At the 90th Academy Awards, which ended last week, 50-year-old Sam Rockwell won best supporting actor on his first nomination for the film "Three Billboards", which is being released in China. The policeman he plays in the film is always in a state of anger and mania, but the audience is moved by this almost crazy little person.
Nearly three decades after his debut, "Whether it's mainstream films, independent films or stage plays, I enjoy playing roles that are vivid and meaningful, and always keep me adventurous." Sam is like a rebel in Hollywood, low-key, niche, neurotic, and he even thinks an actor "shouldn't be famous before the age of 30, and fame is not good for young people." ”
A
At the age of 10, he began to work in the background and became an actor
Sam was born in 1968 in Dalí, California, to actor parents, and moved to New York with his family at the age of two. Three years later, his parents divorced, and Sam's stable childhood life was shattered and he began to wander between his parents. "My mother decided to be an actor instead of a mother; and my father decided to be a father, not an actor." After that, Sam was raised by his father and moved to San Francisco, where he spent the summer vacation back in New York with his mother.
At a very young age, his parents began to cultivate Sam's hobby of film. At the 90th Academy Awards, Sam, who held the best supporting actor trophy, also said that when he was 8 years old, his father took him from school under the pretext of "his grandmother had an accident" to go to a movie.
Because my mother was a theater actress, Sam began her career as an actor when she was 10 years old, "at that time, I used to perform with my mother, and I could see a lot of things in the background that other children couldn't see, which made me feel like a foreigner." It also makes Sam feel like a man — actresses can often be seen dressing up backstage, it's a purely adult world where Sam is quickly matured in an environment where "with adults, you grow up fast." ”
B
In order to make a living, he works while acting and delivering takeaways
In high school, Sam studied acting at a school in San Francisco, and in his memory, getting drunk was a regular daily routine. After graduation, he returned to New York and trained for two years at a local acting studio. During this period, Sam has participated in independent films such as "The Joker's House" and "Brooklyn Black Street", and has also appeared in some dramas and TV movies, but in the end there are not many opportunities.
Idle, he watched "The Raging Bull" fifty times in one sitting, bent on becoming an Italian. He mixed in the streets of New York every day to experience the feeling of Anitarian New Yorker, so much so that when he auditioned in Hollywood, he was dismissed as "too New York, too urban." He shouted angrily, "I'm a San Francisco native." ”
To make a living, Sam works as an extra in various soap operas and commercials while working in New York restaurants. "I've worked in a lot of restaurants, passing food, delivering takeout, and just delivering tortillas for takeout has broken several bikes." This state of life did not improve after he became a professional actor, but the way to make a living changed from working for restaurants to working for movies.
"I want to be a character actor, but I also want to make money", Sam was often caught in the vortex of money and role competition at first, and many of the films made at that time were made to "make a living", "Whether it was "Miracle in the Green", "Galaxy Visitor", or "Uncle Mower", they did not make a difference, those films for me, just for life. But even so, he worked hard to play every role. His performances in films such as "Night of Box Light" and "Uncle Mower" are impressive.
"Three Billboards"
C
After winning the Silver Bear Award, I finally stopped renting a house
Moving between mainstream actors and character actors is good for Sam, "because I can do what I like." But he also thinks he's sometimes too out of the world to meet anyone stranger than himself. "I also wanted to play Batman, and I knew they wouldn't let me do it because I was so weird. In fact, even Paul Newman and Gary Grant are not as mainstream as people think, when they smile at a woman, the ghost knows if there are a lot of dirty thoughts in their hearts, which is why they are charming. ”
In 2002, Sam was selected by George Clooney to be the first male lead actor in his directorial debut, Confessions of Dangerous Minds, with drew Barrymore, Julia Roberts, Matt Damon, and Brad Pitt as the cast. The film is based on the autobiographical novel of TV host Chuck Barris, and Sam spends three months with the archetypal Chuck for this role, going to the coffee shop, eating, watching movies, going for a walk, and Sam also recording Chuck's lines and listening to them repeatedly. His method of memorizing lines is also very special, he will first memorize the lines mechanically like a tape recorder, and Sam will not casually add any intonation to the lines until he finds the right language pattern.
The following year, the film competed at the Berlin Film Festival, and Sam won the Silver Bear for Best Actor. His financial situation improved as a result, buying an apartment in 2003 and renting on New York's West End until then.
D
The one-man show "Moon" was snubbed by the Oscars
After winning the Berlin Film Festival Silver Bear Award, Sam did not plunge headlong into the torrent of commercial blockbusters, on the contrary, he continued to take root in his beloved independent film field, freely walking between art and business, and taking over the "Snow Angel", "Death of the Sharpshooter" and other literary and commercial masterpieces.
Sam had always wanted to be as famous as Gary Oldman or John Markovich, but not like a superstar. "I don't want to become popular at such a young age as DiCaprio, and overnight fame is definitely a huge test for a person, and I don't think anyone should be famous until the age of 30." Sam himself, on the other hand, is known to more people and is 40 years old.
In 2008, Sam starred in the science fiction film "Moon" directed by Duncan Jones, which was tailor-made for Sam, in which he played two roles in one person, and the whole film was basically his one-man show. In the film, he won a lot of improvisations from the director, but the more mainstream Oscars obviously ignored the existence of the film, and the director had to call on the judges who were eligible for award nominations to see Sam's performance, he used the Internet to appeal and promote, and even someone built a petition website. However, all this ultimately failed to bring him a nomination.
However, this independent film is sought after by many science fiction fans, and Sam has also increased his popularity through the film, and the most direct impact is that "Iron Man 2" has thrown an olive branch to him.
I most want to play a pair of brothers with "Dog Daddy"
Sam is particularly fond of Gary Oldman, the winner of this year's Oscar for Best Actor. He once said that he most wanted to play the brother with "Dog Daddy" and drill into each other's heads to see what he was thinking. In fact, in addition to some similarities in appearance, Sam does have a bit of Gary's charm when performing.
Compilation/Teng Dynasty Pictures are from the web