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James Lipton: In each generation, it falls to two or three actors to define their time; in succession: Brando, Nicholson, DeNiro, Pacino, Streep and Sean Penn…have left indelible imprints on their craft, and although the books are barely open on the emerging generation, there is one young actor who is virtually unrecognizable from one film to the next and unforgettable in every one them. From the transgender Rusty in Flawless, to which the Screen Actors Guild honored him with an outstanding lead actor nomination, To his riveting portraits in Magnolia and The Talented Mr. Ripley, for each of which he won the national board review best supporting actor in the same year, to a gallery of startling portrayals in Scent of a Woman, The Big Lebowski, Happiness for which he received an independent spirit award nomination, Patch Adams, Twister and Boogie Nights…his work in the theater has matched his filmwork stroke for brilliant stroke, reaching a pinnacle at this moment on broadway where our guest is alternating in the two principle roles of Sam Shephard’s True West, leading the New York Daily News critic who said that our guest is all set to become the most forceful actor of his generation…Philip…Seymour…Hoffman.  
(Huge applause and standing ovation as PSH enters the stage)  
JL: A number of our master’s degree candidates are close to you in age (PSH: Hmm…) and all of them are about to set out on terrain that you traveled. So our guests’ itineraries are interest too. (?) Where is Fairport?
Philip Seymour Hoffman: Where’s Fairport. It’s outside of Rochester.
JL: And what is Fairport like?
PSH: Well Fairport is kinda like Kansas but it’s in New York State. Umm…very conservative, I was probably part of the only liberal family in the neighborhood, and the only divorced family in the neighborhood.
JL: Talking about your mother, she had very political and feminist…
PSH: She was very liberal-minded, a strong Democrat, when my parents split up she went to law school and became a lawyer at the age of 37. I remember we built a porch in the back yard to have politicians come speak there and uh, she went to the marches, she demonstrated, and there’s pictures of her doing uh…
JL: So she’s a prominent feminist.
PSH: Yeah, she’s very, well you know what I mean, she’s a ball of fire, you know? And uh…But she is very very intelligent, very well-spoken woman and incredibly emotional about what she believes in.
JL: Where did you go to high school?
PSH: Uh, Fairport High School.
JL: What were your principle interests there?
PSH: Through all the way up to my freshman and sophmore year I was big into sports…
JL: Which sports?
PSH: Baseball was my big sport. I really, really loved baseball and it was the one sport that I was truly good at.
JL: What position?
PSH: I played second and short mostly. And uh…but I wrestled for four years, played football for two. Um, but with football I just didn’t like getting hit like that…
JL: What followed that? When did you find acting?
PSH: When I was a sophmore in high school and I was going to try out for the baseball team and then there was this girl I remember and she was older than me, and she was really pretty and she was walking to the tryouts for “The Crucible.” And uh, she was like (girly mumble voice)” [audience starts cracking up] I was like “Oh I wanna try out for baseball…(mumble)” and she was like “Oh…okay…(mumble)” And she walked away, and I remember going to the lockeroom and not going to the tryouts, and then going to the audition for the Crucible, purely really out of the fact that this girl was going to do that. And uh, I went and tried out and I got the part of the drunken jailer. [audience crackins up, then Phil cracks up] So…
JL: So it was a big bang, the whole start, huh?
PSH: Yeah.
JL: Who is Midge Marshall
PSH: Midge Marshall, hehe…was my high school drama teacher, she was an English teacher, and she ran a really, really wonderful program at my high school. Because most high schools do you know, musicals and things like “Sound of Music” or whatever they do, and my high school was doing you know, Shakespeare and you know, Miller…
JL: What was your senior class play?
PSH: Oh…[starts laughing] my God how did you find that out? This is all so embarrassing but uh…
JL: That’s what you’re here for!
[everyone cracks up again]
PSH: [laughing] I played Willie Loman in Death of a Salesman. Yeah, yeah. Willie Loman. Death of a Salesman. And I remember I uh…I mean we did it for like three nights and you know high school is so crazy and you work and work and work and you do your shows and then you…drink from a keg somewhere…[audience cracks up and applauds]
JL: Among our previous guests, we had alumni of Yale drama school, Julliard…but you’re our first Tisch School alum. [surprised look on Phil’s face] What led you to NYU?
PSH: I remember at all the other schools you had to sing, or do some number, or do something like that. I just want to do a monologue, this is what I can do, you know? So I just used this monologue and I went in and did it and got in and went. Studied at Circle in The Square, which at that time, which is where I am working at now, and at that time was affiliated with NYU.
