And then after that came Raising Arizona, and then after that came Vampire’s Kiss, and then Moonstruck, and then Wild at Heart. All of which I saw in the movie theatre. So that basically says it all, doesn’t it. In terms of wild, comedic, dramatic, frightening, spontaneous, interesting, original performances — in the medium of comedy, and the medium of independent cinema, and the medium of something commercial, romantic, art house. He kind of ran the whole gamut. So it’s just like, okay, all right, you are my teacher.
I imagine it didn’t take much to get you on board with Unbearable Weight, then.
No, it was only a matter of convincing them to board me. And I think that having more knowledge of Nicolas Cage in his movies than the writers writing the Nicolas Cage movie of all Nicolas Cage movies probably helped me get the part, because they had no idea if I was funny. And so, all we really did was talk about Nicolas Cage movies. And you know, whether you got the part or not, it was still a fun enough time to just meet and talk about Nicolas Cage, and then be on your way.
Had you met him prior to this movie?
No, I’d never met him in person until I got on a plane to fly to Europe. In September, 2020. I get onto the plane and, of course, we all have our masks on — and there’re these like, you know, those blue eyes, just looking back at me and waving hello.
Presumably you kept the fandom to yourself, for now…
I did. It was easy. I sat myself down — I didn’t want to come at him physically, or anything like that. I guess it’s maybe never appropriate, but particularly not so on our first flight during the earlier parts of the pandemic. And so gradually, we ran into each other at the hotel, and then at the fitting, and then on set shooting together. Then all of a sudden I’m his scene partner. It was pretty cool.
He’s spoken before about how he can’t bear to watch the “highly neurotic” and “anxiety ridden” version of Nick Cage that we see in the film. How would you describe the difference between the two Cages?
Yeah, it’s kind of fascinating in that I wouldn’t say there’s any neuroses off-camera. But the neuroses in the character that he plays is sort of, I don’t know — I think it’s a neurotic that we all have, it isn’t necessarily a neurosis that Nicolas Cage has. It’s just a human neurosis that we’re all capable of. Mine’s way worse than his character’s neurosis, anyway.
I was reading earlier about a potential Face/Off sequel that Nicolas looks likely to be involved with — say one of those projects gets off the ground, like Face/Off 2. Would you want to be involved?