Casting Call Issue 1: Andrew Largeman
Posted by Jason Chamberlain on 04.04.2007
From Darth Vader to The Bride, some characters are unforgettable. In the first issue of Casting Call Jason Chamberlain discusses Andrew Largeman from the 2004 film 'Garden State'.
I don't watch procedurals. Take the Law and Order franchise. Shows like that can't hold my interest, the reason primarily being because they're all about the profession, the situations, and the people never change. To me, what is interesting about a show or a movie is to see the emotional journeys the characters take. Look at Buffy the Vampire Slayer. All the characters on the show changed drastically from the first season of the show to the last, to the point where in many ways they weren't the same people any longer. That's why I got invested in them, and still religiously watch my DVD's today.
Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of other great elements that go into making a movie or TV show enjoyable. A great plot, interesting setting, charismatic villains, great action and special effects are key as well, but if one element stands out for me, it's the characters.
It's all about the characters.
And so is this column.
No matter how many movies or shows you watch and how many hundreds and thousands of characters populate them, some just stay with you. It might be because of their charisma, or their cool factor. Some of them may be rendered unforgettable by their courage and good deeds, others by their uncompromising evil.
Everyone has a favorite. Darth Vader. Tony Montana. The Bride. Indiana Jones. Marty McFly. Han Solo. Buffy Summers.
For my first column I'm going to talk about a character that's not quite as iconic as those ones, but who still resonates for me. Introducing Andrew Largeman, from 2004's Garden State.
Spoilers follow if you haven't seen the movie!
"This is my life, Dad. This is it. I've waited 26 years for something else to start so no, I don't think it's too much to take on because it's everything there is! I see now it's all there is."
Large is a guy who has experienced great trauma in his life. When he was nine he was inadvertently responsible for his mother's paralysis when he pushed her in the kitchen. Thanks to a broken dishwasher door she fell and broke her neck on the kitchen counter. Immediately he was sent to therapy, put on doses of lithium that he would use for over a decade, and eventually he was sent away to boarding school. As the movie opens, he is living in Los Angeles struggling to find work as an actor, and he hasn't been home or seen his family since they sent him away ten years earlier.
Thanks to his past and the drugs that are constantly in his system, Large has lost all his passion in life. He feels numb to everything around him. He sleeps in a stark white room with no furnishings but his bed and telephone, and dreams of a crashing airplane in which he barely registers the crisis as all the passengers around him scream and panic. Even in his dreams, Large feels nothing.
This becomes even more evident when he wakes to what should be the earth shattering news that his mother has died. But as he listens to his tearful father on the answering machine, he barely blinks and no tears fall. In fact, he hasn't cried since childhood.
When he comes home for his mother's funeral, he mingles awkwardly with family members at the wake and when he sees his father for the first time in years, the two struggle through a distant and cold conversation. But while seeing his family doesn't immediately bring him out of his doldrums, a couple of chance encounters put him on the path to rediscovering himself.
After the funeral he runs into an old friend, Mark (Peter Sarsgaard) who is working as a grave digger at the cemetery. Large agrees to hang out with Mark that night and goes to a party where he finds out his friends haven't done much with their lives either. Mark has no drive or direction and is content to call in loans and make exchanges at a hardware store for his money, another has become a cop seemingly for the social status and yet another has made a fortune off silent Velcro, but is dying of boredom with his newfound riches.
The next day at the doctors office he encounters Sam, a woman who is almost his complete opposite. Where he is passionless, she is full of life, and where he can only manage short conversations with his father, she has loving relationships with her mother and adopted brother. And while Large can't cry over his mother's death, Sam is reduced to tears when burying a hamster. But Sam isn't as together as she first appears. She's a chronic liar that has to wear a helmet to her job at a law office thanks to her epilepsy.
The other key element of Large's journey lies in the fact that he left his medication in L.A. As the lithium leaves his body he begins to feel the emotions and sensations he has been cut off from for so long. As the movie progresses he is drawn to Sam and finds the courage to make good on his romantic intentions for her, as well as to forgive himself for the mistakes he's made and confront his father for his. He decides not to take the drugs any longer and to deal with his problems head-on.
As the film draws to a close, fittingly, he finds himself back on an airplane, a real one this time, ready to head back to Los Angeles. But now, as the plane sits safely on the tarmac, he is moved to action, realizing he can't leave his friends and Sam behind. He confesses his love for her and the film ends with their embrace, two people who are still troubled but who are ready to move forward together.
The journey that Large takes in the film is that of a man who goes from simply existing to really living. And what's interesting is that it isn't a long, drawn out process. We don't follow him for a few agonizing months as he struggles to reinvent himself. All it takes is a couple chance encounters and a return home. In four days he transforms from a guy who can't forgive himself for his mistakes and literally feels nothing, good or bad, to someone who takes responsibility for his life, faces his demons and falls in love. He shrugs off his father's authority and makes his own choice for the future, to move forward without the help/hindrance of the drugs and to open himself to all the happiness and pain the world has to offer.
I related to Large for a lot of reasons. Thankfully my life hasn't been as traumatic or drug induced as his but I could definitely relate to his sense of not being sure how to deal with his problems and feeling distant from life. And for anyone who is struggling in their lives, this movie and Large as a character provide hope that each day really is a new day and that we don't know what is coming around the corner. In the span of a few short days, life can change dramatically.
Well that was my first column. Thanks for reading! If you've seen Garden State I hope I've inspired you to look at it in a different way. If you haven't, I recommend you check it out. It's one of those rare movies that helps you put life in perspective. I've got a big list of characters that have interested me throughout the years so I don't think I'll run out of ideas any time soon, but if there's a character that has really resonated with you, drop me a line at chamby.x@gmail.com and I'll add them to the list.
