Interview : Jeff Bridges

I recently had the pleasure of participating in a Q&A with actor Jeff Bridges who is currently promoting his latest film, Touchstone Pictures’ "Stick It," which opens nationwide on April 21st in Canada and April 28th in the US. 

One of Hollywood’s most successful actors and a four-time Academy Award nominee, Bridges earned his first Oscar nod in 1971 for Best Supporting Actor in Peter Bogdanovich’s "The Last Picture Show." Three years later he received his second Best Supporting Actor nomination for his role in Michael Cimino’s "Thunderbolt and Lightfoot."  In 1984, he was honored with a Best Actor nomination for John Carpenter’s "Starman" for a performance that also garnered him a Golden Globe nomination.  His performance in Martin Bell’s "American Heart" earned him an IFP/Spirit Award for Best Actor in 1993.  In 2001, he received another Golden Globe nod and his fourth Oscar nomination for his role in "The Contender," Rod Lurie’s political thriller. 

No one can say that Jeff Bridges doesn’t make interesting choices.  His multi-faceted career has encompassed all genres with directors as varied as Ridley Scott ("White Squall"), Walter Hill ("Wild Bill"), John Huston ("Fat City"), Peter Weir ("Fearless"), Terry Gilliam ("The Fisher King"), Barbara Streisand ("The Mirror Has Two Faces"), the Coen brothers ("The Big Lebowski"), and Gary Ross ("Seabiscuit").  Bridges’ role in "Fearless" is recognized by many critics to be one of his best performances, and the film is widely considered one of the most underrated films of the 1990s.  His performance as Jeffrey "The Dude" Lebowski in the cult classic "The Big Lebowski" (1998) is ranked #90 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Performances of All Time (2006).  He has co-starred with his brother Beau Bridges in the multi-award-nominated "The Fabulous Baker Boys" and with his late father Lloyd Bridges in "Blown Away."  Bridges is also a first rate character actor in films like "The Vanishing" as a psychopathic college professor, "The Contender" as a standoffish U.S. president, and "The Muse" as a carefree screenwriter buddy of Albert Brooks.  Most recently, he starred in "The Door in the Floor" for director Todd Williams. 

Last summer, Bridges finished filming "The Moguls," a comedy written and directed by Michael Traeger, in which citizens of a small town, under the influence of a man in the midst of a mid-life crisis (Bridges), come together to make an adult film.  He recently completed his second film with director Terry Gilliam entitled "Tideland," where he plays Noah, a drug addicted, has-been, rock guitarist.  Currently, his production company, Asls Productions, has a project in development entitled "The Giver" based on Lois Lowry’s Newbery Award-winning novel of the same name.  Bridges’ is also working on the animated film "Surf’s Up" in which he provides the voice of "The Geek."  

In Touchstone Pictures’ "Stick It," Bridges stars as Burt Vickerman, the legendary gymnastics coach who heads up Vickerman Gymnastics Academy.  Bridges recalls, "When I first learned about the film I said, ‘Oh, great, I get to play a coach in this.’"  He noted that he has always been a big fan of UCLA’s legendary basketball coach John Wooden, who had coached his brother, fellow actor Beau Bridges, when he was in college.  "I thought this was a great opportunity for me to tap into that kind of wonderful character…though it’s not quite how a gymnastics coach operates." 

In researching the role, Bridges first met with writer/director Bendinger, who walked him through the world of gymnastics.  "I was able to go to one of the Nationals meets with my video camera," Bridges remembers.  "I must have looked rather peculiar there, because there was all this wonderful flipping and tumbling going on and I’m there with my video camera focusing on the coaches, totally turned away from all the action.  But I learned a lot that day about how coaches operate.  There is a lot of affection – they show encouragement to the athletes – but there is also a kind of toughness that was interesting to observe and which seemed to work for my character." 

What also helped Bridges transform into character is the fact that he has three daughters of his own in their teens and 20s so he has a natural affinity for being around teenage girls.  As Bendinger describes it, "He knew the drill, inside and out, because he’d been living with it for a decade."  And as his co-star Peregrym recalls, "Everyone knows that he’s the most likeable, funny guy, and he truly is.  And after raising three daughters of his own, he gets it.  He understands that we get crazy sometimes.  It’s so cool to see somebody that grounded and that down-to-earth after having the career that he’s had."

