TONIGHT
E-mail a friendThomas Haden Church
original airdate April 8, 2008
Thomas Haden Church has worked on both sides of the camera. His acting credits include TV's Wings and the miniseries, Broken Trail—for which he won an Emmy—and the features Spanglish and Sideways—a part he was offered after planning to quit acting and for which he won an Oscar nod. Rolling Kansas marked his directorial debut. The Texas native began his show biz career as a radio deejay and doing voiceovers. After college graduation, he moved West to hone his skills. Church is next up in the film, Smart People.
Tavis shares the story of how he received his SAG card with the actor. (1:42)
Thomas Haden Church
Tavis: I'm pleased to welcome Thomas Haden Church back to this program. The Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning actor is starring in a new project called "Smart People." The film opens around the country this week and it also stars Dennis Quaid, Sarah Jessica Parker and Ellen Page from "Juno" fame. Here now, a scene from "Smart People."
[Clip]
Tavis: That's why I love the brothers.
Thomas Haden Church: Can I tell you something?
Tavis: I love you, too, man.
Church: Can I tell you something? I picked those guys.
Tavis: Oh yeah?
Church: Those guys both play football for Pitt, for the University of Pittsburgh. One of them was a kick returner who he was third - his per-kick average - per-return average was the third-highest in the nation. He was a finalist for I don't even know - I don't know what the kick return trophy in the NCAA is. And the other guy was a lineman.
But they were watching and I was like, "We've got to get some brothers into this movie, man. This is, like, the Whitest movie. We're so White we're blue." And I was like, "What about those guys right there?" And they were really great, like, young, very focused college kids.
Tavis: And they get their SAG card because of you.
Church: You know what? Maybe. But I'll tell you, man, both of them, this one guy was a rock. This guy was just like - but couldn't have been, like, sweeter. Like, really just good-natured young guys.
Tavis: That's a funny story. Not that this matters, and we'll change gears right quick, but that story about you putting those guys in the movie, that's how, long before I started doing television, that's how I got my SAG card. When I first got to L.A., I came here to work on a particular job for the late, great mayor of this city, Tom Bradley.
When I got here, the city had a hiring freeze on, and so for a few months I had, like, nothing to do because I couldn't go to work because the hiring freeze was on. So I met some people who were doing some extra work and I, for like three months, was an extra. I'm on a film set one day, a movie called "Someone to Watch Over Me" with Mimi Rogers -
Church: That's a very good movie.
Tavis: - Tom Berenger. I'm on a film set -
Church: Ridley Scott.
Tavis: Ridley Scott. I'm on the set being an extra and they pulled me in, gave me two lines.
Church: Nice.
Tavis: And I ended up getting my SAG card.
Church: What were the lines?
Tavis: It was really simple. Actually, it was just one line - I lied, it was one line. (Laugh) I wanted to make myself sound bigger. The line - I was playing a stock boy in the basement, and the killer in the movie is breaking into the building. And I'm a stock boy and I turn around say, "Who's there?" Two words, not two lines, two words.
Church: You see what he did, though?
Tavis: "Who's there?" And I got my SAG card.
Church: But you see what you did, though - you went Hillary Clinton on us. You said, "I had two lines." (Laughter) And then when I pin you down, you're like "All right, I really had two words."
Tavis: Okay, I was sleep - I'm sleep deprived.
Church: I was under sniper fire in Somalia. (Laughter) Wait a second - I mean we were having a basket of muffins -
Tavis: Okay, I'm -
Church: - but snipers were around.
Tavis: I'm sleep deprived, Thomas. I'm sleep deprived.
Church: You are?
Tavis: And what I meant was two words, not two lines. (Laughter) "Who's there?" (Unintelligible)
Church: She was, like, "We were under sniper fire." And then they cut to the video clip and she and Chelsea are, like, receiving flowers and politely shaking hands. Like, wow, those are pretty quiet snipers. (Laughter) Nobody really - right?
Tavis: Speaking of smart people, are McCain, Obama and Clinton smart people? We'll come back to the movie in a second.
Church: You know what? I think all three of them - to get to that level of achievement, I think you have to be remarkably strategically minded and high functioning in terms of intelligence. When it comes to street smarts, who knows? I think of the three of them, Barack is probably the lead. And you know what I love about him? The ears, man, the ears.
Tavis: You like those ears?
Church: Because I got some car doors. I got some car doors going on. (Laughter) When I was a kid, my granddad was like "You're like a car going around a corner and the doors swing open." And then Barack's got the same thing, he's got - but you know what?
Tavis: You keep yours covered up, though. His are just exposed, they're just out there.
Church: Yeah, his are out there, mine (unintelligible). I wanted to get some shrubbery going on on the side there. (Laughter) (Unintelligible)
Tavis: Last time you were here -
Church: I do think they're very smart. You know what, you got to be, you got to be. She's a lawyer, lawyers are pretty smart.
Tavis: He's a lawyer, she's a lawyer, yeah. You're getting involved in the campaign this year, or are you kind of staying out of it?
Church: In rural Texas - I'm an Independent, I'm a registered Independent in Bandera County, Texas. Not -
Tavis: Bandera County.
