by Paul Fischer
by
Paul Fischer
In a career spanning close to four decades, Gene
Hackman is more than just an actor, 
he's
a celebrated Hollywood institution. Often cast as tough characters, the Oscar
winning star of The French Connection, has appeared in some of American
cinema's great classics, and some not-so-great ones. From his quietly understated
performance in Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation, through Popeye
Doyle in The French Connection, Hackman's characters continue to leave
an impression on the consciousness of audiences the world over. Who can forget
such films as Downhill Racer, I Never Sang for my Father, The Poseidon Adventure,
Scarecrow, Night Moves, or even his fiendishly funny Lex Luthor in three Superman
movies. More recently, Hackman delivered powerful performances in Hoosiers,
Mississippi Burning, Crimson Tide, Enemy of the State and Unforgiven.
Over 80 films since making his initial debut in 1961, Hackman says that the passion
for his craft has never waned. Currently on screen in David Mamet's Heist,
Hackman continues to display his virtuosity as a tough naval commander in the
contemporary war actioner Behind
Enemy Lines, and as the father of a highly dysfunctional family in
Wes Anderson's richly textured dark comedy The Royal Tenenbaums.
Ferociously private, Hackman rarely does press, but changed his mind in order
to talk about his two latest films and talks of acting, war and a life in the
movies with our Paul Fischer, in LA.
CrankyCritic: What presented you with the greatest challenge:
your character in Behind Enemy Lines or Royal Tenenbaums?
Gene Hackman: Well, they're so totally different. The hard part about Behind
Enemy Lines was, being in the aircraft carrier; we actually were on the Carl
Vincent for a short while, and they were doing night take offs and landings, so,
that was tough. And it was like a totally different kind of environment to be
in.
CrankyCritic: Can you talk about getting Owen [Wilson] involved in Behind
Enemy Lines and were you already attached to Royal Tenenbaums at that
point?
Gene Hackman: I had met Wes Anderson prior to having seen Shanghai Noon,
but I didn't know that Wes was involved in writing the script of Tenenbaums.
It was just one of those strange 
coincidences.
CrankyCritic: Ben Stiller, when talking about Royal Tenenbaums,
mentioned that the first thing he did when working with you was ask about The
Poseidon Adventure. Is that an occupational hazard and is that one of the
reasons you tend to stay shy with the public all these years?
Gene Hackman: Well, I suppose Ben saw that film when he was a mere child,
you know, so I have that occasion to meet younger actors now who may have seen
me in things when they were quite young. So, that's a funny experience, actually,
to want to be treated as a fellow actor, and yet people look on you as this person
who has been around for a thousand years; it's kind of uncomfortable at times.
CrankyCritic: With the film Behind Enemy Lines, do you use your
previous experience in the Marines to help get into such a movie?
Gene Hackman: Yes, I do, actually. I like to get a sense of what it should
be like, and you know. Even though I wasn't an officer in the marines, I still
had a sense of the kind of decorum one needs in the service - so yes.
CrankyCritic:
Is there still this feeling in the military that 'we won't leave one man behind',
a theme explored in the movie?
Gene Hackman: I think there is, yes. I'm sure it depends on the situation.
But it makes for a fascinating kind of premise for a film.
CrankyCritic: Do you look back on your past work at all or do you try
to get focussed on what you're doing now?
Gene Hackman: Yeah, I always just do the work. I can never ask myself,
you know, how I did this in such and such a film - that never works.
CrankyCritic: Do you have a favorite film?
Gene Hackman: Well, some of my favorite films have to do with things that
may be people didn't particularly like them, or didn't go to see them. Things
like Scarecrow which was not a big successful film, but it was a film that
I really loved doing.
CrankyCritic: Is it more important to play winners or losers, albeit
intelligent losers, but in the case of both of these films, losers just the same?
Gene Hackman: You know, doing character work as an actor is much more fun
than doing a leading man. You have many more things that you can play, you can
pretend to be good and really be bad, and the opposite also. There are just a
lot of things that you can do. So, I like playing things that have some emotional
sting to them, some conflict. I probably love conflict more than anything.
