E-mail a friendMark Ruffalo
airdate July 31, 2006
Mark Ruffalo bartended for almost nine years while trying to break in to show business. He gained attention in the stage production, This is Our Youth, and the award-winning indie film, You Can Count on Me. Surgery for a brain tumor threatened to derail Ruffalo's dreams. He made a full recovery and says the experience convinced him he had to live his life. He's had three film releases this year, including Collateral and We Don't Live Here Anymore.
Mark Ruffalo
Tavis: I'm pleased to welcome Mark Ruffalo back to this program. The talented actor has appeared in any number of acclaimed films, including, of course, 'You Can Count on Me,' and 'Collateral.' For those in southern California, you can see him at a benefit reading at the Stella Adler Theater, August twenty-first through the twenty-third. In September, no matter where you live, you can catch him in the updated version of the classic movie 'All the King's Men.'
The film has an all-star cast, including Sean Penn, Jude Law, Anthony Hopkins, Kate Winslet, and more. Here now, the trailer for 'All the King's Men.'
Tavis: Sean Penn is even powerful in that trailer. So the word is...
Mark Ruffalo: Yes.
Tavis: We'll talk about your role in just a second.
Ruffalo: Sure.
Tavis: The word is that you could just go ahead and hand him the Oscar.
Ruffalo: (Laughs) I agree. I concur.
Tavis: Yeah. (Laughs)
Ruffalo: That was the word then, and it seems to be the word now. He's pretty remarkable. It's a transformation.
Tavis: You had scenes with him throughout the film.
Ruffalo: I have one scene with him. And I actually had a couple little things with him, but was with him quite a bit. It's a real transformation. And really powerful.
Tavis: So you had the same sense, then, that he's on another plane on this movie.
Ruffalo: Yeah. He's in his wheelhouse. He's really, (laughs) he's in his sweet spot with this. And it's socially conscious, and I think it's something that he knows a lot about, and it means a great deal to him. The whole political scene.
Tavis: Well, enough of Sean Penn, he ain't here. Tell me about...(laughs)
Ruffalo: He's here in my heart. (Laughs)
Tavis: Tell me about the role that Mark Ruffalo plays in the movie. That's what I wanna talk about.
Ruffalo: Ah, that's nothing, (unintelligible). (Laughs)
Tavis: No, let's talk about that, that's why you're here.
Ruffalo: I'd rather talk about Sean. (Laughs) I play Adam Stanton. He's a very idealistic doctor, working for the poor, whose father was a great Senator before Sean Penn's character, Willie Stark. And you come to find out that he sort of - Sean Penn's character is using this guy in order to further his, Willie Stark's, political career. And he's also sleeping with his sister.
Tavis: Wow.
Ruffalo: And because of this man's pride, the character I play, he takes great umbrage with that, and he basically goes for revenge in the film. I don't wanna spoil it.
Tavis: No, I'll let you stop there.
Ruffalo: Okay.
Tavis: (Laughs) I haven't seen it yet, myself, so I don't want you to spoil it for me.
Ruffalo: Yeah, no, I won't spoil it.
Tavis: Yeah. How are you going about picking what you wanna do these days? I think I mentioned this to you when you came on before, one of the things I love about the way you've designed your career, I think designed your career, you do a really good job of picking roles that are so varied. How are you going about doing that these days?
Ruffalo: Well, there came a point in my career where I actually got to pick roles, and (laughs) they weren't the only thing that was coming to me. And at that point, you have a choice of sort of going the road more traveled. The more beaten-down path. But I had this kind of premonition; I wanna look back at my career at 80 years old, and say that was mine.
I went where my heart took me, and I did what scared me or interested me, or made me feel like it was gonna be a challenge. And that hasn't done me wrong yet. I come from the theater. And in the theater, you're everything. You're a romantic comedian, you're a tragedian, you do comedy, you do tragedy. You do it all. And no one ever says, oh, you can only do this.
And in Hollywood, they do that to you. And so, I feel like I've always been trying to, I'm like two steps ahead of, like, getting a stamp on me. So that I have a career in the end that I feel is diverse.
Tavis: You said something here that isn't rocket science, but it's the first time I've ever heard it put that way. And it impacts me now, and you're right about it. Nobody on Broadway says you can't play varied roles, but Hollywood says that here's the role we want you to play. Why does that distinction exist, do you think?
Ruffalo: Well, I think the tradition of the theater is one that you can't really come into the theater without some training. You have to work your way up into that world, and you have to have experience, and you have to have some chops. It takes a voice; it takes some command of yourself physically and vocally. And some understanding of text. And so you spend a long time studying, and you become an actor.
