Sir Ben Kingsley Interview, The Wackness

MoviesOnline had the pleasure of sitting down with Academy Award winning actor Sir Ben Kingsley (“Gandhi”) at the Los Angeles press day for his new film, “The Wackness,” written and directed by Jonathan Levine.

It’s the summer of 1994, and the streets of New York are pulsing with hip-hop and wafting with the sweet aroma of marijuana – but change is in the air. The newly-inaugurated mayor, Rudy Giuliani, is beginning to implement his anti-fun initiatives against “crimes” like noisy portable radios, graffiti and public drunkenness. Set against this backdrop, Luke Shapiro (Josh Peck) spends his last summer before college selling dope throughout New York City, trading it with his shrink, Dr. Squires (Kingsley), for therapy, while crushing on his step-daughter, Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby). Famke Janssen, Mary Kate Olsen, and Method Man round out the cast in this edgy, bittersweet, and funny coming of age story.

One of the world’s most respected film, television and theatre actors, Sir Ben Kingsley received an Oscar nomination, a Broadcast Film Critics Award, as well as both a SAG and a Golden Globe nomination in 2002 for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Jonathan Glazer’s “Sexy Beast,” starring alongside Ray Winstone and Ian McShane. He also received an Oscar nomination in 2004 for Best Actor for his performance in Vadim Perelman’s “House of Sand and Fog.”

Kingsley will be seen soon in the highly anticipated film “Elegy” for director Isabel Coixet. The film is based on Philip Roth’s acclaimed novel “The Dying Animal” and also stars Penelope Cruz and Dennis Hopper. He can currently be seen in “The Love Guru” with Mike Myers and Jessica Alba. His other upcoming projects include “Transsiberian” with Woody Harrelson; “Number 13” with Ewan MacGregor; the Coen Brothers’ “Gambit”; and Martin Scorsese’s “Shutter Island.”

Sir Ben Kingsley is an extraordinary actor and we really appreciated his time. Here’s what he had to tell us:

Sir Ben Kingsley: I hear that some of you have been invited to screenings of “Elegy” today, is that right?

MoviesOnline: Yes.

Sir Ben Kingsley: Great. You're seeing it quite soon?

MoviesOnline: Yes. Was “Elegy” the movie you were filming right before “The Wackness”?

Sir Ben Kingsley: Yes. I'd read the script of "The Wackness" and Jonathan (Levine) came to Vancouver to talk to me about it. I was really keen on doing it. I loved it. And then meeting Jonathan, I realized that we were going to get on famously on the set. We really get on well. Yes, I came from a very different world of Penelope (Cruz) in "Elegy." Any of you know Isabel Coixet's work at all? The Spanish director? "My Life Without Me?" "The Secret Life of Words?" She's quite wonderful. With Sarah Polley. She directed it. That's opening after this.

MoviesOnline: This is a great role (Dr. Squires)?

Sir Ben Kingsley: Isn't he wonderful?

MoviesOnline: When you read the script, did you know right away how you'd play this?

Sir Ben Kingsley: Well, I recognized the silhouette. I recognized his narrative function in the film. I knew what that character needed to do for Josh, needed to do for Luke, to make the film work. I think I had a head start as a young actor by being able to do lots of Shakespeare, because Shakespeare practically invented the human being. He was such a genius. There are certain roles that I can read and think, “Well, my goodness.” For example, "Sexy Beast," Don Logan, it's Iago. It's definitely Iago, the bringer of destruction to Othello's life. I read this and know that our director agrees with me that it directly echoes Sir John Falstaff and Prince Hal in Henry IV, parts 1 and 2, when he's carousing in the Thames with Sir John. It's booze and serving wenches, but it's exactly the same relationship, and he's befriending the prince knowing that one day he'll be king and that he needs to see this side of London in order to be a good king. In a sense, I'm the Sir John Falstaff character, the crazy wonderful, larger-than-life wizard, if you like, that needs to impart to the prince information that he’ll need when he's king.

MoviesOnline: Wasn't there another aspect of your character that wasn't fully mature? He was wise but he's also an adolescent at times.

Sir Ben Kingsley: Very much. Very much. I so liked the vulnerability. It's in the writing. It's very much there. It was there for me to exploit with Jonathan and Luke mainly and, of course, my stepdaughter, with whom I'm far more comfortable as a fellow adolescent than I am as a parent figure. And the way that Josh's character and my character switch, he's the adult in many scenes, and I am the adolescent tagging behind. Our poster of me pushing the cart and Josh walking down, there's the adult (he points to Josh on the poster) and there's the adolescent (himself in the poster). Very much so.

MoviesOnline: How did you find working with Josh?

Sir Ben Kingsley: Delightful. From the word go. I learned later that his favorite film, he quoted from his favorite film to me very early on in filming. It’s "Searching for Bobby Fischer" and he can quote huge passages from the film. He must have seen it I don't know how many times. So we bonded over "Searching for Bobby Fischer" and saying the dialogue to each other from certain scenes. It's a joy to work with an equal. And I always feel very at ease when I'm working with an equal. It's like playing tennis. You can have a great game with somebody who plays an equal match with you. Everyone was equal in the film, I think. Jonathan cast it beautifully. There's not a weak link in the picture at all. It was a joy to work with him, an absolute joy.

MoviesOnline: You must be aware that everyone is in awe of you on the set and watches you to see what you’re going to do?

