On television, he continues to leave a lasting mark, with memorable turns in True Detective, Fargo, and Perry Mason. Whether leading a scene or stealing one, Whigham’s work is defined by an infectious mix of intensity, honesty, and restraint — a combination that makes every performance unforgettable.
Away from the cameras, Whigham leads a grounded life. He’s been married to his wife, Christine, for many years, and they share four children together. Unlike a lot of others who live a life in the glitz and glamor, Whigham really does come across as a humble, fiercely focused individual who is sincerely grateful for all of the opportunities that he has been given. Perhaps the thing that stands out most about Shea Whigham is his infectious love for the entertainment business and his appreciation for the magic behind film making. For Whigham, it is not about the fame and riches but more so about being able to take part in the fanciful world of film and television. Deep down at his core he is a storyteller who is always chasing opportunities to work with talented thespians and take part in memorable stories that he connects with.
With a steady stream of exciting projects ahead, Whigham continues to do what he does best: transform every role he touches and remind audiences why great acting doesn’t always have to shout — sometimes, it’s the quiet power that leaves the deepest mark.
You were born and grew up in Florida, but eventually chose to pursue a theater degree in New York. What was the progression that made you decide, “Hey, I think I want to give this thing a shot”?
My heroes growing up were not sports stars so to speak, they were actors, so that's what I did. My mother was a librarian, so that's where the reading that you and I have been discussing comes into play, and my father was, you know, he wouldn't call himself a cultured man, but he was always reading Shakespeare, and he would show me actors like [Marlon] Brando, like [Robert] Duvall, and [Gene] Hackman. So, that's where it started. But I didn't know how. I was just kicking around after high school. In high school, you had to be able to sing and I wasn't going to be able to do musicals per se—although I can carry a tune; I think. (Laughs)
But I auditioned, and I got into some places, and I got lucky. Sometimes you just get lucky, and I got into Purchase [College] in New York, because it was the closest to New York City.
The program that you entered into is very respected, but it's quite small, with not a ton of graduates. That said, it's produced some pretty impressive alumni like Stanley Tucci and Zoë Kravitz. When you were deciding on the program, were you aware that it had such a close-knit, high-caliber nature?
No, I'm gonna be really honest with you. It was the cheapest of the BUs and NYUs. It was the cheapest one. When I said to mom… I professed to my parents that I was going to be a thespian, my mom supported it. But they didn't know what the hell I was talking about. My father was like, “All right, well then, you're going to pay for it.” They ended up helping me pay for it. I'm being somewhat facetious, but I went to work, and it was the cheapest option. The program also had Edie Falco and Wesley Snipes, so I knew about actors that I wanted to model myself after. Then you get there, and you get under somebody. You get lucky. I got a guy who made me read voraciously. I'm reading the Poetics and storytelling at its most basic form and earliest stages.
And then Eulalie Noble, this woman who chose to teach – she didn't have to teach because she didn't make it, she chose to teach – she's sitting on the right-hand side of [Sanford] Meisner and [Lee] Strasberg for eight years, and seven more years to learn how to become a teacher, in order to pass that on. To this day, I still use that as a building block for all of my characters, because if I was “acting” in scenes, she was going to call it out.
Did any other people that you studied with go on to have successful careers?
Well, there's a guy named Kirk Acevedo who got on the TV show Oz. Kirk, he's a great talent. He and I were roommates, and we would sit there, and you know, drink and smoke cigarettes and be like, “We're going to make it like [Al] Pacino and Hackman, and Duvall. We're going to make it to the top.” He's gone on to have a really nice career. It also shows you how hard it is to make it. I started with 30 in my company at Purchase. 31 of us got in, and then it's a cut program. Each semester they cut you. They say it's not working out. We graduated with eight of us. I was the only one out of the eight that didn't have an agent at the end of senior year.
So, I'm lost in New York. I'm walking the streets of the city, not knowing what I'm going to do, and that forced me to start a theater company.
What year was that?
I graduated in 90– I want to say 93, I think.
Can you take me back to those early days of doing theater in New York—what were those experiences like?
I loved those early days of theater, when you didn't know if anyone was going to show up or not. You're downtown in New York City. I had to put it up from casting, to building sets, to really running at night, and everyone was involved. It was really kind of beautiful. It was tough, it was hard, but that's where you earn your stories. Earlier, you and I were talking about storytelling, and that's becoming a lost art even in talking to people about things; you don't want to waste people's time, and we're losing that. So, those are the early days of being able to really go down there and learn what it means to put into practice what it means to be an actor.