So you play characters. In film, we readily will go out and find the guy. You want a guy who's a janitor, well, find a janitor, give him some lines, and he'll be the janitor. So it's much easier to step into the film world as a non-actor and be very successful than it is in the theater world. So there's an unspoken assumption that if you do something very well in film, that that's who you are. And so, that's how people get typecast or stereotyped.
Tavis: You mentioned a moment ago that you wanna look back on your career when you're 80 and see some things that you did, in fact, that scared you. I think I know what you meant by that, but explain what.
Ruffalo: On this journey, there's a safe spot, and you could live in that. And the safe spot gets bigger and bigger the more you go, (laughs) or it gets smaller and smaller. But there is a safe spot. And it's hard to break out of it, and the ego wants to keep you in it. And so, I could tell when my buttons are being pushed by things. Ooh, I've never done that before, man.
That freaks me out, I don't know. That's usually a good sign for me that there might be something there that I wanna explore a little bit. And I just kind of go where my heart tells me to go, too. Things that I've never done before that have become more and more of a turn-on as a challenge, than they have repelled me now. And then I hear people say, well, Mark Ruffalo can't do that. He can't be a romantic, (laughs) he can't do a romantic comedy. And then I'm like, oh really? Well, let's see. I'm willing to give it a shot, if you are.
Tavis: So that gets your goat, when people say you can't do things.
Ruffalo: Kind of. I just think we're much bigger than people would lead us to believe.
Tavis: Speaking of your heart, Stella Adler has a special place in your heart.
Ruffalo: Huge.
Tavis: I should give you a chance to explain and talk more about her. Because for those watching around the country, many don't know who Stella Adler is. She's a legend, of course, in this town.
Ruffalo: Yes.
Tavis: You had a chance to work with her. But let me just let the story go from there.
Ruffalo: Okay. I guess it started when I was eight years old. I saw an actor who I had no idea who it was. His name was Marlon Brando, probably some people have heard of him. (Laughs) And as the years went by, I was so profoundly moved by what I was seeing him do, but I didn't know who he was or what he was doing. I was very young. And years later, I was told about the Stella Adler Conservatory.
I wanted to become an actor. I went and then I find out that Marlon Brando had studied there, and had studied with her. And then I started finding out about her legacy. From the very beginnings of the American theater, the Yiddish theater in America, the great legacy of the American theater, she was born. And became sort of the shining light of the whole American acting style.
Which has now dominated the world, with Marlon Brando on the forefront of that. And the likes of Paul Newman and Bobby DeNiro. And they all studied with her, or some offspring of hers. And so, she was a woman who believed that acting, as an actor, you had a deep responsibility as an artist to the culture, to society, to humanity. And today, I feel like actors have been much maligned.
Much of it is our own undoing. But there sort of feels like a push to make actors kind of cheap, or what we do cheap, or meaningless, or not artistic at all. And that's totally the opposite of my experience of it. And I find that actors, the ones who are really serious actors, are incredibly disciplined, incredibly thoughtful, generous, socially conscious people.
And so, Stella Adler, to me, her ideas, her beliefs, her technology, is important for me as far as the American acting scene, to sort of get behind and remind people of the greatness that she brought to this country's acting.
Tavis: Tell me about this reading that you're doing.
Ruffalo: I've put together, for people who know the theater, it's the original cast of 'This is Our Youth,' which is a Kenny Lonergan play that broke me out 10 years ago. And it's the original cast with the original director, and we're doing three nights' reading at the Stella Adler Theater to bring Stella, Stella's getting a star on Hollywood Boulevard, so it's all concurrently happening.
And to give the school a little boost, paint their lobby, update their computers, and also help usher in the joining of the east coast and the west coast schools, which have been apart for the past 15 years.
Tavis: This Mark Ruffalo is not just a great actor, but a nice guy, too.
Ruffalo: Thank you. (Laughs)
Tavis: And remembers those who helped him get started back in the day. People like Stella Adler.
Ruffalo: That's right.
Tavis: It's an honor to have you back here again.
Ruffalo: Thank you.
Tavis: I'm looking forward to this flick, man. (unintelligible)
Ruffalo: It's gonna be awesome. And I have 'Zodiac' and 'Margaret' coming out, too. 'Zodiac,' David Finch's new film about the Zodiac killer. And 'Margaret,' Kenny Lonergan's new film.
Tavis: You gotta stop being so lazy. (Laughs)
Ruffalo: I'm (unintelligible). I'm blaming my (unintelligible).
Tavis: You gotta start working, man. You gotta get out the house.
Ruffalo: I'm beat, man.
Tavis: Mark, good to see you.
Ruffalo: Thank you, Tavis.
Tavis: (Laughs) That's our show for tonight. Catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local listings. See you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from Los Angeles, thanks for watching, and as always, keep the faith.
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