Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Joseph Leonard Gordon-Levitt is an American actor and filmmaker. As a child actor, he appeared in the films A River Runs Through It, Angels in the Outfield and 10 Things I Hate About You, and as Tommy Solomon in the TV series 3rd Rock from the Sun. He took a break from acting to study at Columbia University, but dropped out in 2004 to pursue acting again. He has since starred in 500 Days of Summer, Inception, Hesher, 50/50, Premium...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionActor
Date of Birth17 February 1981
CountryUnited States of America
Even when I was really young, I hated doing commercials, because I would say, "That's not real acting." And it's not. It's embarrassing what they make little kids do in commercials.
I think the reason I was able to get the jobs I did is because I worked for some very strong, self-possessed filmmakers who wouldn't listen to the executive-suited wisdom, and they believed in me from director to actor. Not from salesman to commodity.
I love her [Kimberly Peirce]. Incredibly intense is a good way of describing her. Brutally honest. Really sharp. She's a director for actors. That's what she's best at, sitting down with an actor and just getting to the heart of what a scene is. And getting to the heart of not just what the scene is and the character is, but what you are, and how to build that bridge between the "me" and the character, and those emotions.
Genres give a vocabulary. They give a frame of reference for the audience to enter into a movie. Then, once they have their footing, that's when you can start doing things that they don't expect.
The director is the most important because, ultimately, as an actor, when you watch a movie, it looks like an actor is giving a performance, and they kind of are. But, what's actually happening is that an actor has given a bunch of ingredients over to a director, who then constructs a performance. That's movie-making.
The term 'popular culture' always used to mean what the people do - pop songs, folk songs, music in general used to live because people would sing these songs and tell these stories together. Then all of these new technologies came out and it became the work of professionals.
Being politically active is "more about doing things, not just standing for some platform or being involved in some political party."
Everyone has the attitude that movies aren't just disposable entertainment - they can really mean something. I love that, because that's the way I feel about films.
I do feel that even though I didn't grow up being a big sci-fi fan or comic books or superhero fan, I felt myself definitely gravitate towards these movies that have a high concept and yet they're giving you a moral dilemma within that.
Real life is not as simple as it is on a screen. I think real life is actually a lot more beautiful.
You see a woman on a screen and you reduce her to just a thing, a sex object.
The traditions of Hollywood are grand and great and are going to survive forever, in a way. But they're not going to be the only way for much longer. The technology is such now that you don't have to have millions of dollars to make a movie. You can make one with a computer.
I think any time you set out to make something, anybody is going to be confronted by those voices in their head that say "You don't need to do this. Someone else can do this better. You should probably just quit right now."
If you don't stick to your plan enough, and you're too seduced by whimsical notions and new ideas, you can kind of lose your train of thought and end up with something that doesn't have a solid through-line.