Tigerland (2000) was your first really big film project. Did you have an agent that helped you get that role, or did you get the agent after that?
Yeah, that changed everything for me. Funny enough, I was like any actor, I was desperate. I didn't know what I was going to do, and a woman named Marci Phillips, who was head of ABC casting… I took a six-week audition course with her. She spotted something in me, and after two weeks she's like, “What's going on with you?” And I said, “I don’t know. I'm floundering out here,” and she said, “You should be working.” And I said, “I agree wholeheartedly.’’ (Laughs) So, she connected me to a guy named Vic Ramos.
Vic Ramos had one client, and that was Matt Dillon. He had discovered [him] when Matt was in the 8th grade. Ramos took me on, and two weeks later, and I'm not making this up, two weeks later I had an audition for Tigerland and for The Sopranos pilot.
Now, this is wild, because I go in character for Tigerland. I played that character that… he's from the South, and he'd had a tough upbringing. So, I go in and faked my way through. I said that I was from Texas… I get Mali Finn, who had discovered Russell Crowe, Guy Pearce, and she'd already found Colin Farrell for this film, who's become one of my closest friends in the world now. So, I go in and knock that down. I leave and I go to The Sopranos audition. Small part, but I knocked that down for Georgianne Walken, Christopher Walken's wife.
So, I have both of them, and they're going really well, and I meet Joel [Schumacher], and then I meet the head, and I get both of them. And then Tigerland—the part was so good, and nobody knew that Sopranos was going to go on to become such a hit show.
That's what kind of started me… my manager, Vic Ramos, and that got me an agent.
Tigerland was a pretty heavy role to kick off your film career. Your character carried a lot of weight and intensity, and you were yelled at a lot.
Yeah, I mean, the genius of Joel Schumacher is that he gave to so many of us and fought for us. I didn't deserve that part at the time, because I didn't have any credits. I had no credits, so Joel saw something. Mali Finn, and Joel. Mali has since passed. So has Joel. They loved discovering new talent.
Colin was so gracious. They picked a scene for me, and I'll never forget, we had to go to the Mark Hotel at 1PM on a Sunday afternoon. This was for the final callback. Joel Schumacher and Arnon Milchen, who was heading up his own production company, were there. We go in, and I meet Colin downstairs, and I'm nervous. Colin already has the part, and I'm going to have to take it to him. It's the one where I go to kill him on the firing range, and I'm delusional at this part. I've lost it. And I said, “Listen, man, I’m going to come at you in this. I'm going to really come at you.” And he goes, “No, no, bring it. You do what you have to do. I already got the role, you bring it.” I don't think that he really knew exactly what I was going to do, and that's the beauty.
So, we get in there, and they pick the first scene, the first scene is kind of nice. They're making fun of me in the back of the truck, and I'm telling him to apologize for embarrassing me and beating me up, and I knew that scene was so important for my character, because you needed to see that out of me. Now remember, you don't carry an actual gun or even a fake one in an audition. So, I had my hand right here, and I'm on the firing range, and I look at him and I start gearing up, and I'm in there, and I go after him. And it's like two bulls, and he grabs my wrist, flips me over, and I hit my head on the glass table. I come up, and I'm screaming, and I go after him, I get him, and we're tussling. But we're in character as Boz and Wilson, and we're breathing, and he gets nicked up as we're down on the floor. We get done and I look over, and Schumacher and Arnon are sitting on the floor against the wall. I'll never forget this man; Joel starts getting choked up. I'm getting choked up, and so is Colin, because it's just so emotional. [Joel] goes, “I think we've found our boys for this,” and Arnon Milchen goes, “This is why I make movies.”
I go downstairs. No cell phones. I call on the phone and I'm weeping to my parents, and I go, “I got it. I got a part. I got the part in the movie.” And my old man goes, “You mean, like a movie movie? Like a real movie, that you go sit in the chairs and you pay money?” So that's how that came to be.
Your dad must have been very proud.
Well, my mom, I gotta make sure I always throw her in there because she was the early one that got a second job and was behind the scenes. Unbeknownst to my father, she was working, doing stuff on the side to help pay for Purchase.
