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1998 年度雜誌訪問 |
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Time for Tobey
Your character's a couch potato in this film. What did you watch when you came home from school? It varied through my ages, but I liked "Three's Company" and shows like "Charles in Charge." I used to flip around a lot. I'm not a big, like, one show kind of guy. How did you prepare for life in a '50s sitcom? It's just a fantasy world. And you just read the script and use your imagination and you just go there and it's pretty strange. You go there, and you're like transported because they built a 21 building town and everybody's in costume. As a matter of fact, I saw a couple of, like, the townspeople, out of their, you know, costume and hair and stuff, a couple of girls, and I didn't even recognize them. And they were like, "Oh, hey Tobey, how you doing?" And I'm like, "Hey. Who are you?" And they were like, "Remember? I was just working with you in the soda shop?" "No way! You were that girl?" So you're just transported as soon as you step onto the set. Were you working on a full color set or were the sets painted in black and white tones? We were seeing color and I think they shot it all in color as well, and then... Drained the color out. Right, saturated it and then added it back with some other process I don't know about. You've played two period teens now. The Ice Storm in the '70s and now the '50s. Considering neither one was really your experience which was more difficult to pull off? Right. I guess Pleasantville was a little more difficult. I mean, he wasn't really a period teen. You know, he's a modern-day teen actually and he just went into this world. And maybe his clothes and his hair were of that period in that show, but he was very much an outsider. I think it was actually harder to play the modern-day guy than the guy in the '70s, you know? Did you do much research on the '50s era? You know, I didn't do much of that. You know, I was definitely asked if I wanted to see TV shows. But I choose not to go into that stuff very much because there's such a particular fantasy world. I've seen a couple of the TV shows and, you know, talked to a couple of people about the time, but I thought that it's really not a reality. It's what the script is. And not what anything really is, although maybe there's an exaggeration of some things. I just decided that I was just going to talk with Gary (Ross) and look over the script. Speaking of old TV shows, you got to work with Don Knotts. I really like Don. He's so funny. And, of course, everybody was thrilled that I was working with Don Knotts. And, so was I. But for me, I was working with Mr. Furley from "Three's Company," you know? You know, you tell people about the film and I'm working with so and so, Bill Macy and Reese and Joan and Don Knotts. And everybody goes, "Don Knotts?! No way! Can I come down to the set when he's working?" It was fun. I mean, he was just hilarious. I remember when Gary cast him, I was like, "Wow, that's an interesting idea." And then, like, the first day, I couldn't even do my scenes very well, because I was rolling; just laughing so hard. Can you tell us a little bit about Ride With the Devil? Yes. It's a Civil War movie, and it's kind of like guerilla warfare. Jewel's in it. Skeet Ulrich. Jeffery Wright. Do you play a soldier? There's the Kansas Jayhawkers, and then the Missouri Bushwackers. And it's guerilla warfare. And basically, people come and kill your family and burn your house to the ground and you have nowhere else to go. So, you just kind of ride along and you want vengeance. And it's actually really sad. How far some of these people go. I mean, the film is about a lot of things and there's battles and love stories and friendships and emancipation in many different forms. You're sort of on the verge of some real stardom here. Have you prepared yourself for it? Yeah. I've thought about it and I don't know. I mean, I'm just going to do the best I can with that. It's just really interesting, to me, the whole idea of fame and I think it can be a real test of somebody, of who they are. You know, 'cause some strange things happen. I've seen some peculiar things as far as a person just living their life, and these things get thrown into it. I think some of it's strange. Some of it looks very appealing and I'm just going to go and do the best I can. Does it give you pause? Especially after watching your friend Leo's experience. You could easily make a movie like Titanic where the wave just comes? Yeah, but how could you anticipate? You can't. I don't know. Yeah, I think about it. I don't know. Each decision is an individual decision. And I'll see when that comes. And, yeah, I'm a little, you know, wary of it, but I think it's manageable and you can keep yourself intact. But sometimes I think that people, you know, get inappropriate. People, photographers, people in the press can sometimes be inappropriate. This was your second time out working with Joan Allen as your