In addition to being an exceptional actor who brings experience and a very finely honed sense of craft to the film, Bridges is also a talented guitarist and photographer.  Indeed, photography is one of his true passions.  Between takes, while on the set of his movies, he is known for shooting behind-the-scenes still photographs of the actors, crew and locations.  Afterwards, he edits the images into a photo book documenting the production which he gives to everyone involved once the film is completed.  His photos have been featured in several magazines, including Premiere and Aperture, as well as in other publications worldwide.  His work has also been exhibited in galleries in New York, Los Angeles, and London, and this past summer at the Museum of Photography in San Diego.  In the fall of 2003, powerHouse Books released "Pictures: Photographs by Jeff Bridges," a hardcover book containing a compilation of photos taken on numerous film locations over the years, to much critical acclaim.  Proceeds from the book are donated to the Motion Picture & Television Fund, a non-profit organization that offers charitable care and support to the film industry workers.

Here is what Jeff Bridges had to say about his latest film at our Q&A:

Q.  No photo books today?

A.  No, I think that might be the end of the photo books.  The last couple movies I’ve done, when I put together that compilation, that kind of hatched the egg or something.  I still like to take pictures, so who knows.

Q.  You took pictures on this movie didn’t you?

A.  I took pictures, but there was also…  You know what’s funny.  I love my wide lens.   That’s my real camera of choice.  But you know in this movie, in this particular setting, I wanted to get closer and it really didn’t allow me to do that.  So I was really pleased with  my shots.

Q.  Did you incorporate anything from John Wooden to imitate your character?

A.  Maybe a little bit, but not too much.  Once I read the script, I found out this character wasn’t much like John Wooden. You know, John Wooden coached my brother at UCLA, so I thought I could talk to Beau about it.  Beau showed me the pyramid of success, John Wooden’s pyramid of success.  It’s such a great model – it not only applies to sports, but life and everything.  And his approach to basketball is a metaphor for how you live and get the most out of your life.  The coach I play is not quite as enlightened as Wooden.  Maybe at the end he’s starting to get the joy back.

Q.  He’s got a little con-man?

A.  He’s got some con-man in him.  And he’s probably a little like Missy’s character at his age, very pushing the envelope and testing himself.  He ended up getting hurt and that kind of dampened his spirits. When he got into coaching – this is all back story, this isn’t really in the movie, necessarily – but I figured he encouraged the girls to do it as he used to do it, as Missy did it, to push hard, and he started to get some of his athletes hurt and get a bad reputation.  He pulled a bit back, and started getting concerned with safety and giving the judges what they want rather than letting the athletes do what they wanted to do.

Q.  You got The Big Lebowski on set a lot.  Is that something that happens to you?

A.  I’m happy about that because that’s one of my favorite movies.  Not just ones I’ve been in, but one of my favorite movies.  It’s just such a good movie. Those guys, the Coen brothers, they’re real masters.  It’s like the athletes, when you watch the Olympics and you see girls flippin’ around; they make it look easy. Then, when you do a movie like this, you see how difficult it is. 

 

Same thing goes for Lebowski.  You see how crazy that script is.  All over the place.  You can’t help but watch and find out where the next scene is going.  All of that.  A lot of people always say ‘it looks like a lot of improvisation,’ but oh no, every ‘man,’ every curse word, every ellipsis, they were all on the page and we did everything we could to say it as those guys wrote it.

Q.  There’s even a Big Lebowski festival.

A.  Oh yeah, I’ve been to them.  They’re wonderful.  A two day festival of bowling, drinking white Russians, and watching the movie.  They throw it up on the wall, just partying. They invited me to come in and play some music, so that was a big plus for me.  I’m playing to a sea of ‘Dudes.’

A.  That was sort of an homage to my father in "Sea Hunt."

Q.  Was having three daughters a reason for taking this part?

A.  Yeah.  That was really a part of it.  And they certainly helped me, meaning my daughters, going in there and seeing all these young girls.  The fact that I have daughters really helped me a lot.  I didn’t really have to think about it.  It’s something that came with the package.  It was like doing "Baker Boys" with my brother, Beau.  We didn’t have to think about being brothers.  You don’t work on that.  It’s kind of a given.

