—Certainly there must be roles you take without being quite so compelled. Was Bill one of these, or did you feel you had to play that role?
"Well, yeah, there have been movies where I’ve had to make my character work for me instead of being compelled to do it. There are movies where, yeah, I didn’t love the character. But, you do it. You fall in love with it, try to find ways of doing it, because if you don’t, you’re going to be in trouble.
"There are characters that I say, ‘I don’t care what I have to do, I am playing this character.’ And sometimes you don’t get those movies. And that’s a hard thing. I really wanted to do movies that I didn’t get. Or when you do get them, there are characters that you do because of financial considerations, because of social considerations, fulfilling relationships with people. You did me this favor; I’ll do you this favor. I don’t know if a lot of people know that. It usually comes down to paycheck, but a lot of it is your friendships. You’ve been good to me, so I’m going to do this movie. You know?"
—Like Neil LaBute? You’ve worked with him quite a bit. How did that come to be?
"His stuff is really good, so that’s a pleasure. We met when I was in college. He was a PhD, and I was an undergrad. He was getting his PhD in theater arts, and I just started doing his plays. At BYU, being a Mormon school, his plays were controversial, to the extent that not everybody would do them, first of all, and they weren’t even allowed on the stages. I have a dark place in me, I guess, so we got along, and I was able to say the words moderately well. At that time I hadn’t read anything like that, but I could say the words.
"What people don’t know is that Neil was not only writing and directing plays, but he was also acting in the plays, which helped me out a lot because I could see how he wanted the original words to be said and to be played. This is interesting when I watch other people do his stuff because nobody has seen Neil. I’ve only seen Neil. And I don’t know why that’s important, but it is important. Nobody knows that Neil can act, very well.
"That’s a relationship I still cherish, and we’re still going to work together."
—It seems you often play a fairly traditional role of the dissatisfied male. Are you particularly drawn to this character or to this type of drama?
"You know, I could say that that’s what I’m best at, but in the end that’s just what’s being written out there. It’s just what’s being written. Forget my career. Look at every other movie that comes out. I mean, that’s what drama is all about — dissatisfaction with what? And what are people mostly dissatisfied about? They’re dissatisfied with what’s closest to them, and that’s their lives. And that’s usually their wife and their children or something. And that dissatisfaction breeds boredom, and then drug addiction, and then blah, blah, blah. That’s what’s being written about in scripts. When you get into the tent pole movies and the bigger movies then you have a different thing. But then people ask why you’re doing tent pole movie. ‘Well, because I’m sick of doing relationship movies.’ That’s just what’s out there.
"Yesterday my agent said, ‘You were just offered blah, blah, blah and it’s about blah, blah, blah.’ And I’m like, ‘No, because I don’t want to do blah, blah, blah.’ Now we’re getting into hurly-burly. That’s drama. Look at TV. Why are there so many cop shows on? Why are there so many hospital shows on? Because it’s filled with drama and dissatisfaction. I don’t know if I’m pre-disposed to it or if it’s just what’s out there.
"I have a dark side, but also I have a side of reality. I like adult drama. I like adult issues. Whatever comedy or whatever I do, whatever movies I do, even my romantic comedies — like the one I just did with Jennifer — (My career isn’t this great thing or whatever) I’m not playing a child. I’m not playing a teenager. I’m not playing an adult who’s a child. In that, what else do you have to explore, other than some sort of dissatisfaction?
"I will say this, my next movie, Traveling… Ok, you’re right, I am looking for more. I’m looking for guys who are not malicious, who are not sadistic or sociopathic. In Traveling I play a man who is dealing with his wife’s death. I’d like to do more family drama, where I’m a dad with a family and kids. But how do you make that exciting? How do you write a script that makes that exciting? There’s got to be an injection of drama in there. And that just doesn’t happen every day. I could scream at my agent every day, ‘Get me an adult movie blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.’ And my agent would just tell me there’s not one out there. They’re not the first thing being made. Plus, not a lot of people go to those movies, so it’s harder to get those movies financed. They’re looking for the market, the kid market."
—They want Meet Bill.
"That’s right!"
Meet Bill opens April 4th at the Lagoon Cinema, and runs for one week only.