John Malkovich
John Malkovich
John Gavin Malkovichis an American actor and director. He has appeared in more than 70 motion pictures. For his roles in Places in the Heart and In the Line of Fire, he received Academy Award nominations. He has also appeared in films such as Empire of the Sun, The Killing Fields, Con Air, Of Mice and Men, Rounders, Ripley's Game, Knockaround Guys, Being John Malkovich, Shadow of the Vampire, Burn After Reading, RED, Mulholland Falls, and Warm Bodies, as well...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionActor
Date of Birth9 December 1953
CountryUnited States of America
I'm not a Method actor. I don't believe acting should be psychodrama. I look within myself and see what I can find to play the role with. If I'm playing a blind man, I don't go around blindfolded for days. A lot of good actors would, but I don't go in for that very much. I like to just make it up as I go along.
The theater is so disappointing, really, that it's hard to go again and again. It's just too heartbreaking. I'd rather watch football or play a game or read.
I don't mind what I play, really.
I think probably when I was little, after my brother turned on me, I just had to play by myself or with myself. I've always done that. I think either it's some kind of weirdly competitive streak or it takes my mind off whatever's bothering me.
You can't take a play someone has directed and do whatever you want with it.
When you do a really good play, the audience and the performers are looking into the same looking glass, the same microscope. And the specimen they are looking at is human life and that's why I do it, that's why I like it.
You have to play your characters, not like them.
There's no worse feeling in the world than realizing the play you've directed doesn't work.
I've lived in Europe for the better part of twenty years, and I've noticed that one of the biggest errors Europeans make is to dismiss America as having no culture. That's an incredible mistake, and whether it's born of arrogance or neurosis, it's wrong.
Most filmmakers' entire body of knowledge is of other movies. When they describe things, they describe them in relation to other movies. That's why we have so many cyclical movies that look like other movies. But I'm not cynical. I even go to some of those movies.
I brought my first fall/winter line to New York, and it was confiscated by U.S. Customs. They asked, 'What is the value of this?' I said, 'I'm not so good with existential questions.'
I wouldn't describe myself as lacking in confidence, but I would just say that - the ghosts you chase you never catch.
I grew up in the Midwest, quite far from any ocean or any beach, a million miles. I think for kids who grew up where I did, the idea of California, surfing and beach life was so exotic and glamorous.
I have driven school buses, sold egg rolls and painted houses, and I have often wondered what my life would have been like if I hadn't gone into acting. Mind you, it's a great life, going around pretending you're other people and getting paid ridiculous sums of money for it.