mom. Is she a better mom this time? Well, I guess as far as the story goes, but she was great, great for Tobey both times. She's... I don't know. She's just so phenomenal. She's such a great actress. No ego. She just shows up to work. She's a worker among workers as far as her ethic goes, and, of course, her talent just rises, you know? Have you learned stuff from working with her? Yeah. I mean, she's just so professional and so focused and doesn't get caught up in a lot of like... anything. She's just so focused. She keeps in her work all day long. And sometimes you need to do that. You know? Sometimes I can go around and goof off and have conversations and stuff, but sometimes when the day's a tough day, you need to just keep to yourself. And just keep stuff going in your head - which is difficult for me. And I'm the sort that doesn't want to let go of being a kid, you know. And there's a certain responsibility to work. And I think her work ethic is amazing. And... she has such freedom at the same time, it's great to see her work. Your character, like a good middle child, tries to makes peace with everyone. Do you relate to him? I can relate to him. I just think of the movie as a whole and then try and go play a scene and try and have as much fun as I can. You know, the stuff was hard for me because I'm so aware of what I'm doing when I go in there and trying to control these situations and trying to, like, stifle things. It's really sad, the scene with Joan and I, you know, when I try to return her to the way she was and when I'm trying to contain Reese's character. Some of that stuff was actually hard for me to play because I'm so aware of what I'm doing going into it. And it was interesting to me because, in life when I'm doing things like that, I'm not as aware of it. But going in to play the scenes, I know exactly what I'm going to do. So, it was fairly uncomfortable. Why do you think he wanted to go back? That's a good question. I mean, that's where he belongs. And I think, in a way, he was done with that place and he knows that's not his home. It's pretty insane how he got into that whole world, but, you know, I think he wanted to go home and he felt like he really got what he got. He got like really brilliant gifts and he gave of himself, you know? A really unique experience. But that wasn't his home. He had to go home. I always want to go home, you know? I'll go do films for three or four months and then I can't wait to go home to L.A. And I complain about L.A. left and right, but then I always end up wanting to go home, you know? Considering that there are more special effect shots in this movie than in any previous movie and that there's a lot of allegories going on, were you ever worried about being upstaged, either by the special effects or by the symbols and metaphors? No. I don't really care about that. You know, the film is the star. You know what I mean? I knew that going into it. It's an ensemble movie and the concept of the film itself is more the star of the film than any actors are, I think. Although, I think there were some really solid performances. I was never really concerned. The technical stuff excited me. I thought that while I was playing the scenes, my greatest hopes was when they tweaked this stuff later on, it's just going to add to the experience somebody's going to get while watching it. You know, that was my hope anyway. What did you think when you saw it? I'm really a bad person to ask about that. When I saw it for the last time, I got to go on the ride a little more, you know, and it was kind of nice some of it. But I'm so critical of my own work that it's difficult for me to disassociate myself and watch it as an audience. Do you hate watching yourself on screen? I appreciate the experience because I learn a lot by watching myself, but it's tough for me. It's really tough. You know? And it's only after seeing it for a few times with a big audience that can shake me a little bit out of myself, you know? And I did enjoy the film. I laughed a little bit and I actually cried. Joan Allen and Bill Macy made me cry. I've cried so many times at Bill Macy now. It's like on the set I was crying; watching the dailies I was crying. What's the message of the film? There's many things I get out of the film, but one of the things that's most important to me is just learning how to let go of control and letting go of stagnant behavior that's actually keeping myself down. And self-sabotage and not trying to control. I mean, it's so funny because I come up with this stuff all the time. You simply cannot control other people's thoughts or actions and you can't even necessarily control your own thoughts and feelings, you know? All you can do is make your choices of what you do with your life and what your actions are and sometimes when you do let things go and you're more passive or more active. And, you know, it's just interesting and it's important to keep on top of myself and be super honest with myself. Do you think teens are going to respond to this movie? Yeah. I think so. I think teens will definitely respond to it. I mean, I think the character development is so strong with Bill Macy and Joan Allen and Jeff Daniels and me and Reese and they're all very different people. |
