Troy to become the drummer his punk rock band. But the more the two bond, the more concerned Troy’s father becomes.

Matthew is having a great couple of months. He starred in the Oscar nominated film, The Descendants, was cast opposite Clint Eastwood and Amy Adams in Trouble with the Curve and Fat Kid debuted at this years SXSW festival to great reviews.

I talked to Matthew at SXSW and man, he was great. I could have chatted with him for hours. He sat and two of its stars, Lili Simons and Dylan Arnold,  sat down to talk to me at SXSW about what its like to be on the other side of casting, his directing style and why he choose to make Fat Kid his debut. Read more

SXSW Interview: Richard Jenkins and Bradley Whitford on ‘The Cabin in the Woods’

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 16:14 — 11.2MB)

Richard Jenkins and Bradley Whitford star in the incredibly fun new horror film, The Cabin in the Woods.

The two play, uh…. well, I can’t really say. If I give away plot details, I may be doomed to the same fate some of the characters in the film meet. That being said, Richard and Bradley totally make the film the standout that it is and I promise you’ll love it.

In this roundtable I did with them at SXSW, they talk about shooting the film, why they don’t create a back story for their characters… ever(!) and what on-set chemistry really means.

I recommend downloading the audio interview because it’s so much better. You can hear their humor and you’ll get much more out of it. In the interview, both the audio and the one below, there are some small spoilers but nothing that will or could ruin the film for you. Promise!

The Cabin in the Woods opens April 13th. Go see it! Read more

Paul Dano Talks About Acting Drunk in ‘Being Flynn’

Now that There Will Be Blood and My Little Sunshine star Paul Dano has appeared in perhaps his most significant role so far in Being Flynn, the adaptation of Nick Flynn’s memoir Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, he has had a lot to say about the production and what he learned from it. 

In an interview with IndieWire, Dano reveals some of the difficulties he had acting in the film, particularly acting drunk.  He also talks about the reward of working with Robert De Niro, one of the most acclaimed actors in film history. Read more

Biography: Justin Theroux

Justin Theroux is an accomplished film, television and stage actor who gained industry notice with his unforgettable performance as director Adam Kesher, opposite Naomi Watts and Laura Harring, in David Lynch’s Mulholland Dr.

Theroux is also a talented film writer.  He co-wrote the upcoming Adam Shankman-directed Rock of Ages, starring Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin and Catherine Zeta-Jones, which Warner Bros. will release in June 2012.  In 2010, he penned Iron Man 2, for Paramount Pictures and Marvel Studios.  The film was directed by Jon Favreau and stars Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Mickey Rourke and Scarlett Johansson.  Prior to Iron Man 2, Theroux teamed with Ben Stiller to pen and executive produce DreamWorks’ Tropic Thunder, starring Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, Nick Nolte and Matthew McConaughey.   

Theroux’s acting credits include David Lynch’s Inland Empire; Zoe Cassavetes’ Broken English; Michael Mann’s Miami Vice; Ben Stiller’s smash-hit comedy Zoolander; David Gordon Green’s Your Highness; Mary Harron’s American Psycho and I Shot Andy Warhol; David Wain’s The Ten; The Baxter; Strangers With Candy; Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle; Duplex; Greg Berlanti’s The Broken Hearts Club: A Romantic Comedy; and Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion.  Read more

Interview: Kirby Bliss Blanton and Alexis Knapp talk ‘Project X’

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 18:17 — 12.6MB)

Project X is a hilarious found footage comedy about a couple of anonymous high school kids who throw one of the wildest parties ever in an attempt to get popular. They succeed in both efforts but getting there is a complete disaster.

I talked with two of the stars of the film, Kirby Bliss Blanton and Alexis Knapp.

Kirby had a small recurring role on the Nickelodeon series Zoey 101 and appeared on Unfabulous, the Disney Channel’s Hannah Montana and HBO’s Entourage.  She’ll soon be seen on MTV’s Inbetweeners.

Alexis will next be seen in in the comedy Pitch Perfect, starring opposite Anna Kendrick and Brittany Snow as well as So Undercover, starring opposite Miley Cyrus.

They two talk about how they got their start, auditioning for the movie, some really bad auditions and Project X! Read more

Rachel Griffiths on ‘Other Desert Cities’ and Her Time in ‘A Doll’s House’: “It was the worst experience of my life”

Rachel Griffiths might be making her Broadway debut in Other Desert Cities, but she has a long history of appearing on both television (Six Feet Under, Brothers & Sisters) and on the stage in her native Australia. 

Although Griffiths didn’t have much time to prepare for the role, she tells TheaterMania.com that she had no problems with stepping into it.

Griffiths says that her demanding work in television enabled her to jump into a play on short notice.  She explains, “Having worked in television, where I’ve had to learn 10 pages a night very quickly, I knew I could step into a role with two weeks rehearsals. Given what I’ve done in the past, I told our director, Joe Mantello, that Brooke is totally in my range, and loved the idea of getting to do something I’ve never done before. “ 

Of course, she still finds the role creatively challenging, pointing out, “Fortunately, the more I get into the role, the more I’m finding the oscillation from humor and vulnerability, and I can actually open up more areas of myself for the role.”  Read more

Daniel Craig Talks Auditioning, ‘Dragon Tattoo’ and Bond, James Bond

British actor Daniel Craig covers all the bases in a recent interview with Time Out London.  The long time performer, who has a series of highly anticipated movies enter the box office this year, discussed everything from his upcoming role in David Fincher‘s adaption of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, as well his attachment to the James Bond franchise, landing work before his studies ended at the conservatory Guildhall, and looking good for the camera.

In one of the most talked about film projects of this year, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Craig stars as a Swedish Journalist, Mikael Blomkvist, who pairs up with a very unique computer hacker by the name of Lisbeth Salander. 

Talking about the cast, the forty-three year old English native discussed his accent in the Fincher helmed production, or the lack thereof.  “Some people in the film have accents and some don’t. I don’t. I had a long conversation with David about it and said that a lot of Scandinavians speak English perfectly. I’m one of those guys. We’ve got Danish people, Swedish people, English people, American people. The only thing that matters, as far as I’m concerned, is that no one sounds American. We sound as European as possible. We’re all speaking one common language and that happens to be English. I didn’t want an accent to get in the way, and for me it would. Salander has no formal education and she has a street accent, it’s quite specific.”  Read more

Eddie Redmayne Talks His Early Days, ‘My Week With Marilyn’ and the Loneliness of Acting

Appearing in films such as The Good Shepard (2006) and Black Death (2010), Eddie Redmayne takes center stage alongside Michelle Williams in the film My Week with Marilyn.

In a interview with The Guardian, Redmayne expressed some of his thoughts on acting and his career. He comes from a family of bankers, and even tried his hand at it while still in school: “It was the greatest feat of acting ever working there having to pretend I knew what a share was when I didn’t have a clue.”

Redmayne was excited by the possibility of working with Williams, especially because he loved Dawson’s Creek, a fact that he’s a little ashamed to admit: “That’s coming back to haunt me, I should never have fucking said that. But she is extraordinary. She makes the part look effortless.”  Read more

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