With several film’s about to be released, Michael Sheen discusses his career: “I enjoy metamorphosis and not being obvious. That’s allowed me more variety”

As an actor, Michael Sheen has played a variety of interesting and varied characters: he has portrayed a pompous Brit on the sitcom “30 Rock” and made 3 films playing the former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.  But it would be Sheen’s biographical portraits he is best known for: Mozart in a stage version of “Amadeus,”  journalist David Frost in ”Frost/Nixon” and controversial soccer coach Brian Clough in “The Damned United“.

In Woody Allen’s latest film ”Midnight in Paris,” which opens Friday, Sheen plays a self-important scholar who spouts facts – at times inaccurately – about Rodin and Monet. In stark contrast, Sheen takes a dark turn in “Beautiful Boy“, a film that opens June 3  in which he plays the father of a college student who goes on a killing spree.

The 42-year-old Welsh actor grew up in Port Talbot, Wales, the childhood home of Richard Burton and Anthony Hopkins. He says while he works steadily, he is not inundated with scripts. “Often I’m booked up in advance, so it’s pointless to read them. But, certainly in America, I think people are unsure how to cast me because I haven’t branded myself. I don’t just play the bad guy or play British. I don’t think I’m necessarily the person that first comes to mind for any character in particular, and that’s a dangerous thing career-wise to do, but I enjoy metamorphosis and not being obvious. That’s allowed me more variety.”
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Tony Nominee Stephen Kunken: “Your career is a marathon”

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If you got a chance to see the Broadway show, Enron you’ll know that Stephen Kunken was well deserved in getting a Tony nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his role as Andy Fastow.

I say “got a chance” because the day Stephen found out he was nominated he was also told that the show would be closing later that week.

If that were me, I’d want to jump out a window but Stephen is taking it all in stride.

And why shouldn’t he?  The critics universally praised his work, he and his wife just adopted a baby and he’s such a fantastic actor, the phone is probably already ringing in his agents office.

I got a chance to talk to him while he was sitting in his car about to take a well deserved break.

Congratulations on your nomination.

Thank you so much.

How did you find out about it?

I was watching, because I knew it was important to find out about the longevity of our show – Enron. With how expensive the show was, if it didn’t get nominated, I knew it would probably be a rough road for us. I was curious and watching for a couple of minutes. Then, they let it go and I watched it online. I sort of saw it all happening in rapid succession. They did the 5 big categories first on TV and then they ended it. So I thought that I had missed my category. I was like, “Damn, I can’t believe it!” But then they actually went back to it.

What’s that feeling like, to be one of the top five actors nominated?

It’s crazy. I don’t know that it’s sunk in yet. I was just talking to my wife about it. It’s such an incredible honor and its a thing that you always dream about as an actor, I think. Especially as a New York theatre actor who grew up on the Tony’s and grew up coming to see Broadway shows. I went to Julliard in the city, which is an institution for theatre.

I remember my first Broadway show, right before I went on, saying “Wow, as soon as the first word comes out of my mouth, I’m going to have done a Broadway show.” It was an incredible, huge threshold to walk across. It hasn’t even really sunk in yet to be considered a part of the community in a performance that was noteworthy in this season of incredible actors and performances. It’s kind of mind-boggling. It’s thrilling. It’s such a huge honor. I know these are all the things that everyone always says, but it’s so true. You actually really do feel awed by the attention and awed by people actually caring. There’s nothing that I just said that’s new or exciting, but it’s totally true. It puts all of that work into perspective for a moment. It’s a milestone in your career that you can look back and you can say, ‘Oh, my God, I actually put together a little body of work.’ It’s quite cool.

Is it true that now you can get better seats in a restaurant?

I don’t know. If I won the award, I could walk in with the statue and I still think I would lose instantly to anyone who’s been on a TV show or in a film. Maybe at Angus McIndoe across the street they might say “Hey!” but I think other than that, that’s the beauty of the theatre that unless you saw it, you don’t really know it.

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Frank Langella interviewed

Here’s an interview with the great Frank Langella.

He talks about preparing for his role as Richard Nixon in both the play and film version of Frost/Nixon.

Click here for the video