Church: Bandera County.
Tavis: I like that.
Church: Not the most popular political affiliation, because just about everybody I know, and maybe everybody I know is a conservative Republican. My cattle partner is a conservative Republican; my dad's a conservative Republican. But you know what? You just - I always, since the very first election that I voted in, which was in '84, and I was actually a page at the Republican convention in Dallas in 1984 when Reagan got the second term, or the nomination for hi second term.
But I really always felt like you've got to go with your heart. I have to measure - look, I'll fully admit it for the first time in front of a camera, I voted for Perot in '92 because I was all for that revisionism. I was all for that kind of grassroots revitalization and reformation and into anything that starts with "re," except "recession."
But I really, I was like let's go, let's redefine where we're headed. And then he kind of the whole thing with his daughter was the object of a conspiracy and assassination plot, and he just was flip-flopping. I'm like, all right, he just lost all of his credibility.
Tavis: I know why you really liked him, though.
Church: Why? Because of his ears. He's got some great ears.
Tavis: Ears.
Church: You got to go with that. You got to go with some great ears.
Tavis: Thomas likes ears. Yeah, anybody with ears, he likes. So "Smart People," tell me about your character and what the film is all about.
Church: Not to be rote, but it's kind of a dysfunctional family comedy-drama. The same producer that I worked with on "Sideways," Michael London -
Tavis: It was a great movie, yeah.
Church: - brought the script to me and he said, "You know what? Superficially, these characters may seem similar." The guy I play in "Sideways" and the guy in "Smart People," kind of ne'er-do-wells, just kind of like banging around, just getting life done. And I really wanted - I took it as a challenge to find something that was a little bit more complicated and a little bit more - a guy that is at a crossroads but really wants to get - he's doing a little bit of soul-searching, and he finds the family and they're all in a state of dysfunction and not able to move forward. And he kind of catalyzes, I think, some emotional rehabilitation.
Tavis: You - and this is not true of every character you play, obviously. But over the course of your career you have been drawn to some characters, I'm trying to find the right word here, that are lost, for lack of a better word. Not dumb, but lost - as you said, a little kind of just out there. What draws you to characters like that, and are you ever concerned?
Because every time I talk to you on the show, this guy is really - you're really, really, really bright, and obviously it's acting, they call it that for a reason - but do you ever worry or wonder that people might think that you are more like the character and not the smart guy that you really are?
Church: I like what you're - I like the descriptive "lost" because even - like in "Spiderman," there's a guy, this guy Flint Marco. He breaks out of prison, he's a petty criminal, but his focal point is to help his daughter, and he sort of loses his way on that journey. And the same thing in, like, the character that I played in the Robert Duvall western that I did for AMC, "Broken Trail."
He's a guy, he's, like, 40ish, but still a cowboy, working just for grub and wages, and has no real direction. And I think that's what I do. Like, I like it whenever these guys have an epiphany or there's some sort - they find almost kind of this random salvation in life where they discover what their purpose is after the audience has met them. And you go to, like, like the character I played on "Wings," the TV series I did early in my career. Lowell kind of ostensibly was this guy that people were like oh, yeah, he's like the dumb mechanic.
But I always strove to find something that was quirky and innocent and a little lost about him. And if people want to define that as dumb, that's their choice.
Tavis: That's why I went there, because I like - as you know, I love "Wings," it's a great show.
Church: Tavis, we've had this conversation before.
Tavis: I know, I'm not going to go there again. I know, I know.
Church: I'm embarrassed to admit -
Tavis: I don't want to fawn over you again.
Church: - I always wanted an African American love interest. And I knew you were out there doing extra work. Come on.
Tavis: Yeah, I love you took, man.
Church: Why not?
Tavis: I could have said that. I love you too, man.
Church: Why not? I knew you were out there, man, doing extra work, waiting to get started with Mayor Bradley's office.
Tavis: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Speaking of conversations we've had before, when you were here last we talked about the cattle. I forgot what the count was last time, but how many head of cattle - is that how you say it in Texas, head of cattle?
Church: You do say, "Head."
Tavis: How many head of cattle you got now?
Church: We also say - and I'm going to give you a whole 'nother little -
Tavis: All right, give me some terminology.
Church: I'm going to give you another nugget, a little nugget of our -
Tavis: In Bandera County.
Church: - our secular lexicon in Bandera County. You say, "How many mama cows." And I know you're from Mississippi, so mama rolls out pretty well.
Tavis: Yeah, pretty easily.
Church: Mama cows.
Tavis: How many mama cows?
Church: How many mama cows do you run? We have about probably - we run - it's right around the same number, about 500.
Tavis: About 500, yeah.
Church: Yeah, we're just, we're -
Tavis: Next down I'm down Bandera County way -
Church: Bandera County, man.
Tavis: Bandera County. I'm just going to stop on in.
Church: You've got to come hang out.
Tavis: I'll do that.
Church: I got a camp house, I got a bunk. You're welcome any time.
Tavis: I look forward to it. The movie, "Smart People," starring a very smart guy named Thomas Haden Church.
Church: Aw.
Back to April 8, 2008