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Tavis: John C. Reilly is an Oscar nominee and an awfully talented actor whose films include "Chicago," "The Hours," "Gangs of New York," and "Boogie Nights," to name a few. Later this year, you can catch him in Martin Scorsese's "Aviator" with Leonardo DiCaprio. I think that's the Howard Hughes flick. And now you can see him in the critically acclaimed new film "Criminal." Here now a scene from "Criminal."

Rodrigo: I knew that trick.

Richard: Oh, yeah?

Rodrigo: Yeah.

Richard: Did you ever try it?

Rodrigo: No.

Richard: Why not?

Rodrigo: Ah, it's--it's too loud.

Richard: What?

Rodrigo: You know, you have to make a whole scene.

Richard: That's the point. They're not interested in making a scene. That's the key, OK? The more offended you are, the less suspicious you look, you know. If things get sticky, you blame everybody else. Have you been paying attention?

Tavis: John C. Reilly. How are you, man?

John C. Reilly: Good, thank you, Tavis.

Tavis: Nice to have you on the program.

John: Good to be here.

Tavis: I've seen that John C. Reilly a thousand times. What's the "C" stand for?

John: Christopher.

Tavis: John Christopher Reilly.

John: Yeah. I used to be named after a saint, but I guess he got desaintified.

Tavis: Ha ha ha!

John: Now it's just Mr. Christopher, I guess.

Tavis: Can one be desaintified?

John: Well, Vatican II, yeah. They kicked a couple guys out, I guess.

Tavis: I guess so. I recall a couple--we just met for the first time when you walked on the set here a few minutes ago, but I recall back in 2002 you were everywhere. In fact, you were in 3 of the 5 Academy-nominated films. They were "The Hours," as I recall, "Chicago," and "Gangs of New York."

John: Right.

Tavis: So 3 of the 5 Academy-nominated films you were in. So I've been dying to ask you, how do you go about picking your roles? Because you've got a system that's working here.

John: Yeah. You know, I think you just said it yourself. It's the role that I pick.

Tavis: Yeah.

John: I used to, when I was younger think, like, "Will this be a good movie? Will this work?" And I realized after a couple disappointments, like, you can't really control anything as an actor other than the role that you are going to play. So I just try to choose things that are--that are challenging and are different, that are going to, you know, have me grow in some way. I always say, like, if I get nervous reading a script, that's a really good sign. That means that I'm not quite ready to do it, which means you have to grow a little bit in order to pull it off.

Tavis: Wow. So if your nerves start rattling, you think, "OK, I might consider this"?

John: Yeah, or some job or something, the occupation of the character is so different than what I'm familiar with that I'll have to really, you know, learn about another walk of life. That's always interesting. But you know, those movies that came out in 2002--actually I had another movie, "The Good Girl," that came out earlier that year, so I had 4 that year, but it was just a marketing fluke. You know, I made those movies over the--

Tavis: Don't tell nobody that. I thought you had it all planned. I thought you planned it all.

John: I know. I wish. I wish. I mean, I'm gonna 3--by the end of the year, I'm gonna have another 3 out this year, so it seems like, you know, I do it on purpose, but it's just things stack up, and people decide when they want to release, and, you know--

Tavis: So you don't make those decisions by the money?

John: No. It's just a sort of perfect storm of Reilly that year.

Tavis: Yeah. What--do you deliberately go about trying to choose roles that are--I asked this question once of Jeff Bridges, another fine actor, because Jeff just does--the range of character that he plays is so diverse and so different, and I get the same sense from you that you are looking for opportunities to do things that are unusual, that are atypical stuff you've not done before.

John: Yeah, you know, I think most actors--you know, some actors kind of figure out what's in their wheelhouse, as they say in baseball, like what they do best, and they look for that.

Tavis: Right.

John: And then, you know, there's a whole other way of thinking, which is that you're looking for things that are totally different than everything you've done, and you know, that is how I look at things. And it's worked out well as sort of a business plan, actually, too. It's just kept people guessing about what I'm really like myself, you know? So every director thinks, like, they're discovering me for the first time, and that I can only be that character that they're trying to, you know, have me be. So, yeah, I deliberately try to push against that tendency in this business that--where people, if they see you succeed in something, they'll want you to do it again, you know, and it's sort of the actor's job to say no at that time so you can--

Tavis: Do something different?

John: Yeah.

Tavis: Yeah. You said a moment ago that you--you conceded that you like playing a variety of characters. And I made that comparison to Jeff Bridges because he plays a variety of characters as well. What's different from you as compared to Jeff Bridges is that Bridges has played a number of lead characters, and you have certainly played some, but not in the way that you--I perhaps assume could have played--but I get the sense that you like being in the background. I mean, you always stand out because your acting is so good, but I don't see you, like, anxious to push out front. You are in "Criminal," but not in most of the other stuff.

John: Well, you know, if I had the choice, I would--I love to be an actor. I've been doing it since I was 8 years old. Anytime I get to do it, I'm always happy, you know, to do more than less. So it's not like I deliberately choose supporting parts over leading parts. I think if I was offered more leading parts, you would see me in more leading parts. But you know, it's--you're just looking for a good part, and I was--people have been talking about "Criminal" lately like what's it feel to be the lead of the movie? I honestly--I'm not doing anything differently. I'm just doing more of the same, and in a way, every part that I play I think of as the leading part. I think you have to.

Tavis: It is for you.

