Bryan Cranston: ‘I would go to malls, sit near arguing couples and watch them’ | Film
Hi, Bryan. Where are you today?
I am calling all the way from Chiswick. We could have done this over tea.
Why are you in Chiswick?
One of the things I’d done, just after the end of Breaking Bad, was to create a production company to produce television projects. One of my projects is called Philip K Dick’s Electric Dreams. [1] We’re shooting here in London. We have five episodes and I’m acting in one of the episodes. It’s an anthology series.
Which one are you doing?
This particular story is called Human Is and it really examines the simplicity of what is it that makes a human being. It’s really provocative, and evocative, and I think audiences will really like it. It will be on Channel 4 later this year.
In Wakefield [2], you have some scenes with raccoons. Were they CGI?
They were real raccoons. I talked to the animal trainer and asked, ‘How long does it take you to tame a raccoon?’ And he was saying, ‘Well, raccoons are tameable, but they’re still very wild.’ And I said, ‘Wait a minute, did you say they’re trainable, or that your racoons are trained? Because there’s a very specific distinction between the two things.’ [3]
You have a tendency to play men in the throes of a crisis very well. Why are you drawn to those kinds of roles?
I’m mostly drawn to male roles, I think.
Although you have have been seen dressed as [White’s wife] Skyler. [4]
Oh yes, there you go. It was a wrap party, and we dressed as our opposites. I think it’s interesting because those men are interesting. Men who are complex and have idiosyncrasies about them that could be conflicting and have an unclear agenda, make for interesting people in real life, let alone the world of make-believe.
Is Wakefield also about what makes a human being?
Yes. I think it’s very relatable. Howard Wakefield is a man who is not dissimilar from other humans. He works hard, he just had a fight with his wife, he’s tired, he wonders: ‘Is my life just one day after another the same? Am I on this hamster wheel for the rest of my life?’ His desire is to push the pause button on his life, that’s all. Just for a couple of hours. [The character vanishes and goes into hiding.] Unfortunately for Howard, he can’t unstick that pause button.
I found some parts of the film chilling, particularly the voyeurism.
Yes, and that’s a legitimate thought. On the other hand, if you had the opportunity, wouldn’t you do it? If you had the opportunity to be undetected and watch your life without you in it, isn’t your curiosity to the point where you’d think, ‘Yeah, I wonder what they’d do if they thought I was dead? How would they behave?’
Would you really want to see that?
Of course. I’m too curious not to. It’s a prerequisite to being an actor.
Now that you are very famous, though, how capable are you of curiosity?
It makes observation more difficult, because once the observer becomes the observed, behaviour changes. But fortunately, it didn’t happen to me in my 20s. It happened to me in my 40s. [5]
So you’ve had time.
I had 40 years of undetected observations. I would go to shopping malls with a newspaper and I would hold it just before my eyes. If I felt a couple was arguing or something, I’d go and sit near them and, quote unquote, read the paper, but I was just watching their behaviour.
Did you ever get caught?
No. Nuh-uh. I would also have headphones with me and if they thought I was listening, I’d bob my head as if listening to music. I did this!
Can you imagine how life would have turned if you’d been this famous in your 20s? Often people say they’re grateful that it didn’t happen earlier.
I’m grateful it happened later, because I was able to develop a sound foundation of my life without any level of fame given to a boy. One of the traps in being a celebrity is, there’s a certain curfew that I have in my mind. If I’m out in public, every time I feel it, I look at my watch to see what time it is, and almost invariably, it’s around 10.30pm. I’m starting to feel a waning of the evening. The energy has changed. I attribute it to alcohol. My wife and I squeeze each other’s legs, and it’s time to leave.
You’re like Cinderella.
Yeah. If I’m there at midnight … Nothing valuable or worthwhile usually happens after midnight.
How many times a day do people ask you to do Walter White?
I get asked for a picture or autograph every day, but I don’t get asked to recite [lines]. Some do. Some will say [them]. And I go, ‘Oh well, that was then.’
You don’t do it?
You don’t want to be subjected to someone’s whim. You have to have certain boundaries. But to talk to fans who’ve felt an impact from Breaking Bad or anything else, it’s nice. I like it. I remember when I was doing a play in New York and I would sign autographs afterwards, and I’d ask, ‘Whose first play is this?’ And I loved that. To see some 14-year-old kid, it’s really cool that you’ll tell people the first play you saw and I was in it. I’m coming back later this year to do a play at the National Theatre. It’s called Network. Lee Hall has adapted the film and we’re presenting it, Ivo Van Hove is directing. I’m super-excited.
Footnotes
[1] Cranston has also exec-produced the series and the cast is ridiculous: Janelle Monae, Steve Buscemi, Greg Kinnear, Anna Paquin and Timothy Spall are among those announced as stars.
[2] The lead in Wakefield is called Howard Wakefield. Bryan Cranston has never bene to the good city of Wakefield in West Yorkshire but was open to the idea that the premiere should be held there.
[3] It is illegal to keep raccoons as pets in many parts of the world and this may be why.
[4] This is a very popular picture on the internet. Aaron Paul also dressed as his TV girlfriend Jane.
[5] Cranston was a jobbing actor for years and once did an ad for Preparation H haemorrhoid relief cream.
Wakefield is released on digital on 28 July and DVD on 31 July
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