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Entertainment Spotlight on Tobey
Two of today's hottest young actors, Tobey Maguire and Reese Witherspoon team up in the fantasy 'Pleasantville,' in which they play two colorful '90s teenagers who are sucked into the black-and-white world of their favorite television show. But their affect on the world is more dramatic than you might think. They tell us all about it here. Have you seen the movie? What was your reaction to it? Tobey: For me, it's a little difficult to see things that I'm in. But I saw it in Toronto at the film festival and it helped me a lot because the audience was really into it and they thought it was really funny. I was just shocked. I mean, I really like it as an idea and as a concept - it's just hard to watch myself because I'm so critical. Reese: I thought it was great seeing it for the first time because I think visually - it's something you could never imagine while you're making the movie. Actually seeing the black-and-white and the slow evolution into color was really so striking and dramatic. It was really great to see it. What did you guys think of seeing yourselves in black-and-white? You didn't grow up with a black-and-white TV. Reese: It was cool. We had a great cinematographer who shot it. Tobey: I thought it was cool. I didn't think I looked too bad and I thought Reese looked very good in black-and-white. Reese: Thank you. This is a really conversation-provoking film, there's no question about it. What do you think is so "pleasant" about Pleasantville? What do you think the conversations are going to be about? Tobey: Wow. I think there's so many things you can take away from the film depending on who you are. I mean, each character is very relatable and is very much a real person. So, I guess it depends. Kids will probably have something different than somebody who's a mother. Reese: I think it's going to be a really interesting for people to see because we all think of the Fifties in one particular way. That's sort of how the early way that you see Pleasantville is sort of perceived as - this perfect, idyllic setting with picket fences and beautiful houses and nice, white families. But as the movie progresses, you start to see this undercurrent of everything that was "underneath" the Fifties. Especially Fifties television turmoil and hate and discomfort and distress, and I think people will really be talking about how this movie sort of represents the juxtaposition between what was on television in the Fifties and what was really happening in the Fifties. Let's get back to the way you looked. That's going to be the "question du jour." What you guys were wearing - like those bullet bras you had to wear. What was that like? Reese: It was interesting. We had a great costume designer, Judianna Makovsky, who did wonderful work. I remember going in for my first fitting and it was like walking into a palace. They were putting these wonderful old costumes on us and I was thinking, "I've never been in a movie like this before." They did such a wonderful job of having everyone's outfits tailored perfectly. All of Joan's outfits were made from scratch. Was there anything you had to do since you were going from black-and-white to color and then there were little bits of color? Was there any sort of mindset you had to get yourselves into? Tobey: It's just like all the other aspects of living in an imaginary world. Something else to play with and remember. And yeah, certainly, you have to act and behave in a certain way. I think it was just an interesting challenge and knowing that this was going to be effected later and I knew the emotions would be heightened by this effect - so it juiced me up a little bit everyday. Reese: To me, because we shot the movie out of sequence, it was really hard to remember when you were supposed to be in color and when you weren't supposed to be in color. Am I supposed to know myself from the inside out now or am I supposed to be introverted? It was completely bizarre. So Gary [Ross, the film's director] would have to come up to me and say, "No, you're in color now." (To Tobey) How did you like reteaming with Joan [Allen]? Did you guys have a shorthand at this point? Joan is just so fantastic. She is just so helpful and such a great example. I had this one great day with Joan where I didn't quite feel connected and I was struggling a bit, so Joan started doing a little improve before a scene with me. It was funny because it ended up helping, but I was so amazed at her because she's so brilliant that I started messing up because of that. But I just love working with Joan - I couldn't say enough about her. Did you guys feel like brother/sister on the set since you play siblings in the movie? Any sibling rivalry? Reese: It was actually great because we