JL: What is Bolstoy? [not quite sure I got this right]
PSH: [with an incredulous look on his face] Oh my God! That’s amazing…[cracks up] Bolstoy…
JL: Yeah.
PSH: Oh my God! I mean people said that that was gonna happened and that’s like, that’s frightening! It’s like someone’s going through your trash or something!
JL: I did not go through your trash. Christine Bruno went through your trash and brought it to me.
PSH: Bolstoy was this company we tried to start up in college that was just a huge fiasco, there was never a performance, we rehearsed one of Eugene O’Neill (sea?) plays for I think awhile but none of us could get up for rehearsal in the morning…we were so hungover! [audience cracks up]
JL: I also understand that there were some near fist fights over who, which of you was getting the true and authentic method.
PSH: Yeah! Did you talk to Steve Schub?
[JL shakes his head “no.”]
PSH: Hmm…you talked to the Schubert I think…um…um…no. Steve studied at Strassbourg and Stella Adler and I studied at Circle in The Square so I…Circle in the Square was known for its eclectic style, for which, now, I was really, really grateful for that. And uh… Steve…some of us would you know, the century worker or something like that, who was getting the real, the real deal…
JL: McCoy…
PSH: Yeah
JL: What did you do after graduation from NYU? I understand that you came under the influence of a rather remarkable man named Austin Pendleton.
PSH: Yes. Yes Austin (applause). Yeah. Yeah. Austin, Austin Pendleton I owe a tremendous, tremendous amount to Austin Pendleton. Well when I was a senior in college, I had this girlfriend whom I was very much in love with, and we both had decided not to do anything with our lives. And uh…it was uh…because we both just thought, let’s just be, let’s just wake up and be miserable together…and that’ll be good! You know? [everyone’s cracking up again] And so she came home one day and she said, “I got an audition at the Williamstown Theater Festival,” and I remember going, “We weren’t supposed to work or do anything!!” You know what I mean? “You’re not supposed to advance your life!!” And I said, “I want to audition…” and I met Austin Pendleton there, and he hired me, and I spent that summer in Williamstown. And then he hired me to play Edgar in “King Lear” at the Hole Theater in New Jersey after that summer. So he really gave me my first two important jobs.
JL: How did your professional film career start? There’s “Triple Bogey on a Five Par Hole,”
PSH: Yeah that was my first film,
JL: Yeah and there’s another film but the real breakthrough was in “Scent of a Woman…”
PSH: Yeah it was. I remember getting that job and that was one of those Christmas morning-type feeling, you know, I cant’ believe this, I was 24 years old, and I got to work with Marty Brest on that, who is one of the best, really and truly one of the best. And he led me through that like a teacher. He’s great.
JL: How and when did you acquire three names?
PSH: When I got into Equity, very soon after that, there was another Phil Hoffman, who I’ve met a few times, a very nice fellow, who has done a lot of musicals, directed in the theater, and stuff like that. You can’t have the same name in the union so if you ever think it’s because of pretentiousness, it might be…but it might not be.
JL: You actually were launched very quickly in “When a Man Loves a Woman,” we talked about that with Meg Ryan and with Andy Garcia. You were in Nobody’s Fool where you had the pleasure of being knocked cold by Paul Newman, huh?
PSH: Yeah yeah, no I had a few years there where I did a lot of these small character roles which was fantastic because it really helped me not get pigeonholed in that sort of thing.
JL: Whatever we thought of Paul Thomas Anderson, or you, I don’t think any of us were quite ready for the skewed, diamond-hard brilliance of Boogie Nights. [applause] Did he write the role of Scotty for you?
PSH: Yeah that’s what he says, yeah, and I don’t doubt it I don’t think I had any idea what I was, what I eventually did for the role.
JL: You talked about the first read-through of this role, you startled him…
PSH: Yeah yeah we did the first read-through and I was doing all this stuff, and Paul called me to his office and was like, “Well…” and he was really nervous, and he was like, “You’re very weird.” [laughter] I don’t think he saw the eccentricities of this character that I was seeing, and I’m like, “Just go with me, go with me.” And he went with it and we went with it full-throttle, and we were both very happy that we did. Because I, as an actor, we shy away from those things too. You’re just like the director, you know, you’re like afraid to do something that might draw attention to you or you’re afraid to do something, and you know what? It’s just, it’s just…The world is much weirder than anything you’ll ever, ever, ever read, or see on the screen [audience laughs and applauds]…Ever. Ever. It’s ridiculous, people are like, “Oh it’s too much!” I mean, how many times have you been on the subway and been like, “[pointing in different directions] That’s too much! That’s too much! That’s too much! That’s too much!” [audience laughs and applauds] You’re all overacting! You’re all overacting, you all have failed!
