411 Mania Interview: Josh Lucas
Posted by Tony Farinella on 09.04.2012
411's Tony Farinella sits down with Josh Lucas (A Beautiful Mind, Sweet Home Alabama, Glory Road) for an exclusive interview about some of his past projects, fame, his career so far, his love of dogs, and his work on the new film, Red Dog!
Josh Lucas has always been an interesting character on screen in such films as Glory Road, the Lincoln Lawyer, A Beautiful Mind, Sweet Home Alabama, Undertow just to name a few. He's always brought a certain rugged charm to each film he's done. Recently, I caught up with the actor to talk about his latest film, Red Dog, which hits DVD and Blu-Ray on September 4th. It's an inspiring film which also features Rachael Taylor from the first Transformers film. We also discussed his career up until this point, how what he wants out of a project has changed, his work with Clint Eastwood and Ron Howard, and how having a child has changed how he views fame. This is an engrossing, informative, and frank conversation. If you would like the audio, it is also featured in the article via the You Tube link.
TONY: What have you learned about dogs and their connection with people both through this movie and through your own experiences?
Josh Lucas: That's why I did the movie. I had rescued a dog a couple times in my life, and I have a dog called Loki who I got from a shelter in Harlem who is my best friend in so many ways. I've seen him a couple times do things that are so soulful, particularly with people in pain. A friend of mine had his heart broken terribly and my friend didn't like dogs, any dog for that matter. My dog Loki walked up to him one day, a grown man sitting on the couch crying, and he walked up and literally looked at him straight in the eye, put one paw on his knee and put his other paw on his another knee and leaned up. It was the most astounding thing. My friend kind of froze, and he put his other paw on his shoulder and his other paw on his other shoulder and gave him a hug. It was shocking, and I've never my dog do anything like that before or since. Now, it's funny, this guy that still doesn't like any dogs but loves my dog (laughs).
That experience alone, I've had a couple times in my life where I've seen similar things happen or I've seen people with heartbreaks or people who have gone through diseases and different things and dogs who just got them through. I think what it comes down to it is they're just totally, at their soul, these humble connected species that are not looking for anything but loyalty and love. Red Dog to some extent or another, I think, captures that because this dog has become so famous before the movie, obviously, that he changed that community. People, to this day, when we were making that movie would come up to you and show photos and tell stories of how Red Dog did this or Red Dog was their best friend. Everyone said Red Dog was their best friend, so it's interesting. He really did what the movie says: He brought that place together. Now oddly and wonderfully enough, the movie being so successful, it kind of did something similar in Australia as well. I hear Red Dog can't even walk down the street to take a pee (laughs).
TONY: (laughs) Wow. For you, how rewarding is it to be a part of a film like this? It seems like it speaks to so many people and creates such a reaction.
Josh Lucas: Every movie, you go into it and have different expectations and different hopes for it. This is like that child that you hoped would have a good life and go off and be successful and ended up and going off to be an astronaut or something (laughs). It's wildly beyond your best expectations. That's just such a treat. This movie has been one of my favorite movies to be a part of, A: because I loved making it and I loved all of the experience of it, which is not the most common. Movies are very difficult and sometimes very uncomfortable things because you're away from your family or you don't get along with a group of people, whatever it may be. Everything about it was just joy.
I have a real strong affection towards Australia and traveling to Australia. I had managed to go across the {inaudible} and take a trip by myself up all the way along the ocean to where the movie was shot up in the northern territory up there, the northwest territory where the mining, and there's just no reason to ever go there. And most Australians have never even been there and it's just profound landscape I would say. It's so remote and so powerful to be there and see the earth in that way. That became part of the joy of making the movie and then when the movie goes on to become successful and does something really great in Australia, where it did seem to bring communities together. Look, that's the best form of entertainment, best form of what we do as actors, or moviemakers, or writers, or anything that we can do that, something that brings people together or creates joy, that's the ultimate of entertainment.
TONY: You mentioned how this film brought you so much joy. I want to ask you, right now, in terms of your career, what are you drawn to and what's inspiring you creatively with different projects?
Josh Lucas: It varies every single time, but more and more, it's telling stories that I think people are not just going to want to see, but I think that have a good soul to them as well. That's really what it comes down to. The people involved are people I respect. Obviously that's a huge element to it. Something like Red Dog, I knew some of the actors involved and I knew a lot of the talent involved, but really I just loved so much the story and what it said about people's profound relationships with dogs. I had that in my life, so each movie, does this speak to me and will it speak to other people?
I guess I'm changing a little bit more these days where I'm trying to associate or question whether it's something I think people are going to enjoy rather than just be an interesting experience for me as an actor. I used to do that more where I would say, ‘This will be such an interesting challenge for me. I don't care whether people see it or not.' I don't necessarily think that anymore because a lot of money and a lot of work and a lot of pain and struggle that goes into putting a movie together. You hope and want people to make their money back at least.
TONY: As an actor, how do you know what people are going to respond to? Do you have a certain barometer on set or when you read the script?