got to hang out together about three months before filming started. And by the time we started shooting, we had the bickering down pat and we knew exactly how irritated to be with each other. But it was great, as the movie went on, I felt like we built that dynamic and became more like brother and sister. Tobey: I have a really deep respect for Reese and it's a little uncomfortable for me to say that with her sitting right here. It was a really important experience for me to work with her. Are either of you guys marathon TV watchers? Do you ever watch any black-and-white TV? Reese: Hmmm... I watch "The Andy Griffith Show" sometimes, but that's from the Sixties. Tobey: I usually just watch TV in hotels so I just flick around and watch basketball or MTV or the news or something like that. You talk about "The Andy Griffith Show," what about Don Knotts? What was it like working with him? Tobey: Well, I knew him from "Three's Company." Mr. Furley. I would tell people, "Yeah, I'm doing this movie with William H. Macy and Joan Allen and Don Knotts." And they'd be like, "Don Knotts! You mean Mr. Furley?" Reese: You know what's great about Don? I don't know how old he is, but he would come on the set and I was so impressed that he could still pull off his comedy. He's one of the most inherently funny men I've ever met. He's so funny in this movie. When he had a scene, we would stand like a set away and watch and we were just cracking up. He would just sit funny. And stand funny. He was just so funny in everything he did. One of the most profound things about this film is that everyone discovers about themselves that there's a little bit of color, which is so sweet. Is there a technicolor moment in your lives that made you say, "Okay, I get it now?" Reese: I think it's hard in this business to be or discover the kind of actor that you want to be. I've had moments in my career where I go, "I can't believe I made any of those movies before." Now I know what I'm here for and what I really want to do in my career. But I like - in that what happened to my character in 'Pleasantville' - it's hard and I think there are defining moments where you find yourself in everybody's life. Tobey: I couldn't say one specific moment - I think moments happen all of the time. I think it's constant and it's nice to recognize that when it happens. |
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Maguire Fire
Actor Tobey Maguire may be a round peg in a square hole when it comes to fitting Hollywood's idea of leading man material, but the life he's led so far has given him the kind of believable qualities no one can manufacture. Watch out - he's going to be big. Here we go, Tobey. Let's start at the beginning: Where were you born? I was born in L.A. Growing up, I bounced around a lot - Palm Springs; Ashland [Oregon]; Vancouver; Washington State. My mother was eighteen and my father was twenty when they had me. They got married when I was two, and I think they got divorced when I was two as well, so they would move around separately. My father already had a kid from when he was seventeen. I'm twenty-three now and he had two kids at that point. I can't even imagine that. How many siblings do you have? I have four half brothers. But I grew up as an only child, pretty much. Which of your parents raised you, or did they both raise you? I've lived with my more by herself, my mom and her boyfriend, my aunt, my grandma. I've lived with my dad alone, my dad and a stepmother, my dad and his brother, my dad and his mom. How did your mother support you both when you lived with her? She worked a lot of different jobs. Office work, mostly. Looking back, if anything was her career, it was her children. That's what's she's given her life to and it's a big burden. Part of me is grateful and part of me is resentful because I want to see her have her own life. On the other hand, what's wrong with someone's passion being their children? Were you poor while you were growing up? We were super-duper poor. Did you feel that your mother worried about not being able to get you things? I needed braces when I was a kid but they were too expensive. My more would still get me these crazy gifts, though. On Christmas or my birthday she would get me something completely beyond our means. She got me a keyboard piano one year, a nice one, even though she couldn't afford it. It sounds like your mother wanted you to have creative dreams, and maybe try to achieve them. I don't know what her plan was for me then, but she wanted me to have a taste of things that maybe she wanted to do and never got to. She was always getting me into things like break dancing. When I was eight we'd go to this Saturday market in Portland [Oregon], where me and this other kid would do backspins and little routines and put out our hats and get money. I also took piano and ballet lessons, though I never followed through with anything for too long. When did acting start to become a big part of your life? When I was eleven and I was living with my uncle and my father