JL: Something else that Anderson does in this film which is absolutely fascinating. That is, that so often, you are framed in the background of shots of other people.
PSH: Uh huh, Yeah.
JL: He uses you like a Greek chorus. And your face and body language continually comment on the actions. Is that deliberate on his part?
PSH: Yeah. He’ll trust that I’ll do something that will fill out the reality of that scene hopefully and then not draw focus still be there and do something interesting. And that’s why I love working with him. You know, but I think in that film, it’s really about the ensemble. You know, and they’re always there.
JL: One of the most vivid and memorable scenes, of course, is the one in which you invite Mark Wahlberg out to see your new car.
PSH: Yeah yeah yeah yeah…
JL: Was it easy? Was it difficult? Was it just interesting?
PSH: Uh…no it wasn’t easy.
[Scotty and Mark’s kiss scene from Boogie Nights]
[commercial break]  
JL: In “Next Stop Wonderland,” you appear on the street, under the titles, and then you appear later in the film, on the videotape…
PSH: Hee hee hee…Yeah, yeah, yeah…
JL: Here’s a very political guy. Did any of that derive from your feelings as a child from living in a political household?
PSH: You know what it didn’t actually...it was weird, it didn’t. It derived from Steve Schub, that guy you were talking about earlier.
JL: I wasn’t talking about him! I never heard of that name before!
PSH: Oh yeah…right you must’ve gotten that from Steve. And uh…
JL: Dean’s oath!
PSH: Ha ha! No this guy Steve is a great friend of mine, and I went to college with him. And he would always try to get me to be passionate about my people and…what, my people?! You know, like, my people?! You know, I, you know!
JL: What people is he referring to?
PSH: Well, Irish I guess but that’s like, I’m like five generations types of people, I’m a mutt, I’m such a mutt you know? I mean like my people are like stripping in the woods somewhere…up in Western NY. They’re streaking somewhere that’s where my people are…I mean when I was in college that was my like my people!
JL: There is a disturbing, brilliant and corrosively funny movie that won the International Critic’s Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, and it’s called “Happiness.” What do you play in it?
PSH: I play Alan. Alan Melanome, but you don’t know this because you never hear his name. The guard who was actually played by Todd Solonze, the door man, says my name, and put that in the movie, but ha ha, Melanome, I think that’s fantastic…
JL: Melanome?
PSH: Yeah, that was his last name, I think that it was.
JL: Cancerous character.
PSH: Yeah. Absolutely. I play a guy who basically is afraid of the world, of being outside, of intimacy, but is in desperate need of it. You know, interested in a woman.
JL: You had to walk a very fine, perilous line in that part. Between a character that could, and perhaps at moments should, have repelled us. But someone who we thoroughly understand as the film goes on. What did you find in him that you were able to believe in him so thoroughly?
PSH: Well I think that I understood what it was like to be shunned. So if you understand what it’s like to be shunned, you understand how you wouldn’t want to try to get close. And so you have to start with what you’re fearing with Alan. So what is it you’re fearing? Rejection, that’s just very basic. And then keep going down, I mean acting to me is about asking questions. Now some people have different levels than we do so there’s more and more and more questions you have to ask yourself. I mean, with Alan, he’s not like other people, like he might be rejected by somebody and there are different levels in which it would bother you but with Alan it’s very minute. Very, very minute.
JL: I’m sure that when people talk to you about that role, they refer to the one act, the one activity in it…
PSH: Oh! The activity yeah,
JL: Which is twenty seconds…
PSH: Yeah I jerked off in “Happiness” or whatever, and they’ll think like “Yeah you’re the psycho,” and they’ll say weird things like that and ugh…and you know again, I don’t look at it like that, I can’t look at it like that. That’s his attempt to say hi…You know? And see what happens, is when he says hi and someone says hi back, he gets excited…because that is the only, ONLY connection he ever gets…is that!
JL: As I prepared for tonight, one of the most surprising revelations, was that if you think about it, Philip Seymour Hoffman may be the archetypal sex symbol of our time, because in role after role, filmmakers are fascinated with what’s going on in your nether-regions…[Phil looks scared, then smiles as he feigns putting his hand down the inside of his pants, and the audience totally cracks up] It happens over and over and over again. This is our Errol Flynn! In “Boogie Nights,” in “Happiness,” even in “Flawless,” it’s your sexual behavior that intrigues the filmmakers and it intrigues the audience. This is our Errol Flynn…[Phil giggles] Why do you suppose that is? Why are they so fascinated with what goes on below your belt?