Q.  Did you ever coach your girls in sports?

A.  My girls were into soccer, and when I was younger, no one played soccer, boys or girls.  So, I didn’t have too much of that. I coached them in surfing, playing guitar, that sort of thing.

Q.  How much gymnastics did you watch on TV [in preparation for this role]?

A.  Not too much on TV.  I went to a meet.  It was a national meet.  I must have looked pretty peculiar, all these girls doing these amazing things, and I’m videoing the coaches – their hands, how they move their feet, but I got a lot out of that. Many ways, being a coach, it was going to be how was this guy in his early days.  I saw there were some coaches who probably never stepped foot in a gym in their lives. You know, the beer belly in their youth. 

 

But I also found out a lot of these guys weren’t even gymnasts growing up.  Bela Karolyi was probably the most famous of them all, and he wasn’t a gymnast.  He was a boxer.  That was kind of interesting to find out.  Of course, there were some coaches that were very fit and trim and looked like they could get up there and do the tricks themselves.  So I took bits and pieces and made my character a bit of that. There was a great coach on set, who was our technical advisor.  She would help the girls - Pat Warren.  I would go to her all the time.  She helped me a lot.  I might go up to her and say, ‘Pat, what am I looking for when they’re doing this trick? What are they doing? What would I say?’  She would give me all those things and that was a big help.

Q.  You sang to Nikki (the actress who played the role of SooHoo) when she was having a bad day.  Did you feel like a father figure on set?

A.  Yeah, it’s almost like a reflex action.  A girl that age, and she starts to cry… I’ll make sure to play guitar.  I played guitar.

Q.  What’s going on with "The Moguls?"

A.  It’s called "The Amateurs" now, which is kind of an interesting title.  (Bridges laughs.)  I can picture you guys saying ‘Well, they got the title right.’  I don’t know, but they don’t listen to the actors.  I love the movie, though.  I think it’s coming out in July.

Q.  Is that a very Dude-like character?

A.  He’s got a bit of Dude in him.  Kind of a slacker.

Q.  Is it PG-13 or R?

A.  I think it’s an R.

Q.  It’s OK to be an R-rated comedy now.

A.  Yeah, right.  It might be PG-13.

Q.  And what about "Tidelands?"

A.  Yeah, "Tidelands," a movie I made with Terry Gilliam a while ago up in Canada. I play a rocker in that, so I was able to play music. The tune that was played was from one of my friends, John Goodwin – not John Goodman – and you can hear it on my website or by going to ITunes – the name of the song is "Van Gogh in Hollywood."  That was great to get back with Terry and kick back.  It’s the weirdest movie I’ve ever seen, I think.  Terry Gilliam, it’s the weirdest Terry Gilliam movie – it’s out there.

Q.  Even weirder than "Fisher King?"

A.  Oh, much weirder.

Q.  When’s that coming out?

A.  I think it just got a distributor, so I’m not sure.

Q.  And what are you doing in "Surf’s Up?"

A.  I play a penguin in this movie called "Surf’s Up."  The description of my character doesn’t do it justice, but the guy showed me some stuff that hooked me.  I’ll tell you how he hooked me.  The premise of this movie is sort of a mockumentary, sort of like "Spinal Tap," like a Chris Guest film.

 

The consensus is there are these penguins that actually surf and that’s it.  And it sounds kind of crazy, but it works.  I play this penguin called The Big Z.  The way they hooked me is they illustrated me in this scene in "The Big Lebowski," where you have me saying ‘You can call me The Dude.’  They had me illustrated and the penguin doing the scene, so they got me – it was a dirty trick.

Q.  Is he kind of like the Big Kahuna?

A.  He’s kind of like that.  He’s not really Dude-like, but he’s an old surfer who’s now a recluse who teaches the young surfer how to surf the big wave.  It’s Shia LaBeouf and Zooey Deschanel.

Q.  Before The Dude, what would people come up to you and quote?

A.  Oh, maybe Starman.

Q.  Are you recording any more music?

A.  I’m sort of going through some of my tunes and seeing what’s going to be on the next album.  Hopefully, there’s going to be another one.  I hope so.

