As an actor, it�s a very easy answer: there�s never been a better movie actor that Brando. I�m talking about the young Brando of Streetcar and On the Waterfront. That�s as good as it gets. He could do character work � what I call �putty nose acting,� with funny walks and talks � but he also could be really raw and emotionally naked. That�s a very unusual combination. People can usually do one and not the other. Nowadays, of course, they can barely do either! I always emphasize the �raw� part myself, or try to. Technical work of any kind bores me. It�s just a trick somebody learns, and who in their right mind cares about tricks?! I want to see somebody�s soul!
Gerard Depardieu is another actor who can really do both. So was Marcelo Mastraionni. De Niro started off that way, but he�s embarrassing to watch nowadays. I mean he�s a perfectly fine actor and everything, but the work he�s doing is nowhere near his Taxi Driver mark. Pacino was a huge influence when I was a kid, but he�s aged badly too. His work in the first two The Godfather movies was so subtle and now he just gets up there and yells and postures. It�s very facile. He�s lost that intelligent glint to his eye. I was also very influenced by James Dean once upon a time, but that�s just because I was constantly being told I looked like him. Actually, he�s a very strange actor, almost like a dancer � these big, symbolic, kabuki moves, like rolling that bottle of milk over his forehead in Rebel Without a Cause. When people imitate James Dean, they just mumble and slouch, but he was really a whole other thing, much more offbeat than his imitators could ever hope to be.
With writing, I can�t say I�ve ever been especially inspired by screenwriters. I love to read and I�ve got a long list of favorite authors: Kerouac, Hemingway, Faulkner, Nietzsche, Rimbaud, Kundera, Conrad, Mailer, Fante, Celine, Bukowski, Whitman, Flaubert, Keats, Paglia, etc. I�m sure this is all reflected in my unbelievably literate screenplays!
5. What's more challenging: acting or writing for a film?
I wish they were both a little more challenging! With acting, I find it�s just trying to remember a lot of stuff in front of the camera. Not the lines � that�s easy � but remembering your marks and to pick up this prop before that one and to make sure you don�t duck too low because you want to catch some of that light coming in through the window, and that kind of thing, all the while trying to act. I always feel like a caged lion on a movie. You�re given these very narrow perimeters and I like to be more much spontaneous. I think that�s where the magic happens. Also, I really don�t care for make-up and wardrobe. I hate having crap on my face and I hate changing clothes. Once I get dressed in the morning, I�m done!
I think maybe the hardest part of being a screenwriter is dealing with notes. You can get an awful lot of them from a lot of different sources and it�s like trying to drive with five sets of directions. People are very good at telling you something�s broken (and sometimes it really isn�t!), but they�re not so good at saying how to fix it. In terms of the writing process, once I�ve figured out the story, it�s usually easy to write the screenplay. It can really big tough trying to come up with that initial idea, though. It�s a lot like being a salesman � how about this, how about that? You just want the producer to approve something so you can get to work!
6. As an actor, do you prefer acting in films that you had a hand in writing or that someone else wrote the screenplay to?
Well, most screenwriting is so uninspired I can�t help but feel I could do better. At the same time, though, I always try to show respect for the lines as written. A lot of Hollywood actors don�t bother to learn their dialogue, or they come to the set with all kinds of �improvements.� I think that�s really rude. You were hired to act, not re-write the damned script! Personally, I won�t even say �can�t� if the writer wrote �cannot,� but that�s a New York theatre attitude. Hollywood actors are unbelievably lazy! Their concentration isn�t on the job at hand but the job to come. I can�t tell you how many times I�ve looked over on the set and seen actors rehearing for some upcoming audition. Jesus Christ, let�s think about this movie before moving on to the next one!
I think, as an actor, the disadvantage of writing your own part is your lack of objectivity. You�ve already made up your mind how it�s going to be played and never get that fresh approach. So I think, if I really got to choose, I�d prefer to do someone else�s script � but a good script! And therein lies the rub: how many good scripts are there? I�m sure you can guess my answer.
7. In your life you must have crossed paths with a lot of well-known names in the motion picture industry. Can you name a few of them?
Man, I think I�ve met just about everybody, or been around them at some point. It used to be a really big deal to meet famous actors. Now I really don�t care all that much. I don�t mean that to sound smug or something. If I�m in a room with someone unbelievably famous I�m just like anyone else � I�ll glance over at them. But it used to really get my heart racing when I was a kid and now that doesn�t really happen anymore.
I remember the second time I met Al Pacino. He was good friends with one of my mentors, a guy named Sully Boyar, and we were over at the New York Actors Studio and Pacino came walking up, kind of small and gray. Well, Sully always got kind of nervous around Pacino and didn�t realize he�d introduced us once before � not that it really mattered � and I go to shake Pacino�s hand and I guess I really squeezed it hard because Pacino kind of winced and said, in that unmistakable Pacino voice, �Wow! This guy is powerful!� And Sully went, �Yeah, he�s a sheepherder.� Wow, thanks! You just told Al Pacino I�m a sheepherder! I grew up on a farm in Virginia with sheep on it, okay? Not exactly the same thing!
Then, another time, I was over at the Actors Studio standing in the back with this weird hippie. I was an observer at the Studio and every Friday I�d get there late and crack open the door and walk around to the back and watch the first scene standing up behind the bleachers. Well, every Friday this strange hippie would do the same thing. He had long hair and a beard and always wore black, with these big-framed black glasses. Well, one Friday I was standing there and I happened to glance over at this hippie and noticed he had this huge mole on the side of his face. And I thought, �Wait a minute, is that�?� And I turned back again, trying not to be too obvious about it, and, sure enough, it was Robert Freaking De Niro! I�d been standing next to Robert De Niro every Friday for the last month and never realized it! I thought I was going to die!
Richard Gere was somebody I used to run into quite a bit when I lived in New York. I was a teenager and one month I ran into him every few days, completely by accident. Finally, about the sixth time this happened, he said, �You know, I went to see this psychic the other day and she told me this blonde boy I�d known in a previous life was going to enter into my current life and I wondered if that wasn�t you.� Yes, I know, it sounds incredibly gay, but I honestly don�t think he meant it that way. I thought, �Wow, I might have known Richard Gere in a previous life!� Like I say, I was pretty starstruck in those days.