CrankyCritic: Wes Anderson has talked about how hard a time he had getting
you to do the role in Tenenbaums What actually changed your mind in the
end?
Gene Hackman: I wish I had a really clever answer to that, but I'll tell
you the honest truth. I was in Montreal, down to the last week of [shooting] Heist,
and I was having so much fun as an actor, and I realized I only had a week to
go, and I knew that Tenenbaums was going to be done within about 6 or 8 weeks,
if I committed to it. So I just called my agent and said, Let's do it. So I mean,
I wish I could say that it was because it was a great script, which it was. But
I was tired and yet I was still kind of committed to the work.
CrankyCritic: Earlier, you said that near the end of The Heist,
you were happy acting. And it sounded like you're not always happy when acting.
Is that true?
Gene Hackman: Well, I act out of a kind of angst, that it's never good
enough and it's never what I would like it to be, and I wish we had more time,
and all that. And usually by the end of the film, or towards the end of the film,
I start getting more relaxed and maybe better. I don't know. But that's what I
was referring to - at the end of The Heist, I wanted it to go on. And the only
way for it to go on was to take another film right away.
CrankyCritic: Is it difficult to do a movie with all this comic timing
and lack of rehearsal?
Gene Hackman: Well, you know, for film, I like not to rehearse too much,
because you can keep it fresh that way, and you can then rehearse on the company's
time, while you're on the set. And then there's that kind of sense of immediacy
about trying to get it right before you go in front of the camera. I like that
tension, that kind of - the need, hey, we've gotta get this thing done, and there's
always something good comes out of that.
CrankyCritic: We've heard a lot of actors complain that they find it
harder to get work as they get older. You work an awful lot. <g>
Gene
Hackman: The work is harder now. I suppose because I care more than I did
earlier - to small degrees, and that I like the work. I find it challenging and
so consequently it becomes harder.
CrankyCritic: Do you find you still get offered the same stuff as maybe
10 years ago?
Gene Hackman: Yes, there are very few good scripts around.
CrankyCritic: Even for someone like you.
Gene Hackman: Yes.
CrankyCritic: Are you still tenacious in chasing certain parts?
Gene Hackman: I never chase parts. I mean, usually the things are kind
of around and my agent, Fred Specter, will find them.
CrankyCritic: Why don't you do more comedy?
Gene Hackman: I do whatever's offered to me. You know, there are not a
lot of comedies offered to me.
CrankyCritic: As an actor, do you think the events of September
11 will change the way you work, in terms of travel?
Gene Hackman: No, I don't think it will change. I'm just speaking for myself
and I don't have any real reason to say that, except that my gut feeling is that
it probably won't change.
CrankyCritic: Did those events affect you personally?
Gene Hackman: Well, like everybody, I'm a little leery of getting on a
commercial airplane. You know, I think we all have that. There are kind of inconveniences
that we experience in the airports that we're not used to, but I think we have
to get used to. I feel real bad about innocent people that were killed in New
York, and also in Afghanistan. I think all of us feel that way; that nobody wants
children and innocents killed, but I mean, these are very trying times to us.
CrankyCritic: Do you see a film like Behind Enemy Lines as a
new kind of war film?
Gene Hackman: I would think that probably my idea about taking this film
had more to do with the events [in it]. I like the idea that an American pilot
was shot down; of his adventure of trying to escape, and the people behind him,
how they reacted. So I didn't think of it in terms of Second World War or present
day happenings, but more of just that event.
CrankyCritic:
Back to the Tenenbaums for a minute. I noticed that every frame was very
precisely balanced, visually. Can you talk a little bit about working that aspect
of it with Wes. You know, the visual thing being as important as the character
work?
Gene Hackman: Well, a lot of times as an actor, we're not always aware
of the visual of what the director's work is headed in terms of how he's setting
a shot up. In this film, a lot of the shots were very static, as you just mentioned.