in Palm Springs, I had an elective class. My father's a cook and my grandmother taught culinary arts and I love cooking, so I was going to take home economics. But my mother gave me a hundred dollars to take drama. At the time it was a gigantic sum of money. So I took drama. Was living in Palm Springs a happy time in your life? The first month I moved there, I threw up every single morning, as if I were pregnant. I was a kid going through a lot of stress about being at a new school again. I'd been to so many different schools, I never had a friend for more than a year. In fact, I was in Palm Springs for about a year and a half and made pretty solid friends again, and then, midway through seventh grade - boom! - I had to move again. I went back to L.A. to live with my mother, and she told me that I had to make a choice for eighth grade. What kind of choice? I could go to a professional school and focus on acting or go to a regular school and focus on school. So I chose the professional school. In ninth grade I did a play for a third of the year, and the tenth grade was home study. I eventually got my high school equivalency but as far as I'm concerned I have a ninth-grade education and not a great one. And I had been a great student up to seventh grade. So you have a disconnected relationship with education? Yeah. I wanted some stability but because of all the moving around, it wasn't there. Having to go meet new kids for like the twelfth time was too much - I couldn't take it. I became really rascally around that time and ditched school a lot. My morn and I would get into huge fights, where she would beg me to go to school. She would threaten me with truant officers and I would say, "Go ahead, Mom. Here's the phone. Do you want me to dial the number?" I knew in the end she wouldn't have the heart to do it. Anyway, around that tenth-grade year, I started to read acting books and I'd do one play and then another and I became really interested in acting. Part of it was that I was always a big fan of movies and had a real respect for actors. Did you go to a lot of movies when you were a little kid? Yeah. When I lived with my dad, my morn would come and pick me up and the weekend would consist of going to eat somewhere and going to see a movie, and sometimes we'd sneak from one to the next. I liked every movie I saw in those days. So at some point the pleasure those experiences gave you must have fed into your feeling that you could be the one up on the screen? Uh-huh, and once I began acting and I'd been in it for a year or two, I decided I really wanted to succeed. I was doing a first rehearsal of a play in L.A. one time when I was sixteen and I remember I was pretty much scared out of my mind. But when the director asked me to get up and sing, because I'm a terrible singer I decided the only way to get through it was to take the room. That was quite a breakthrough for me. Was that the first time you'd ever taken a room? No, no. As a kid I was always kind of a nut, you know? [laughs] I remember when I was four years old I sang "Zippity Doo Dab" at a local talent show. I've always liked to embarrass people, and on that occasion, when I was onstage singing, I said, "My mom is in the audience and she's right there, everybody. Look!" One of the first movies you did, when you were around sixteen, was This Boy's Life [1993]. How did that come about? Around the time I was auditioning for that I was developing a taste for movies from the '70s with Hoffman and De Niro and Pacino and Nicholson. I thought anything else was utter horseshit. And then suddenly I was one of ten kids or so reading with De Niro for the main kid part in This Boy's Life. I was terrified. I think I did a really poor job with the audition. Leo [Dicaprio] got the part, of course, but I was given a tiny role in the film. It was like the first respectable gig I'd gotten. This whole generation of new young stars is an interesting subject. So many came from L.A., and so many started off as kid actors going around to audition. They should make some weird documentary on kids auditioning. Whether they come from out of town or whether they live in L.A., the pressure that's put on them can be such twisted shit. I knew a nine-year-old girl who didn't get a job after six weeks, and she said, "I was happy to go home, but I was sad because everyone got a job and I didn't." It's a little like child labor. There's a difference with kids who know what they want, who have a dream to be in pictures, but the ones who get pulled around because of someone else's ambitions always remind me of those turn-of-the-century photographs by Lewis Hine, which documented the cruelty of kids being put to work in factories. He had to disguise his camera to get those pictures. In the entertainment business it's all out in the open, and it even looks glamorous. But if it's not what someone wants, it's a whole other story. Anyway, you obviously started to want it. Tell me your sense of why. Acting gives you a sense of community and that drew me to it. You