Interview by Daniel Robert Epstein

Dan Epstein: Spike Lee mentioned that you two have a rapport because you directed Anna in a play. How did that help you two out?

Philip Seymour Hoffman: Since in 25th Hour, she played someone who had all the power over me.

Anna Paquin: There was a part of me that enjoyed that.

PSH: A comeuppance. It was really great. Working with Anna on the play then acting with her was like seeing something through fruition.

AP: Philip, when you play these characters that are so odd, do you have to come up with a way to sympathize with them?

PSH: I do. With this, I sympathize with him totally. I don't think this guy is crazy. He has no interest in sleeping with underage girls at all. I think this is an obsession he has with one specific girl for specific reasons that all evaporates very quickly. I didn't want to justify it and I definitely didn't want to tell a dirty old man story.

She stands for everything that he will never be and never was. She's got the tattoo, the belly button ring, she's very open with her sexuality and she's very confident. None of those girls were ever attracted to him. It plays on his insecurities. He's more disturbed by his attraction to this 17 year old girl than everyone is. His two friends are just like, get over it. But it's not only about that. It's about him coming to terms with something else. He's created a prison of fear in his life. When he kisses her, he immediately realizes it's not what he expected and that it's wrong.

DE: Anna, how was it playing this character?

AP: It was a hell of a lot of fun to play someone that upfront about how they are with their personality right out there. Very chatty, says whatever they are thinking and wears whatever she wants to wear without every filtering that for anyone's benefit. That's not how I interact with people. I don't have the guts to go argue with someone about a grade and then use the fact that I'm only wearing half an outfit to manipulate them.

I'm not conservative but it's not how I deal with people.

DE: When Edward Norton's character gives you the dog, what did that mean to you?

PSH: It's Monty giving him a piece of himself and Monty also taking a piece for himself. There's an admiration between the two characters because each wants what the other has in a weird way. It's a gift.

DE: Anna, how was your experience on X-Men 2?

AP: It was good. Those kinds of movies are so different than any other film you'll work on because so little of the time you spend on set has anything to do with the job an actor does. You're waiting a long time for things to be set up. There's always going to be glitches along the way and all these things I don't know anything about. It's very long hours but there is also a lot of fun stuff to do. I have some pretty cool stunts that I trained for three months but I can't tell you anything about them because they would give stuff away. I do all this wire work.

DE: How difficult was it replacing Brittany Murphy at the last minute?

AP: I came into the film like three days before any of the rehearsal. I found on Friday I was supposed to read on Saturday then start shooting Monday. It was actually kind of blissfully short between auditioning and getting the part. It's actually kind of an actor's dream not to be left dangling for three months.

DE: [To Philip] What was it like doing that dialogue scene with Ground Zero right outside the window?

PSH: It wasn't in the script. I thought it was incredibly grounding to the reality of the film. I live in NYC and was here when it all happened. It just personalizes it for the audience and me.

DE: Was that something you were willing to do?

PSH: I was completely willing to do it and I was glad to. It's great that Spike did that. It says a lot about him and his relationship with city.

DE: [To Philip] As a character actor you've worked with a couple of directors more than once and with P.T. Anderson on all his films. Do you feel comfortable that there is like a net there for you?

PSH: I think I'm like any actor. Most actors it's just inbred in you that you'll never work again even if you're working a lot. That's just the way it is. You spend so much time before you're working regularly just to get work and feeling like no one will ever hire you. Also the fickleness of this business is that everyone wants people to go down and then they go back up and then down again.