PSH: I just think that it’s more about the fact that I would do it. You know? I would say okay I’m not going to judge this person, I’m going to do it because I think that I understand or feel for this person a certain way that I think I can portray it without bringing shame on him or the project. And that they had that kind of faith in me. That’s really what it’s about, I just you know, I wanted to do it.
JL: Do you like eccentricity in your characters?
PSH: I do, I do, but really it’s funny, it’s more of like you’re working on the part and you’re trying to be as expressive as you can be…
JL: Also to interest yourself…
PSH: And to interest myself, yeah exactly. That’s the art of it, it’s how you let things happen, how do you not edit yourself, how do you not judge the character of the story, it’s that thing you’re playing. Judgement…it’s a KILLER. It will kill ya, you know? If you’re looking at a scene and and going, “Well, he’s very upset here,” it’s like it’s a killer. Don’t ever do that. I mean even laughing, “Oh he’s elated…” it’s a mistake, don’t ever do that because then you just kill yourself from all the other choices that might have been what happens in life, which is usually not what you expect.
JL: Now hold in your minds, the changes you’ve seen from role to role to role, and think for a moment about Flawless (applause). How did this role come to you?
PSH: Joel Shumacker. I met Joel and the casting director said “Well you want me to phone Philip Hoffman?” and he was like, “Who’s Phil Hoffman?” and he said, “Well bring him in, if you want me to meet him, bring him in,” and then he realized, “Oh no that’s the guy I was looking for,” he didn’t realize that I was the same guy. So I came in and he was like “Oh yeah…” and I talked to him and we talked for like an hour and he gave me the part the next day. I didn’t read for it or anything. It was really the beginning of that for me where I was like, “Well, don’t I have to read with DeNiro or anything?” and he was like, “Nah, nah…” And literally, that’s how I got it. It was a really spooky experience because all of a sudden here I was in this lead role with Robert DeNiro, I’m playing this guy who thinks he’s a woman…I just worked my ass off and you know, and did the job, and it really was one of the more satisfying jobs I’ve done. Really. Definitely.
JL: How did you and Joel work on this character?
PSH: I thought that A) He wasn’t a drag queen. He’s a guy who believes he’s a woman. There’s a big difference. So you can’t even say that he’s really gay, because really he was attracted to the straight men, because he really wants to be a woman. It has nothing to do with the sex drive. It has nothing to do with “Oh I want to have sex with that…” it has to do with these fantasies of this life that he would like to lead; you wanna get married, you wanna wear a gown, you wanna have kids, you know, you wanna make lunches for them and send them off to school. I mean, but because of that that’s where he ends up where he is, he works in a drag club and does all these things… it's cool but that's why he ends up where he is, and he works in a drag club and all these things...
JL: What kind of research did you do for it?
PSH: I,well I was in Italy actually, at the time when I - I had to go to Italy to shoot The Talented Mr. Ripley, and Joel sent me all these videotapes. And so I watched a lot of stuff on transgender people, and on the drag world because he works in the drag world, and all his friends are drag queens. And I just I really just scoured these videos and found a couple guys that are tuned into the - thought were in the right area and just started working... physically and vocally... because I could work on the acting part seperate but I needed to know that once I got to the set that no matter what what came to me or what I was creating emotionally or intellectually or thought-wise or logically would come onto me naturally in the physical and vocal way I needed it to come out.
JL: Did Joel Schumaker schedule his movie around The Talented Mr. Ripley so that you could do both parts?
PSH: Yeah. Yeah he did. He was very nice that way... and Anthony Magella also...
JL: You were going back and forth?
PSH: I was goin' back and forth. Yeah.
JL: Did it ever confuse you?
PSH: No, no, it's [something] it was really nice to be able to lay down one and pick up the other.
JL: Is it true that all of you did that picture for scale?
PSH: Yeah. I didn't get much. [laughs]
JL: Everybody did it for scale.
PSH: Yeah, no, it was it was a pretty low budget. We shot it like eight weeks, something like that... yeah, pretty quick.
JL: It is one of the most layered performances I've seen in many years. You were creating a person who was creating a person.
PSH: Yeah, exactly. That's exactly right.
JL: You were surrounded in the film by legendary drag queens.
PSH: Yeah, yeah I see them now, I run into them once in a while [picture cuts to still from Flawless of Phil and drag queen friends] and they're just soooo...
JL: How did they treat on the... Did they help you?
PSH: Yeah, yeah. They were really helpful, and they... [picture cuts back to Phil] they saw me play the part right there and they were... they just embraced me completely.
JL: Was the drag body suit an easy thing to accommodate?