go around and see these same kids at auditions, and even though there's some weird competition going on, there's also some continuity. So Leo and I were friends, and going into read for This Boy's Life we said to each other, "No hard feelings if the other one gets the big part, and whoever gets it will help the other person get a part in the movie." I was really excited when Leo got the part and I was excited to be in the movie myself. It was really cool doing it, because Leo knew what a crazy fan I was of De Niro's. I remember being in L.A. when Leo was up in Canada starting rehearsal. I got home one day and checked my machine and it said, "Hey, Tobey, it's Leo. What's up, man? I'm just cruisin' around up here in Bob's car." He goes, "Hold on, someone wants to say hi." And Robert De Niro gets on my machine and goes, "Hey, Tobey, how ya doin'? Lookin' forward to getting you up here. Take good care of your buddy Leo." Then Leo got on and he was like, "Hey, I'll talk to you later." Click. This was unreal to me. You were obviously doing something right to land the part you did. Do you think that's partly to do with drive? There was a point where I snapped into this real aggressive fervor, this clawing to achieve what I wanted. I've relaxed a little bit, but for a while I was going nuts. When I lived with my father and uncle, I'd help my uncle around the house and in the garage, and I became really efficient at that because I was kind of afraid. He was a real controlling perfectionist, and partly as a result I'm a perfectionist, too. I'm really hard on myself and I'm hard on others who are close to me. I just start seeing all the flaws in myself and even in my mother, who I love and who I think has done really well with her life. This is the side of myself I don't like so much. Half the time I'm heating myself up and half the time I'm going, Relax, it's OK. The idea is not to be a perfectionist but to be aware of your shit and work on it. So I try to allow myself to make mistakes. But at the same time, I still have this motivation to be successful. Anyway, by the time I was sixteen, I felt I had so much inside me. I've always known that I have a really powerful spirit and that in life you can have almost anything you want. But you have to be ready to do the things you want to do. In that respect, watching Leo was great for me because he's really good and I respect him as an actor. And also the fact that his success has opened up tons of parts for guys my age. He's almost single-handedly caused this whole youth thing to explode. Obviously there were kids before him like River Phoenix, but Leo's the pioneer of it right now and I have him to thank in a large way. Our relationship has gone through some weird turns because success has been so extreme for both of us, especially for him. He had a different family life from mine but he was also really poor growing up. I used to drive by his house and as I was pulling up I would watch the blue glow coming from his room. He was this little tiny blond kid playing video games. And something else we shared in common at that age was that we hated being underestimated because we were young. In a way, as actors, we are all really selfish and on our own driven paths. But, at the same time, we are all supportive of each other and not that jealous. My actor friends are some of the most phenomenal people I have ever met. For Leo and me, it goes back to those auditions we used to go on together and to wishing each other well when we went up for This Boy's Life. What came next for you after that movie? For a while I did fairly well. I started to make money and get more important jobs, but at the same time I started to become less hungry. I became more interested in partying. I was into it for the social aspect, but in reality I wasn't participating when all my friends were dancing and having fun and talking to girls. I was just like a piece of furniture. From seventeen to nineteen I went into some weird, weird place. I was constantly quiet. I was really shy and insecure with girls. I had absolutely no confidence. I became bitter and sarcastic. All my friends called me an old man 'cause I liked to play golf and smoke cigarettes. Around nineteen I went up for this film, Empire Records [1995]. The director [Allan Moyle] loved me. He said, "This is my hip-pocket kid - I don't know where to put him yet but he's definitely gonna be one of the leads." But when I went into read for the film I wasn't prepared and I sabotaged my chance of getting a big part. I disappointed Allan and I disappointed myself, but my agent got me a small part in the film. The way it turned out, that movie symbolized a lot of the shit I was into at the time - youth and music and taking control of my life. I don't know if destiny is exactly an accurate way to describe it, but the experience was a lot about change. It sounds like a big change. I'll tell you. I went out to the set in North Carolina and it was like a party scene. The rest of the cast had been working together for a month or