After Tigerland, we really couldn't go anywhere; it was weird. We were seeing Colin’s face on magazine covers. I was living in New York. He was living on my couch at the time when he would come to New York, and he was the godfather of my second child. So, we'd have him on the coach, and my little brother, who now represents me – he represented Colin and Michael Shannon, Danny Mcbride, Tim Van Patten, too – and he was living on the floor. It was a one bedroom. But then Colin got shot out of a cannon, and he just went to work.
I think, for a lot of people, the first real project that they started to connect with you on was 2010’s Boardwalk Empire. What's the story behind that show? How did that come about for you?
That's interesting. I'd met Scorsese while I was doing Tigerland. He was coming to television for the first time to do a cop show, and he's looking at Colin’s dailies, and he sees some of mine, and he flies me to New York. I get to read with Mr. Scorsese, you know, and I get the part. I fly back down to Florida. I tell Colin and all the boys, I'm like, “I got it, I'm Mr. Scorsese's guy!” Scorsese and I had dinner, we had drinks. It was magical.
But down in Starke, Florida, we're staying at the Day's Inn, me and Colin and everyone else, and it's stark! That's where they killed Ted Bundy. We're staying in that town. So, I get a blinking red light. It's a message from Mr. Scorsese: “Hey kid, sorry, it was great to meet you, but the network's not going to let me go with you. I’m sorry about that.” I'm thinking to myself, “You're Martin freaking Scorsese,” but I don't know, man. So, I called my father, and I said, “I got it, but I didn't get it,” and he gave me the greatest piece of advice. He said, “Let him off the hook, son. Call him back. I know you're hurt but let him off the hook.”
So, I called him back. I gathered myself because I was probably going to cry when I talked to him, and I said, “Mr. Scorsese, it's okay. Best of luck to you, and we'll see you around the way.” And he said, “Thanks a lot, kid.” Cut to 10 years later, almost to the day, and they call me in for a ship captain running hooch role in Boardwalk Empire.
The casting director, Ellen Lewis… I go in and she goes, “Why are you coming in for this small part?” I said, “I don't know. I just want to be in it.” She goes, “No, no, no, I want you to take these sides, go outside, and come back in as the brother.”
Meanwhile, she had gotten Marty on the phone, and she said, “You remember this guy that you wanted to hire 10 years ago. He's coming in right now for Eli, Nucky’s brother.”
I went in. I guess I knocked it down, but she told Mr. Scorsese, “Remember, he let you off the hook?” Ellen Lewis—she is the one that I want to give so much to because she said [to me], “You're going to get this part.” She and Scorsese kept telling [me] that the network wanted them to look at every Chris and Ryan and everybody. Rightfully so, they're all great, but Mr. Scorsese, to his credit, Ellen shared with me that they were looking at tapes, and they never looked at another tape other than mine.
And when I got to the set, I see Mr. Scorsese. On the first day, Marty said, “Kid, you let me off the hook. I'll never forget that. Let's go do this one.”
That's where I met Tim Van Patten, who's now my closest friend. Terry Winter, and [Steve] Buscemi was so gracious to let me… I think Eli was supposed to die, probably in the seventh episode, because I go to kill Nucky, and I had no business probably living, but they all let me, you know… live and stay on the show.
Success on the scale of Boardwalk Empire often brings opportunity and attention. How did the show's success shape your day-to-day life and the way that people interacted with you? Did your visibility and notoriety increase?
Oh, yeah, you know, man, I'm pretty lucky. I don't do any social media. I keep a real low profile. It did increase, people would come up to me, but it was very respectful. Actors would come up and want to ask questions about this and that, but it did, man. It shot my career into a place… just because of the impact that Scorsese had. He had been out in the press saying, “These are my guys, and we're going to go make a great show.”
It was great storytelling, and it got me a few free meals. (Laughs) A few drinks at the bar… it was magical, man. It was really magical. I still, to this day, get people sharing that they’ve watched the show a second and third time, all the way through, and I think that it's one show that stopped before it’s time. There were still stories to tell. We quit after five seasons, and our bench went so deep. We went 12 to 15 deep with Michael K. Williams, Michael Shannon, Steve Buscemi, Michael Stuhlbarg, Kelly Macdonald. It was just a murderer's row of great actors. I think we should go revisit that show in a movie.
Portraying a character in that historical setting, did you find yourself diving deeper into the true crime and culture of the Prohibition era?