PSH: No, none of it really was, you know. The body suit attaches to, you know, from the crotch area there and I and I remember they - my fitting they left me alone to put that on. And, and it wasn't snapped, you know... So I put it on like over my head and tried to snap it. Well, you're supposed to snap it and pull, you know, pull it up. I could not get this thing around to snap. And I was sittin' there tryin to get this thing around to snap and literally I almost broke into tears. I was like 'they GOT the wrong guy, they GOT the wrong guy. I'm totally - never gunna be able to do this, right I don't even know how to put this [bleep] thing on', you know. It was AWEFUL. So eventually I snapped it on, and I was sittin' there and they walk in. I'm like, and then, that was the day. I remember goin' like 'I'm gunna quit today'. I mean it was really, really like 'I'm gunna quit' and that was... Literally in that half hour, I had to say 'Just put on the dress', and you know it sounds silly but that was.. and that's just what it is, just go like that and you go like that and you just keep walking forward. And that's what I did, and.. and really it's about that feeling of like 'Ok, they didn't laugh.' I put on the dress, they didn't laugh. See me, I just immediately thought: Ok, I'm gunna put this dress on, I'm gunna put this makeup on, play this part and they're gunna be like 'WHAT?' [mumbles] Everyone's just gunna be like 'What were you thinking? This is a joke. You're like a 220 pound... linebacker, what the hell are you doing here?' But the thing is is that when I met these drag queens, you know, there's this one guy that was built like Lawrence Taylor, this guy, built like Lawrence Taylor and he's this huge, huge famous drag queen in the community and... I loved him. And I was like - so boom, I started walkin' through the part. That was it.
[cuts to clip from Flawless of Rusty telling Walter about how he first started on his transgender journey]
JL: It struck me that Rusty was at his most feminine in the scenes, not with the drag queens, but with DeNiro.
PSH: Yeah, because, you know, he's with a man. And, to convince this man that he's a woman... It's not to convince him just so that he can be more of a woman.
JL: What was it like working with DeNiro?
PSH: It was fantastic. He was... amazingly nice to me and respectful of me and he's probably... and he's obviously he's one of our great actors. And... that goes without saying. But his listening skills as an actor were far beyond most people I've worked with. And that was really like, you could key into him like, like nobody.
[commercial break]
JL: 1999 was Philip Seymour Hoffman's year, with Flawless, followed almost immediately by Magnolia. You've said that Magnolia is one of the most important experiences of your life. Why?
PSH: See I just think it's... a brilliant film and, but to play a character in type of film that has the morals and the principles that this character did was something that overjoyed me. And I can't tell you why, it just did. It just... that I got a chance to look at somebody who had their ducks in a row in such a way that most humans won't even come close to. And, you know, the fact that on Saturday night he wasn't goin' out to a club or he wasn't goin' out on a date, that he was home with a man who was gunna die...
JL: What is the character's name in the film?
PSH: The character's name is Phil.
JL: Why?
PSH: Because Paul wrote it, he wrote it for me, and he didn't want me to, and he said: This is, this is Phil. I want this to be you. You know, and that was very important to him. Of course, it's not me, I mean I don't think I have my ducks in a row like this guy does.
JL: Phil is the film's catalyst. He brings the key players together, even against the wishes of some of them. He's the levening in this thing, is he not?
PSH: Yes, yes, it's very true. He, I mean, that's his job. That's what he's doing in the film, is he's trying to bring the son to the dying father
JL: Notice that Anderson uses the same device he used in Boogie Nights, which is keeping Phil, Phil the actor and Phil the character, in the frame in the two big, key scenes of Robards and Cruise. Look at those scenes, and you'll see in the background is this Greek chorus every single moment. I'm sure again, that was by design.
PSH: Well, yeah, I mean that - Phil is, Phil, it's like we call him the crying nurse. Cuz we realized we shot and it wasn't planned that really everything that happened with Phil and this, this character played by Jason Robards, brilliantly, and he's a great guy, and [picture cuts to two black and white stills from Magnolia] that was effective and that, Phil got too emotioally involved, here on this one.
JL: You heard Phil pay a tribute to DeNiro as a listener [picture cuts back to Phil], if DeNiro is the best, then Phil is very close to the second best. How important is listening to you?
PSH: Oh very. Listening is, it's the key. You can do all the work you want to do but if you're not listening, you're not on the same play, you're not on the same stage, you're not in the same reality as the other person is. And the play doesn't happen if the scene never happens.
JL: Did Anderson ever explain to the cast, the frogs?
PSH: No... it's, it's pretty clear to me, I mean I think it's just...
