Movies
How did you wind up getting this part?
"I have known Jennifer for a very long time from when she was casting Boxing Helena, she was 19 or something. I was not planning to do the movie and an actor dropped out towards the start of filming and I had told her that I was not feeling ready for that turf but she said, 'You've gotta think about it.' Somehow, looking at the script again in a braver moment I said, 'Let's do it.' I'm really glad I did because it was a really rich experience on a lot of different levels."
Because of the way the film unfolds, you can't show too much of your character. Is it difficult playing someone that elusive?
"I had a pretty good connection to it with Jennifer. I could trust that she would dial around - so we did takes in a couple of different registers to see how far we could push the envelope to reveal what's hidden inside of him. I thought she edited really well because it's always in balance."
Is she a good collaborator with actors? Did you build the character with her?
"I've worked with David (Lynch, Jennifer's father) and her and it's curious to compare. Jennifer would really talk a lot about background of character whereas David never does. Both of them have an incredible way of looking at the joy of performing and filling you with it. For Jennifer, it was always a love story. It was an intoxicating way to do it."
Are David and Jennifer similar as people?
"They both have an incredibly cracking sense of humour, which can be very potent on the set to charge everybody in the right way. They're very surprising, and very surprisingly out of modality about being serious about things. They can be both serious and make fun of themselves at the same time."
How did you find working with Julia?
"Fun. She was working in a mode very different from my impression of her as an actress. So I was dealing with a person I'd never met before and since we have this incredible secret, it charged the air a lot in the scenes we were doing."
Was it uncomfortable for you and Julia filming the scene towards the end where you have Pell James's character trapped in the police station?
"There was a kind of history to that because originally that was the ending of the movie and then they shifted it because they thought it was too harsh. We were always talking about shooting it as an alternate ending. So we'd already shot it, then we went back to do it for a DVD kind of thing. It was a little giddy and queasy, but Jennifer was in full form and I think that's what she really wanted and why the scene is in the movie."
Do you take more pride in doing a film like this than Independence Day?
"Oh yeah. This is the kind of movie where, because I've known Jennifer for so long, because I feel like it was a full-blooded film... It wasn't compromised in any way from her vision, she's a strong visionary, tapping it out everyday. The kind of challenges that come with independent film, keeping the money going and seeing the limitations as an opportunity are a really great thing. You don't often have the journey that Surveillance has - opening up at Cannes with a standing ovation and you're standing there with a great friend, it's a deeply satisfying thing."
Surveillance is released in cinemas this Friday.