Q.  Were you encouraged by the first one?

A.  Sort of encouraged and discouraged.  I was so excited about it.  I would play it for friends and they would like it. You’ve got Michael McDonald on there and David Crosby backing me up.  I figured I have relative fame.  I can go onto a couple talk shows and talk it up.  We’ll get it on radio.  Radio is very hard to break that radio thing, and it didn’t get any airplay; but the positive thing about it – making it was just fun – but, also I decided to distribute it through my website, so I created a website and that kind of took off. 

 

I thought, ‘Oh wow, this is sort of another canvas, another expression; this is great.’  I was able to put a few other things on there like drawings. Eventually what I’m hoping happens when the bandwidth gets bigger is getting your own radio or TV station in your house.  Just do whatever you want to do.  You don’t have to wait for someone else.  I’ve been working on this [software] program, Garage Band.  You can get such good sound out of that.

Q.  Is there a movie you’ve seen that changed your life in any way?

A.  You know what movie came to mind (he hums the theme to "A Man and A Woman").  Yeah, that came out.  But I don’t know how it changed my life.  Maybe a good make-out session (laughing).

Q.  Are you and Beau looking for anything together?

A.  We keep looking for stuff.  It’s so hard to find something like "Baker Boys" with such a fabulous script that’s good enough.  Just the gimmick of the brothers, it was such a good script; not that we always have to play brothers, but I’m always looking for something as he is.  It’s hard to find an exceptional script that transcends doing a film with your brother.  Hopefully we’ll find one soon.

Q.  Is there a role you haven’t done yet that you want to do?

A.  Not really, but yeah there is one in the way I’m drawn to a repulsion.  I’ve been trying to get this movie off the ground for 9 years.  I think the attraction is there.  It’s based on a book called "The Giver," by Lois Lowry.  It’s kind of a challenging role, and I’ve never done anything like that, but I’m really excited.  We got this wonderful writer, Vadim Perelman.  He wrote "House of Sand and Fog."  He also directed it.  He’s going to be doing the screenplay and also directing this one.

Q.  Is that what you’re going to shoot next?

A.  I don’t know.  It’s not set up anywhere yet.

Q.  What are you going to be shooting next?

A.  Don’t know

Q.  What’s the criteria for you for choosing roles? This isn’t something Jeff Bridges fans would think you’d be doing.

A.  Yeah, well that’s something too.  Something that makes people keep…  You know my father, Lloyd Bridges, had this "Sea Hunt" series in the 60’s, and it was very successful.  He pulled off his part so well that people thought he was a scuba diver who they gave some acting lessons to.  For years, all the scripts he would get were scuba diver scripts.  And I saw how he struggled with that.  Years later, I did a movie called "Blown Away," and I talked to the producers and I told them, ‘I know a guy who could play my uncle, and he looks a little like me, too.  Lloyd Bridges. 

 

Are you familiar with him?’  He looks at me and he laughs, ‘You know, your dad would be great, but he’s thought of more as a comedian.’  I said, ‘What are you talking about?’ ‘The Airplane movies; he did a couple of those.’  So I gotta be very careful about developing too strong a persona because it not only makes it not as interesting for me in doing this stuff, but it’s tougher for the audience to imagine me in different roles.  If you’ve got too strong a persona, that’s all you can imagine that guy being.  So I try to mix it up, and I’m drawn to things.  Sometimes I’m kind of drawn to the same things I’m repulsed towards – something like ‘that’s not me, that’s not what I do.’ There’s something in me that kind of tickles me, like an itch and I try to push it away, and I try my best to not do it and those ones I do are just too damn intriguing.  Why am I drawn to it?  And then figure out why I’m drawn to it.  And then sometimes you can’t figure that out either.  I have to get into it to find out.  But at least we’re moving down the line, and that seems to kind of work.  I like it, and it’s also a message to the filmmakers that you start to get a variety of scripts cause you have them saying, ‘Oh, Bridges did the girls gymnastics thing, let’s get him.’  And I’d be doing one of those again.

Q.  Is there one Big Lebowski quote you get asked to repeat over and over?

A.  ‘The Dude abides.’

Q.  If "The Giver" gets made, that would be amazing.

A.  Yeah, but you don’t want to mess with that ending.

I thanked Mr. Bridges for taking time out of his busy schedule to discuss his exciting new film, "Stick It," which opens in theaters later this month.  This is a fun and entertaining family film that you will not want to miss.  And if you’d like more information on Jeff Bridges and his career, you can check out his official website at http://www.jeffbridges.com