JL: Say what's clear.
PSH: Well, it... Frogs falling from the sky is like someone dying of cancer. It's the same thing, you can't really wrap your head around it, can you? It doesn't really make any sense, the world, it never does, especially when you're going through it.
JL: Both are plagues.
PSH: Yeah, it's a, both are plagues and it's also, you know, that seems so obvious to me, cuz it's like 'Enough! Enough! Enough! Everybody. Enough! Drop it. Let go. Let go. All this pain. All this suffering.' There's a hospital right down the street here and if you walk by there every day, there's like these people sitting out in their wheelchairs, and they're sitting there, and this is the day they have. This is the sun they're gunna see and that's it. Then they're goin' back inside for whatever test they're having for whatever illness they have. And they don't have the money I have, they don't have the opportunities I have, they don't meet the people I meet, they don't have the life I live, they don't eat at the restaurants I get a chance to eat at, they don't have the friends I have. That's not me, I'm like one percent of this world, you know what I mean, it's just silly when we start thinking that everything's okay just because we are. You know, and just, I mean everytime I talk about this movie I get like this. I get to be the guy in it that says 'I will help you'... I mean, you can't get a better part than that. You just can't.
JL: Or do it better than that. [Phil mumbles 'Thank you'] From the self-effacing, self-sacraficing Phil of Magnolia, you turned 180 degrees again to the snobbish, socialite Freddie Miles in The Talented Mr. Ripley. [picture cuts to stills of Phil in The Talented Mr. Ripley] This man is an acting whirling dervish. [picture cuts back to Phil] Was that role a stretch for you? It's a very upper-class guy...
PSH: No, no, like I said I come... I was gunna say where I come from, no, I wasn't upper-class, I - but there's something about... I played some upper-class parts... like, I played three or four upper-class roles. This guy's like, you know, George Plimpton. Like, you know what I mean, very very very intellectual, educated, very wealthy...
JL: Sounds like George.
PSH: Yeah. And I looked, actually, remember, thinking about how he talked when I was doing the part and, but he's, it's just such a joy, it's so freeing. Somebody like that.
JL: You have a spectacular death scene in that, after you've taunted Tom mercilessly.
PSH: Yeah, it is, it's great. It was great.
[cuts to the clip from The Talented Mr. Ripley of Phil taunting Matty 'mercilessly']
JL: For his performances in Magnolia and The Talented Mr. Ripley, Philip received two richly deserved National Board of Review awards. Last week my wife and I went to the theater. Twice. To see the same play. No. We saw two different plays on the same stage, in the same set. It's a staggering. Experience. And of course it's Philip Seymour Hoffman and John C. Reilly alternating principle roles. In Sam Shepard's True West. [picture cuts to a playbill of True West, then back to Phil] Tell us please, how did this. Marvel. Come to pass.
PSH: I was shooting a film this fall, with David Mamet, and I got a call from John Reilly, and he said: I met this guy, Matthew Warches, doing True West out in L.A., cuz John was in L.A., and he wants me to do it and I told him that I think you should do the other part. And I was like 'Really?' and I was like 'Oh that's nice, thanks John but I don't know if I can do it.' Then he said we'd be able to switch parts. And I was like 'Oh... I dunno, that's kind of strange.' I really thought at first, I was like 'Well that's kind of a gimmick, and I don't know if I'm interested in that.' But he's like 'We should really, Matthew's really great, you should really read it again, read the play.' So I read it again and I was like 'Wow'. I forgot how much... How good it was.
JL: How did you rehearse the play?
PSH: Well, we both played two parts and by this time I was convinced that two parts was actually the way to do this play, because of the nature of the play, that it is the two sides of one person. Meeting Sam, Sam actually was saying that to us, verified that even deeper. And so we would, every three days we'd switch. And there you are, all of a sudden watching the other person do the part that you've been having ego about. All of a sudden the other person's doing it, and they're figuring it out quicker than you are. You know what I mean, or they're making breakthrough in something that you didn't make a breakthrough yet. And that's really [picture cuts to stills from True West] the experience that me and John went through. Cuz I wouldn't have found the way I play Lee now, if I didn't rehearse it the way I did. I would have found it differently, obviously. So a lot of things were found through osmosis, through just the learning from each other, and how we behave and how we express is the difference, but the play we explored together. So we're really one actor up there in a way and that's, what I think was Matthew's diabolical plan from the beginning, is that because of that, naturally, you're involved on a much deeper level than if you were just playing one of those parts.
JL: Each of those parts exists on the stage through the whole play. You had to learn an entire play.