Sir Ben Kingsley: I'm not. I'm not. Honestly, I'm not. I'm just another kid on the block, you know. Really I am. It's as fresh an experience for me. Day one for me is day one for them. The first take of the first scene I have the same stomach full of butterflies that they have. The relief when the director says, “Got it, let's move on, print it,” is the same for me as it ever was and is for them. Because, as I said, it's a cast of equals. Now if we were damned with a complete amateur playing Josh's part, because he might look good on the cover of some magazines, it's very cruel to the young man and it’s very hard on the other actors. But I'm afraid it does happen. Somebody along the line has said to this unsuspecting kid, you should be in movies, and the poor unsuspecting kid has said, “Ahh, okay.” It doesn't work like that. They must be so terrified and disappointed and challenged in all the wrong ways. It's hard enough being them in the first place, but then to stick them in front of the camera and tell them to act, no wonder they're found overdosed. The gap is too big to bridge. They cannot do it. And it's unfair to ask them to. Josh can. He absolutely can. He’s a consummate professional.

MoviesOnline: Josh started as a child actor as did Mary-Kate with whom you have an interesting scene. Based on your experience working with young people who have been in the business since they were children, do they have a sense of discipline because they’ve been doing it for so long?

Sir Ben Kingsley: Yes. They do have a sense of discipline. Very often they've been in television series. The demands on the television series actor are crushing. The turnout is enormous. The expectation is very high. The consistency is terribly demanding. You cannot stray off your character. The audiences don't like that. They want this. The writing, the learning of the dialogue, and the taping, and the hours and the privacy, and the onslaught on your personal life, they're pretty extraordinary by the time they get into their early 20s. How old is Josh now? 21, yeah. He’s about the same age as my youngest sons. 21, yeah. He is a consummate professional. There is a difference, because they last. Those that are good last. Those that can't do it will tragically have to fall by the wayside. It's ruthless. But you can't ask someone to pretend to be an actor. It won't work. All the makeup, clever camera angles and script in the world, it won't last. You have terribly disappointed 22 years olds thrown away after one season. What do they do?

MoviesOnline: When you first read the script, what made you want to do it?

Sir Ben Kingsley: What attracted me to the script was its perfect symmetry. It is a great comedy, but it also has a heart and at the heart of it is this perfect symmetry of “once upon a time there was a boy who had no parents and once upon a time there was a father who had no children.” I love the way if you start your story like that, then the universe in the story find a way of bringing these people together, however momentarily, and they fulfill each other's needs perfectly. I fulfill my urgent need to parent somebody, because my stepdaugther doesn’t listen to me and my wife thinks I’m a joke. But I’m not. In me, somewhere in my character, is a really great parent. It’s clear because it worked. Josh’s parents lie to him continuously, and they fight in front of each other, and it must be terrifying to the child to hear that awful language and to be lied to and to see your house being emptied before your eyes, and not being told we have no money. Terrible! So he’s parentless; I’m childless, and the universe brings us together and for that crucial time we’re together, it works. I found that symmetry beautiful. Comedically, it’s flawless. I found it very, very funny. It’s dangerous. It’s tasteless at times. It’s elegant at times. It’s moving. It’s absurd. It’s never cynical. It’s never cruel or cynical. It never gets a laugh at somebody’s expense.

MoviesOnline: If Josh wasn’t who he was, do you think you could have still made it work?

Sir Ben Kingsley: It wouldn’t be the same film.

MoviesOnline: He didn’t audition with you?

Sir Ben Kingsley: No. He didn’t. I did see the screen test. Jonathan sent me Josh’s screen test which I found beautiful. He sent me Olivia’s too which I found beautiful. I did learn later that Josh, somewhere on some website, named me as his favorite actor. And I didn’t know this. He was asked who is your favorite actor and he said, Ben Kingsley. And we end up working together. Just as the universe brings people together in a play, I think the universe brings people together in life. I’m sure Jonathan would agree that once the film’s cast and the scenes begin to be assembled, it’s very difficult to imagine anyone else doing it other than the cast we have.

MoviesOnline: Is it a cliché that psychiatrists are more screwed up than their patients?

Sir Ben Kingsley: Yes.

MoviesOnline: Do you think it’s a cliché?

Sir Ben Kingsley: No. (laughs)

MoviesOnline: When you read your character, did you want to make him solid because that’s a cliché?

Sir Ben Kingsley: No. No. I think it’s a truism. I think it’s the truth that people who cannot heal themselves want power over others in order to look as though they’re caretaking some other [person], but it’s all projection. My character projects my entire adolescence onto him, saying “Don’t do what I did. Don’t be like me.”

MoviesOnline: Is there a film you saw when you were growing up that made you realize films could change people’s lives?

Sir Ben Kingsley: I was 4. It changed my life because I determined (then) to be a film actor. It’s called “Never Take No for an Answer.” [“The Small Miracle,” 1951, co-directed by Maurice Cloche & Ralph Smart] It was made by I think an English director. Martin Scorsese found me a copy of it, which is very kind of him. He’d remembered seeing it when he was young too. I was taken to the cinema to see “Never Take No for an Answer,” and it’s remained my motto ever since. It’s about a little boy whose donkey is dying in an Italian village. He can’t get his donkey into the crypt of St. Francis of Assisi without special dispensation from the Pope. He goes to Rome, he gets the letter from His Holiness, he comes back to his village, and his donkey’s allowed in to be healed. I looked exactly like the child when I was watching the film. I looked so like the child that the cinema owner announced the star’s presence in the cinema. He lifted me up above the crowd shouting, “It’s little Pepino! It’s little Pepino!” I didn’t have the heart to say “No, I’m not.” That’s when I changed. (Laughs)

MoviesOnline: And you said, “I want to be a star.”

A: (Laughs) Nothing’s changed.

“The Wackness” opens in theaters on July 3, 2008.