so, and I again felt like this extreme outsider, desperate to fit in. I was really uncomfortable. I was going to extremes. I didn't want to use my dry, sarcastic, cutting humor anymore; I wanted to have really honest communication, but I just couldn't find my spot. There was a real sadness for me at the time. What happened? Well, I had a kind of semi-breakdown. I thought about my life in the past and my relationship with my father in particular. I decided that I needed to quit the movie and go home to L.A. to live with my room. Not worry about acting for six months. I had read a little bit of The Celestine Prophecy, about how there are no accidents, and I was thinking that everything was happening on purpose. I went to Allan and asked to be let go. He was very understanding and one of the things he said to me was, "I want you to write a script for me, and I want it to be about you and a friend. You're the more intellectual and introverted guy, and your friend is more outgoing. I want it to be about how you guys find the middle ground of communication." And this exactly paralleled my relationships with some of my friends. He said, "Here's a good title: There Are No Accidents." It echoed in my head and I just freaked out. Then he said, "Here's a better title: Make It Stop." What did you do? I went back to L.A. I was kind of lost for a couple of days. I was calling therapists, trying to get some help. I talked to a friend of mine, telling him about needing a spiritual shift in my life, needing to have control again, and he's like, "That sounds great. But it's not about having control of your life again. It's about letting go of that." He suggested I talk to this mutual friend of ours who was going through some similar stuff. I called the guy and said, "I need help. I'm lost." And the guy helped you get help? Yeah. And I found these guys who ended up being my roommates for the next year and a half, which was a great growing environment. For the next year, none of the exterior things in life mattered to me anymore. I quit acting for a while and told my agent I didn't want to go an any auditions. Then all the inner work started paying off externally. In what ways specifically? Things started to turn around and I began to participate in life and, no matter how much fear I had about being judged, I would get out there and dance a bit at parties and start talking to people, even though I was almost trembling at times. It became like a personal triumph to walk through fear like that. And what happened was that I started getting good work and girls began paying attention to me. I got a little bit lost in that. Because... You're human. I'm human and I was getting to taste this stuff I desired for so long, but only through letting go of it, you know? I've been straggling ever since with that. Trying to find a good balance. Because the external success just keeps growing. It's now on its own course. I don't control it. As you got on your feet again which movies came about first? The start of it was a short film I did called The Duke of Groove [1995]. It was with Kate Capshaw and Uma Thurman and it ended up being nominated for an Oscar for Best Short. Kate was amazingly supportive. I remember telling her about my life one day, semi-complaining. She says, "Tobey, would you really change one thing? Because all those things led you up to who you are now." And I had to admit she was right. Was The Ice Storm [1997] an important one for you? Yes. It was the first feature where I had a significant part with great players, a major director, Ang Lee, and a great screenplay. It was also about something I could relate to - I wasn't living it at that moment but it was close enough that I could still feel it and at the same time bring some humor to it. I played Paul, a kid who's growing up in a family that was falling apart and needed a tragedy to bring it back together. My character is kind of removed from the family because he goes to boarding school, and he's the one who makes the right moral decisions supposedly. Did you feel good about your performance? Not entirely, but it was great working with people like Kevin Kline, Sigourney Weaver, and Christina Ricci. It was just what I needed. Ang Lee's a great outsider, too, of course. And so sweet. He's very quiet and the way he moves and speaks is very soft but demands so much respect. He's very serious about his work, so it sets the tone for everyone else. I'm really fortunate to have just shot his next flick, which is a Western called Ride With the Devil. I understand that your new movie, Pleasantville, is partly set In a televised American small town that is perfect to begin with but goes wrong when real life starts seeping in. Since The Truman Show tapped Into a similar consciousness it makes me feel that something's in the air - and maybe it's a recognition that trying to live in the real world with all Its harsh realities is more truthful than seeking out utopias that can never exist. So tell me about Pleasantville in your own words. Reese Witherspoon