PSH: Twice. Yeah, yeah. The learning the lines part which I always thought was... people always say 'How do you learn all those lines?' and you always think 'Oh, that's so silly, that's the thing they think is the hardest part, and then is a job where it was one of the hardest parts - learning every word in that script was, was a task.
JL: Both parts are immense.
PSH: Yeah, I mean, you don't leave the stage...
JL: I saw the play twice in two days. With the roles reversed. And I noticed that. The blocking is pretty much the same.
PSH: It was very similar.
JL: What was more interesting. If you are priveleged to see it twice. Is the differences. Each of you butters the toast. In his own way. One of the most arresting aspects of the production. Is it's use of silence. I happen to be a lover of silence. Especially on the stage. The two of you do it. Extraordinarilly well. It's planned I'm sure.
PSH: Yeah, no, it's very important the time for their not saying anything. It's extraordinarilly important to Sam Shepard. Sam Shepard, when he writes this, he puts actually puts those pauses there. And they're pretty right, ninety-five percent of the time, it's like right on the money, you know, and you see why. Once you get to the truth of it.
JL: I'd just like you to say one or two sentences about. The other half of your persona in this play. An amazing actor. John C. Reilly.
PSH: Oh, John, yeah. Most actors you act with in theater, even some very very good ones, you know, eventually you just reach this point where you kind of know what they're gunna do, and you're kind of the one trying to find how to do it differently. But with John, it's like you're both finding out how to do it differently together. It's just very very odd and very real and very new, like, if you're not doing it, there's John who's gunna do it. It's like 'Oh my god, what'd he just do there?' or 'What am I gunna do?'. He's just extraordinary and I love it, love doing it with him.
JL: I'd like to close with a question about the LAByrinth Theater Company. This is your company is it not?
PSH: I'm a co-director with John Ortiz and David Deblinger and David Zaus. [something] for about five or six years, and I've acted in shows with them, I directed a show with them last summer, I'm gunna direct another show with them this summer.
JL: What was that show called?
PSH: Called 'In Arabia, We'd All Be Kings'. Written by Stephen Adley Grierges who's a tremendously talented playwright who I look forward to doing this next show with that we're doing a workshops of right now, but... It's really, it's what I look forward to, tell you the truth, out of everything I do. And I'm very busy doing a lot of things, but when I go to the theater and I see these people... it's like, I swear like this breath comes out of me and relaxtion comes and I get very relaxed. I'm like 'Okay, here I am, the place I wanna be, what're we gunna do?' You know, and I'm so happy.
JL: What do you want from a director? As an actor?
PSH: Oh god. For them to be right. No, what I want from a director is, is trust, A. And then I want them to know how to talk to me specifically. To know what they're getting at when they're talking to me cuz a lot of directors will talk to you and they're like 'Well I don't know... It was a little... I don't know... you know, it's just kinda, kinda... it kinda went uuuuu... you know and... you know, you were kinda goin' along and it was pretty good there and then and then it kinda like dropped...or something, it's like too loud... it's too loud or something' You know, and that's a nightmare. That's just like: What? What do you want? Like what are you talking about?
[commercial break]
JL: [cut off by commercial] Beginning with. The questionairre that was invented by [someone]. Phil, what's your favorite word?
PSH: It's okay, it's okay.
JL: What's your least favorite word?
PSH: Relax. But it's not in the way it's said, it's just when somebody goes 'Relax'
JL: In this whole wide world, of everything that's in it, what turns you on?
PSH: Oh boy. Oh god... what turns me on, I mean... well... you know... stuff... what turns me on...
JL: Don't censor yourself.
PSH: Well no, I mean there's like, you know, of course there's this thing, you know, beautiful women. You know, I mean, you'd think, you know, those are the obvious things... you know, like, that's good. And...
JL: Or Errol Flynn.
PSH: Oh yeah, or Errol Flynn, yeah, yeah... But... What turns me on, I was thinking about that the other day, and you know, you know what turns me on in the way that I think that that question's about, is when you, and I mean this, is when all of a sudden you're just going through your day and like da-duh-duh-duh-da, you're here, there, you're everywhere, and all of sudden you run into somebody who's just like nice because they wanna be, and that's just like such a buzz, man. And it never happens.
JL: And if it turns out that she's a beautiful woman, then you've got it all.
PSH: If she's a beautiful woman... [big smile]
JL: What turns you off?
PSH: When people think they have the right to somehow let their baggage be your news.
JL: What sound or noise to you love?