John: Yeah, it is for me, and sometimes I'll go see a movie that I play a supporting part in, and these other scenes come out with the other actors, and I'm like, "What is this? This is not what the movie is about. Get back to me."

Tavis: "Get back to my part"?

John: Yeah, because you're so intensely focused on making that person real, you know, that you really do take on the point of view of the character.

Tavis: Let me go back to something else you said earlier, when you said that some actors decide that--they figure out what it is they do well, and they want to do more of that. You, as we've already established here, play a variety of characters, but is there something you think now, after being in the business for a while, that you do better? A character that you play better than you do other stuff?

John: I don't know. You know--

Tavis: Have you figured that out yet?

John: I think that has something to do with, like, self-knowledge. And as weird as this might sound, I actually don't have very much self-knowledge. In a way, like when people want me to come in situations like this and discuss myself or my work and I always think, "Well, that's the least interesting part of me," like the most interesting part are the characters that I've played, and when I inhabit someone else, I think--I think I just--you know, it's a little fuzzy as to, like, exactly defining who I am and--and what do I do best. I like to think like there's nothing I can't do, that my life is just a constant journey of--of challenging myself to do new and different things and growing, you know. I think that's how you stay interested in your work, you know. You hear these stories about older actors who are so grumpy, like the director can barely talk to them, you know, without them throwing a temper tantrum, and I think that comes from, you know, playing the same stuff over and over and where it starts to become routine for you, and, you know, I'm just trying to stay ahead of that. You know.

Tavis: So let me ask you, since this is not your favorite thing to do because you don't have much self knowledge, you don't really like sitting, doing these things--

John: Listen, I'm happy to talk about--

Tavis: How tortured are you, how much do you hate doing this publicity stuff for a movie? You can be honest with me. Be honest.

John: You know--a situation like this--

Tavis: Not that you love me, but how much do you hate doing this?

John: A situation like that--we just met.

Tavis: I'm just teasing. I'm just teasing.

John: But like, you think on your feet. You know what I mean?

Tavis: Yeah.

John: We didn't, like, decide what we were going to say before I came on here. It's those situations where you can see, like, they're warming up to throw you the pitch and, like, "OK, here comes that question," that can be...

Tavis: Boring.

John: Whatever, you know. And junket-type situations where you're doing a lot of press and people tend to ask the same questions over and over, like, I'm just--you know, I'm easily bored, kind of restless person, so--but I understand that you have to go out and talk about your work in order to get people excited to see it, and this movie, "Criminal," all of us--you know, Diego Luna, who this is one of his first big American films; Greg Jacobs, it's his first time directing a film after being an assistant director for years and years. And like you said, it's one of my first leading roles, so--you know, as--you know, I don't want to sound negative like I don't like to do press--I'm really proud of this movie. I understand what it takes to get people excited about seeing your work, but in a way, I look back like when I was a kid, like, in the seventies, the real--the real actors or whatever would never go do press. It was like the work spoke for itself, and that was the way that they communicated with their audiences, and, you know, I can relate to that for the reasons I was saying, not because you know, I think I'm so much better than the press or something. It has to do with, like, I just find myself boring, I guess. I don't know. You know, it's really like the most interesting part--the most interesting thing I think an artist can give is their art, not necessarily conversations about their art, so...

Tavis: Well, I'm sorry you feel that way. It's all your fault, because if you weren't so good at what you do, I wouldn't want to talk to you, and other folk wouldn't want to talk you, so I don't feel sorry for you.

John: I don't want to sound ungrateful, you know what I mean?

Tavis: It's your fault. If you weren't so good, we wouldn't want to talk to you.

John: Coming from where I come from in Chicago, like no one in my family is in show business, the fact that I'm sitting here now is like...really, like, it's just absurd.

Tavis: Speaking about your family, you're from--I'm from a large family. You're from a decent-sized family. You're the fifth of 6 kids.

John: That's right. Yeah.

Tavis: What does being 5 of 6 mean? How did that mess you up or how did that help you?

John: It helped me a lot, actually.

Tavis: In what way?

John: Because, you know, my older brothers and older sisters got all that intense scrutiny, you know, coming out of the 1950s and early sixties when parents were still trying to--you know, force their kids into some type of behavior, and so all that kind of scrutiny was happening to my older brothers and sisters, and by the time they got to me, if I wasn't getting arrested, you know, or I, you know--I wasn't drunk or at school or something, then I was kind of like fine. "You're doing fine." So it was like that classic middle-kid thing where you kind of skate through, and the younger kids tend to get spoiled, and the older kids are disciplined too much, and the middle kid just kind of like--I was the sort of weird Zelig character as a kid, like I hung out with all these different groups of people. I never really fit in with anyone except the theater kids that I eventually came to know. But yeah, that was kind of my life was sort of like below the radar. It's funny, 'cause that's my reputation a little bit as an actor now.

Tavis: You are fastly moving above the radar, and I hate to break it to you, but when you get above the radar, until you get way above the radar, you got to do more of these, but you're good at these things.

John: No, no, no. I'm happy.

Tavis: You're good at these. I'm just teasing you. Nice to have you on, John. "Criminal" is the movie. Go check it out. Starring John C. Reilly--excuse me, John Christopher Reilly. That'll make his mama happy. Anyway, that's our show for tonight. As always, you can catch me on the radio on NPR. I'll see you back here next time on PBS. Until then, thanks for watching. Good night from Los Angeles, and keep the faith.