Kevin Costner Interview, Mr Brooks

MoviesOnline sat down with Academy Award winning actor Kevin Costner at the Los Angeles press day to talk about his new film "Mr. Brooks,” a gripping suspense thriller about an otherwise exceptional man divided in two by his unbearable need to kill. Costner stars as the charming, widely admired Mr. Brooks, whose shocking private life is about to unravel. A successful businessman, a generous philanthropist, a loving husband and father, and a true pillar of the community, Mr. Brooks nonetheless harbors a sinister secret—he’s an insatiable serial killer, so lethally clever that no one has ever suspected him—until now. Demi Moore, Dane Cook, William Hurt, Marg Helgenberger, Ruben Santiago-Hudson, and Danielle Panabaker also star.

There were many reasons that director/screenwriter Bruce Evans ("Stand By Me”) and his long-time writing partner Raynold Gideon imagined Kevin Costner as Mr. Brooks from the start. First and foremost was the chance to subvert his charm, looks and reputation, as an unassailable screen hero in a way they knew would ratchet up the tension in their thriller. But it was also an opportunity to showcase, in an unexpected way, the acting skills that Costner has demonstrated in such diverse roles as the Civil War Lieutenant who befriends a Sioux tribe in "Dances With Wolves”; the hardened kidnapper who connects with his young captor in Clint Eastwood’s "A Perfect World”; the iconic title hero of Lawrence Kasdan’s "Wyatt Earp”; the once-great baseball star who falls for an embittered woman in Mike Binder’s "The Upside of Anger” and most recently, the aging Coast Guard rescue swimmer facing his legacy in Andrew Davis’ "The Guardian.”

"I’ve always thought of Kevin as someone very capable of surprising audiences,” says Evans, "and I don’t think he’s gotten enough credit yet for what a skilled actor he is. He doesn’t hide behind tics or mannerisms or large brush-strokes. He is much more subtle than that – which is where his power to really take a role like this and run with it comes in.” Co-writer and producer Gideon adds: "Mr. Brooks is a very flawed human being and his crimes are shocking, but he also knows what he is doing is wrong, and the way Kevin brings that internal struggle to the fore is what makes him so fascinating.”

Costner did not want to whitewash the stark truth of who Mr. Brooks is -- a man who fights his inner demons yet returns again and again to the compulsion to kill. Nor could he forget the havoc and heartbreak the character wreaks with his brilliantly planned but gruesomely cruel murders of total strangers. States Costner: "Make no mistake, the places Mr. Brooks goes are indefensible and despicable, but what makes him so interesting is that he has this other pressure on him that you don’t usually get to see in a killer – there’s a conscience beating at him.”

In producer Jim Wilson’s eyes it’s precisely the very human qualities which Kevin Costner brings to this monster of a man that makes the character one of the of most chilling serial killers yet seen on screen – one who digs deep into our worst fears about what the most charming and alluring people we know around us might be hiding.

"Here you have this dashing, charismatic man in Kevin Costner, but you start to peel away his layers and realize that he has a terrible, unstoppable addiction to killing,” sums up Wilson. "In Kevin’s performance, with every single scene there’s another layer of Mr. Brooks that we see. I think it’s as complicated and multi-layered a character as he has ever played. "

Kevin Costner is a fascinating actor and we really appreciated his time. Here’s what had to tell us about his new film:

Q: Were you concerned that Marshall might overwhelm this movie?

KEVIN COSTNER: Well, I knew it was a really flashy role. And I very often take movies that have scene-stealing roles all around me, and I relish that. I think that's important for movies. I don't get scared by that stuff. I encourage the actors to be really good around me. I want that to happen. And I want them to do it inside the lines of the movie. And so when I see a great role, I want to go for a great actor. A great actor recognizes a great role. It just raises the whole level of the movie. [pauses]

Q: Does it surprise you to hear that...

KEVIN COSTNER: [referring to last question] I want to go to that for a second. It is a pleasing role. And you know, sometime the temptation is, in American movies now, conventional wisdom is they'll ask you, ‘What scene did you hate the most?’ And you'll tell them, ‘What scene did you like the most?’ In modern day filmmaking, that scene you hated the most goes flying out of the movie. But that doesn't mean it should have. It gives the movie a balance. And they might ask you about characters, and you say, ‘Well, I really like Marshall the most.’ Then an executive goes, ‘Let's write some more scenes for Marshall.’ I think Marshall was in there just perfectly. Just perfectly.

Q: How was it playing those scenes opposite William Hurt?

KEVIN COSTNER: It was fun. I mean, I've known William because of The Big Chill, and we both are rehearsal-oriented actors, and writer-driven actors. So it fit into our game really nicely.

Q: Was Marshall based on somebody?

KEVIN COSTNER: Yes. Marshall was based on a...I found Marshall when I was 12 years old in a book of children's dreams. And he would play basically a Black Knight, an evil person. But I liked him so much in the book because he was kind of cool. And I liked him so much, actually, I was afraid he was going to die in the book, so I never finished it. And my father used to discipline me with the idea that if I wasn't good, that the Black Knight would come and get me. That it would come and get me, that it actually hid in my closet. And like any young man, eventually you challenge your dad's theory and you open that closet. And there was my imaginary friend, and he was not scary at all to me. And so he's been with me. Sort of my alter-ego. And that began when I was 12 years old.

Q: Bruce [Evans] had only directed one film prior to Mr. Brooks. What did he do to convince you that visually he could accomplish this?

KEVIN COSTNER: Well, I didn't look at his other movie. [Laughs] I didn't want to. Because once I committed to him as a director, I wanted to try to support him, and I didn't want to get panicked. I mean, I had heard different things. I didn't want to jade that. Once I gave him my word that he would get a chance to direct it, I wanted to back that up. But I wanted also to protect the movie by keeping final cut.