PSH: Sometimes I'll be alone and I'll sit there and I'll suddenly realize I can make sound, I don't have to be silent. And it's not cool to talk to yourself, so I'll... hum. And that's what I think sounds kind of corny cuz it's very much... like a baby, I think. And then, all of sudden you're like hmmm hmmm hmmm... so, the... the humming to myself. A very pleasing sound.
JL: What sound or noise do you hate?
PSH: Car alarms are the worst. I have one right outside my apartment, right now, that is just screaming...
JL: What's your favorite curse word?
PSH: [bleep] you, you mother[bleep]er, you stupid [bleep]ing [bleep]sucker, shut the [bleep] up, right, something like that. [comments on the applauding audience] They all... Lookit all together there, and they just keep it, keep it goin' until they're like 'I'm gunna ask you to leave!' So, oh, YOU'RE gunna ask me to leave! So, the curse word is really about a whole fight, it's gotta be a conversation.
JL: What profession, other than yours, would you like? To attempt.
PSH: Teaching.
JL: What profession would you not like? To participate in.
PSH: Oh god, a critic.
JL: Finally, if heaven exists, what would you like to hear god say when you arrive at the pearly gates?
PSH: All right, let's do it again.
JL: You said a moment ago that you would like to teach. I would like to thank you for coming here and teaching us. Tonight.
[audience and JL give PSH a standing ovation!! yuh! now we move on to some q&a with the audience]
Audience Member #1: Hi, I'm [something] Rodreguz and I'm on the acting track here. Is there any process you follow in order to find out and explore choices in your characters?
PSH: Yeah, yeah, you look at a script and you find out well, what's going on, or the given circumstances, you know and you got all the given circumstances and you're very attuned and then what haven't they given me, that I need to know. And how long have I been here, all these are very basic questions that you learn and you know, ask all of them and really really look for all of them. I mean, given circumstances is one form of what the character needs or wants. And then you can start looking at the needs and the wants of the characters, and then you start asking questions about why would they need or want that thing. And then how would they go about getting it. Now, everyone has their own way of going about getting certain things. And that's where character comes into play. And you can learn that by being informed by the given circumstances of the character in the story, and you can look at life and you can look at things you've read, and art and stuff like that, and it can start informing you about how to go about, and that's behavior, and that's the character.
Audience Member #2: Hi.
PSH: Oh hey.
Audience Member #2: My name is Lucy Anne and it's very obvious that the character work that you do do is different in each of your characters and that you - so it's obvious to me that you don't make judgements on your characters.
PSH: I try not to, but I'm like everyone else, you know -
Audience Member #2: How do you make specific choices without... judging - ?
PSH: You have to allow the choices to come to you, you have to be free and you have to trust yourself that you don't have to make, don't have to answer all those questions immediately. You don't make the judgement that you keep asking the questions, they get specific and then they get personal. And the other thing is not be literal. Not to go like 'Well, it doesn't link up JUST RIGHT. I mean, I never really MADE toast, so I don't know if I can really do it... so, therefore, what will I do?' You know, you can't be literal, you gotta allow your imagination to explore all these avenues. That's why you have to allow yourself to create anew every night, every day. You have to allow yourself, you can't try to copy, you can't try to duh-duh. You gotta go: Okay, I'm gunna ask those questions again, only get at that again, what is that specifically, what is that, you know.
Audience Member #3: I hear you sayin' yer gettin' yer objective, and yer also sayin' you gotta have that freedom. Now, I get the sense, work and everything, but how do you find yer character's objective so strongly and allow that freedom, you know, to be able to, you know, come in and inspire you?
PSH: Oh boy...
Audience Member : Do you break it down'n'beats? Or [insert gutteral noise]?
PSH: Oh yeah, sometimes I'll like, every beat, and every beat's gunna be a different action. You have that as a tool, you have breaking down the whole beat of a scene, and like: I'm gunna put a title to that beat - this is the 'birds must die' beat, you know, I'm gunna write that on the side of the page. So with all that [something], what is it that I'm really going after there, and that clarifies it and I have something I'm going after. Why am I going after it and how am I gunna go after it. Now, those are the choices that you have to make, and that's all the technique that you use, what sentry work [???] is, in my opinion, is really something that brings you closer to yourself, it's not something that takes you farther away from yourself. It's like 'Okay, now I can get really character-y' - It's, what it does, is you're getting a sense of something that's actually going to bring you closer to who you are and how you react to the world. So that's what I think all that technique stuff is about, is getting closer and closer to who you are so you can start making smart decisions instead of just playing yourself over and over and over again. So you'll be able to form.
 
 
first 25 minutes transcribed by lee in march 2002 THANK YOU! the rest was transcribed by daryn draven on august 28, 2001.