Josh Lucas: You don't, and I would say to be honest with you, I've probably been more wrong than right about that. I've made a lot of movies that I thought, ‘This one might work or this one might be an award winner or this one might have a big audience,' that didn't have a big audience and didn't end up working well. I think I've probably learned as much from my mistakes that way. And then there are obvious ones like I didn't expect Red Dog to do as well as it's done in Australia, but I would say I did think it had great soul and great heart and would be accessible in a way certain kinds of movies like Sweet Home Alabama or whatever that strike people that end up hitting and being financial successes as well. I guess it's really still quite a mystery. I think if someone came up with a formula for that, they would be running Hollywood (laughs).
TONY: One of my favorite films of yours, and when I heard I was interviewing you, I was extremely excited because one of my favorite films of yours is Undertow. I think it's such a magnificent, well-made, well-acted film. I want to ask you about that project. What was it like playing that character and being involved in a film like that?
Josh Lucas: It's funny, I agree with you. It's one of the gems, particularly not as seen or not as successful as I would have hoped in some ways, yet it does seem to be a movie that people are talking about or finding sometimes particularly in interviews and I'm really happy when they do because we poured our souls into it. It's a movie that was made for I think less than a million dollars. It was David Gordon Green at a point where his career was really about to take off. Obviously, Jamie Bell, and it had all these different elements to it. All of us were there doing it just purely for love, partly because David brings an esoteric kind of remarkable Terrence Malick-like talent to what he's doing.
Malick was involved, I'm not sure you know this or not, but the film, sadly, is a bit of a true story. Malick was working in a runaway shelter and he got a phone call. Basically, a little boy on the other end of the phone told him that story, and it resonated with Malick over the years and he tried to write versions of it over and over and over and then when he saw George Washington, David Gordon Green's first film, he was like, ‘This will be a great director for this project' and gave it to David. There was a dark, sad heart to it because it was a true story yet I think we were all there trying to make something as deep and interesting as we possibly could. A movie that was terribly painful for me to make because I had to look into what it is, the idea of killing your own children and every single person I heard interviewed and read about had basically all said the same thing that they had done it because they wanted to release their children from the pain of life. That's kind of the ultimate horror. I think that movie captures elements of the south and the esoteric kind of oddities of the deep south in ways. That's a movie I'm very proud to be a part of.
TONY: One looks at your resume and of course, we see Ron Howard, Clint Eastwood, Lasse Hallström, all very unique, talented, and very creative artists. How have those experiences enriched you as an actor?
Josh Lucas: I'm obsessed with directors as much or more than actors. I know I'm not a director. I'm hoping I'll direct a couple times in my career, but there's a big difference between particularly the people you mentioned, whose careers are just remarkable and brilliant directors. Each one of them, what I find so different and interesting about directors is how different they are. Each one of them, you have someone who is a happy, quiet, obsessive, seems like the boy next door in Ron Howard. Someone told me the other day that he wears you down with kindness in a sense that you just do it over and over and he's searching for this perfection in a really interesting way that Ron Howard can do because he's the boy next door and he makes you feel good about it and makes beautiful, big, amazing Hollywood movies.
And then you have a guy like Clint Eastwood who does one or two takes and he's just an extraordinary artist. Clint Eastwood was, to me, is the most inspiring filmmaker I've worked with because he has so much profound respect for everyone he's working with and what it comes down to is he has the ultimate trust in the people who he has hired. When Clint Eastwood sort of taps you on the head and says I trust you, that's an amazing feeling. You know you have to come up with the goods for him, too, because he's Clint Eastwood (laughs). What I find so interesting is how each one of them is different and each one of them, the skills are so different that are involved with the way that they tell stories. And to me the more I can work with those kinds of directors, the more I find that's when you are in good hands. It's like being with a great coach on a team. You don't have to have the best talent, it's about having the best leadership and great directors are really that. They're ultimate leaders and they do it in such profoundly different ways it's remarkable.
TONY: In terms of being an actor, it's interesting because I've had some previous interviews with you where you've talked about how you view yourself as an actor and how you want to stand out and not just be seen as, ‘Oh, that's Josh Lucas.' How do you feel about yourself right now as an actor and the work that you're producing?
Josh Lucas: It's interesting. I've just become a father. My son was born two months ago, and I think that automatically impacts your life in a profound way, where it makes you look at who you are and where you're at. I think in some ways, I feel some satisfaction for the fact that I have done a lot of work I'm proud of and I feel a lot of hunger to do more and particularly to do it with the caliber of director you're talking about. By no means do I feel like, ‘Oh I've made it.' I guess I've just never felt that. I've always felt this sense of satisfied hunger and having a child has put everything into perspective even more so.
I guess more than anything having a child has done something interesting to me, though, it's made me less interested in being a part of Hollywood or fame and more and more interested in being a part of really good work and being proud of the work that you do. And the things I would want to impart on my son are that fame and money and those elements, the tensely sort of obviously glorified elements of what being an actor bring to you have been the things that have been the least satisfying and the most satisfying has been being a part of things that are profoundly interesting and good and that make you feel proud like Red Dog and working with Clint Eastwood and working with some of these people, that experience has been much more rewarding than anything that fame or money has brought us.
TONY: Thank you so much for your time, Josh. It was great talking to you. I'm a big fan of your work, so thanks for doing this and everything you do. I appreciate you.