and I play a sister and brother who are complete opposites. Reese's character is only interested in boys and her social status. My character's intellectual and not very good socially. He's obsessed with this '50s TV show called Pleasantville that's like Father Knows Best or Leave It to Beaver, where everything is pleasant. Somehow we get zapped back into the Pleasantville show. I wasn't sure about doing the movie until I realized what a powerful concept it is. Did it meet with your expectations? It was a $40-million movie and I had a lead role, so there was a lot of pressure on me. To be honest with you, I'm not sure how I did. Are you where you want to be right now? I'm getting there. I have a girlfriend for the first time in my life, someone I've cared about consistently for a while. She's showing me that work is not the end of everything. She has good relations with her family and I use that as an example. I'm becoming a little bit more relaxed in my relationships and with work. I am realizing that work is not this sacred freaky thing. I want to be responsible about it, but it's not the meter for who I am or what my worth is. It sounds like you want to be responsible to yourself first. Yes. And that means I don't want to do four movies a year. I would prefer to do one film a year and something I've chosen very carefully. Whatever I do, I should put myself, my heart, my head into it 100 percent. Because doing a movie is a lot of work, more than I ever thought it was. But I'm still a kid. I'm growing up and I want to grow up. But I don't want to miss anything, you know? |
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Cheery Maguire
You don't have a police record, a band, a tatoo, or a piercing. What kind of young actor are you? I am a blank slate - therefore I can create anything I want. After playing a kid in the 50's in This Boy's Life, and a kid in the 60's in the Oscar-nominated short The Duke of Groove, you created the archetypal angst suburban teen of the 70's in The Ice Storm. What's your take on the 70's ? I like the movies and the music a lot. It was a really raw time. Movies like Network were really the core of what people were feeling then - they were really pissed off or just wanted to be truthful. Even Jethro Tull - you can understand what that guy's saying with his dumb flute, 'cause it feels so raw and organic. You realised a young actor's dream: a cameo in the upcoming Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. I play this really weird hitchhiker who has long blond hair. They bleached my eyebrows for it, and they had to make me completely bald and put a wig on. How far would you go for a role? Would you go the full monty? If I was so inspired, if I thought it needed to be in there to be effective. Like Harvey Keitel in Bad Lieutenant - that was ill-willy. What wouldn't you do for a movie? Smoke cigarettes. I've been off for like two and a half years. I haven't been chewing gum for a couple days now and I'm off coffee for about three days. So you're completely vice free? I wouldn't say that. I would say that I'm doing my best and the road gets narrower, but you can always switch seats on the Titanic - there's trillions of vices. I've been curious about certain things, but didn't let them get in the way of my life. I don't know how people become successful with some kind of habit. Is your theatricality the result of nature or nurture? My mom wanted to be an actress, so she figured her son could be one for her. She said she'd give me $100 to take drama instead of home economics - I wanted to be a cook like my pops. And you ended up doing McDonald's ads. I started working around eighth grade. I remember doing a Doritos commercial where there were four days in a row of eating them, and I will tell you, I have not eaten many Doritos since. My first big break was two lines on a Rodney Dangerfield special that got me into the union. At seventeen you had your own sitcom. "Great Scott!" We shot thirteen episodes, and six of them aired. And we were on Fox up against "60 Minutes". (Laughs.) So we had a really good shot. Are you a happy person? This is interesting to me: On one hand you have just feeling happy: I don't mean, like, laughing and giddy, but feeling light, like you're free. And on the other hand, you have murky discomfort, whiny self-pity. And I personally know the steps to get to both. For some reason the majority of the time I think I choose Door No. 2 - the dark, uncomfortable, familiar territory. When I'm being inappropriately rude or trying to manipulate somebody, I know it. So what's up with the ego? Why can't I stop myself and just say "Sorry, here's the truth." I mean, do I get to look forward to that in my life? If you can get over yourself. What makes you tick? All the people throughout my life who were naysayers pissed me off. But they've all given me a fervor; an angry ambition that cannot be stopped - and (laughs) I look forward to finding a therapist and working on that. |
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