And so as an actor who likes to get up and be physical and instill a lot of behavior
in my characters, that was somewhat off-putting at first, until I recognized what
he was trying to do. It's an interesting process because it takes a lot more focus,
and you can't dissipate your energy through behavior and one thing that you have
to focus on. It's a way of making films that for a certain kind of film, it works
quite well.
CrankyCritic: The New York Times called Wes Anderson a master director
at 31. Having now worked with him, do you agree?
Gene Hackman: Well, I understand that he's a young man who has a concept,
and a lot of people don't - a lot of people do - a lot of young people do films
that they've seen before - they just remake something. They might call it something
else, but it really looks like a lot of films that we've seen. And to his credit,
this film does not look like a lot of other films. At least, that's my idea.
CrankyCritic: After all the movies you've made, what works for you -
what keeps you fresh. What is it you still get out of making them?
Gene Hackman: Well, I like the interplay between the other players. I like
the exchange, the conflict, the kind of tension that happens, and how one is able
to deal with that, and trying to elicit from the other person some kind of response.
And you get going in this kind of ping-pong match, let's say, and that's exciting
to me. To make those kind of - or to be part of making that kind of thing work.
CrankyCritic: Can you talk a little bit more about your experience in
the Marines and how that corps has changed over the years?
Gene Hackman: Well, I volunteered when I was in the Marines, I don't think
the military changes that much, you know. The technology changes, and the governments
needs change. But in terms of the military, it's pretty much the same probably
since in the 30's, that there are certain things that you are required to do,
and that will probably always be true. It's - I think it's the governments that
change.
CrankyCritic:
Other than talent, what else has kept you working at such a steady clip?
Gene Hackman: I suppose I like the idea of committing to something - once
I decide to do something then I commit fully to it. And I've never felt that you
can kind of skate through a part and make it work. I think that the idea of being
kind of - to use a word that we used to kick around at the Actors Studio - to
be natural is not really very interesting. And people spend a lot of their time
in this business trying to be natural. There's a difference between that and being
real - being real is trying to find something - you set yourself a task, something
to work on. So when you're working on it, you make the difference between something
real and something natural. That may sound kind of abstract and esoteric, but
that's - for me - that's the essence.
CrankyCritic: What do you like to work when you're not working?
Gene Hackman: I paint a little, and I'm working on my book, and I'm getting
ready to go to sea, maybe. We are talking about buying a boat and do a little
cruising.
CrankyCritic: What do you like about writing?
Gene Hackman: I found over the last 4 or 5 years since I've really been
writing seriously, is that it's like acting in some ways, in that I can express
some kind of emotion and ideas about what I believe in, and not have 90 people
in the same room while I'm doing it.
CrankyCritic: Do you like the isolation of being a writer?
Gene Hackman: Yes, I like that.
CrankyCritic: Why?
Gene Hackman: I don't know. It forces you to think about things that may
be important to you.
CrankyCritic: We've heard that you're now writing a book?
Gene Hackman: Yes, I am.
CrankyCritic: About?
Gene Hackman: This book takes place in 1929, just before the stock market
crash. And it takes place in the Midwest.
CrankyCritic: Is it true you were going to become a journalist after
leaving the marines?
Gene Hackman: Well, not really. Both my grandfather and my uncle were both
reporters, and I was always attracted to that. But I didn't even have the schooling
earlier on to do that.
You had this tough army life, so what prompted the decision to go into the world
of the arts ?
Gene Hackman: Well, I always wanted to do that from the time I was 10 years
old. The Marine Corps just happened to be a kind of a weigh station on the way
to doing that, and it was lucky for me, because I grew up kind of quickly in the
Marine Corps And, then when I went to New York, it came in handy.
CrankyCritic: What did your marine buddies say?
Gene Hackman: I don't think I ever told anybody in the Marines that I wanted
to be an actor, except that one of my first jobs in New York was as a doorman
at Howard Johnson's in Times Square, and I was standing outside the door in a
white uniform with green piping on it, and a Marine Corps sergeant came down the
street, who happened to be the sergeant that recruited me. It was a strange coincidence,
and he looked at me, and he never stopped, but just said to me "Hackman,
you're a sorry sonofabitch".
November 2001