Oh, yeah, that's my favorite period to tell a story in, because it's not easy. For me, it's not about how big of a bump I can get off of this, or how can I win awards. It is, do I fit into the fabric of the period of the story that I'm telling? That's what I want to do. Can I do the thirties? But also come back. I just finished JonBenét Ramsey, can I fit into that?
That's the challenge. I love it, man… because it's like Perry Mason. There's something really romantic… I don't even know how to describe it. It's the costumes. It's the interior life of trying to figure these guys out for me. But it's the exterior as well, just to put that uniform on every day and then walk out of that trailer, and then to go into it, as deep into character as you can to nail it. For me, that's as good as it gets.
As an actor, do you ever find yourself conflicted with whether you like the characters that you're playing, or that you're playing alongside?
Yeah, you can't sit in judgment of a character. I always try to keep it in the grey, there's not all good or all bad. That said, when I played the slave owner, George Bass Reeves, that was not a fun place for me, because I had to commit to that character, just as I do if I'm doing something light. But that one was tough, because you have to live in it. You don't just get the sides and show up to play these roles. I'm always asking for my material way out in order to be able to figure out all the questions that I may have. You don't have to like them, but you can't judge them.
I was thrilled to discover American Primeval; it was an amazing series. Your character is such a man of the times, and he's based on a real historical figure. Was that big, rugged beard of yours a prosthetic?
No, no, that's all me.
How long did that take to grow?
I had a couple of months out. I loved playing Jim Bridger, the same as I did Eli. These are two roles that are very close to me, and ones that I wasn't done exploring. I'm kind of sad, even when I talk about it, because I wasn't done exploring them. Bridger was a great, great man. I mean, a real Renaissance man of the time, and how he kept this whole ecosystem working in this fort, you know. Through humor, through the shovel, whatever he had to do. I found him fascinating. He was married to three different native Americans; one from the Flathead tribe, one from the Ute tribe, and a Shoshone woman who was the daughter of a chief.
Mark L. Smith wrote a script like I hadn't read on the page before. I didn't change one word of it. The only thing I improved was when the kid in the first episode asked me, “How do you get a fort like that, mister?” I say, “You build it.” That was the only improv. But everything else was really Mark's. But it was so hard to film. It's not like a two-hour film. This is six episodes spanning all in a year, and then the filming itself in the winter, in the climate. But Betty [Gilpin] and Taylor [Kitsch] and Kim [Coates] were incredible, incredibly committed.
Researching a complex figure like Jim Bridger must have been intense. How did you move from studying him on the page to living him out on screen?
You can't play a guy like Jim Bridger without knowing about him. I always start very broad with the work, the intelligence, the reading of everything that I can get my hands on. At some point, he has to be inside. We had a Native American [on staff] who was an expert in the history and culture, and an expert on Bridger and the fort, so there was a lot of help.
I’ve always been drawn to that genre and time period, but we often tend to romanticize it. American Primeval does a great job of reminding us that it wasn’t always as easy or glamorous as we might think. It was a tough and challenging era.
Well, you're talking about building the frontier, the building of America.
So, Mark [L. Smith] and I, we were staying at this hotel, and he would come by the room and say, “Let's revisit and talk about Bridger, and talk about the scenes.” We kept reminding ourselves, a day in the life of any individual at that time, there were no guarantees that you were going to make it through.
It should become visceral. That's why you have to go places, you can't play at something. A lot of the time when I watch something, I see the actor working, and I see the wheels turning, and they're showing me that you’ve got to make sure that you are there going through it. I mean, people don't know but Betty [Gilpin] was pregnant during filming. We had to do some pickups because of the snow, and she's pregnant, I mean, ready to pop, and she's on a horse, committed as anyone. I kept telling Pete [Berg], our director, that the key is that Bridger is part Twain. You need a break from the violence. There was humor that got people through the day, and Bridger is one of these guys. It was effortless. He was an observer of life.
It must be great as an actor, to actually sit down and watch the full show, once the score and everything has been added. Some of the filmed storyline has nothing to do with your character so in some ways, you're watching it afresh.
Oh, man! For me, I don't watch other actors’ stuff, so that I can experience it. I'm not in every episode of this latest thing that I just did, this JonBenét project with Melissa McCarthy and Clive Owen playing the parents. I'm not in a couple episodes, and I didn't even read those. With character work you have to be careful that the actor – Shea – doesn't get out ahead more than the character would in the moment, you know what I mean?
So, when I'm playing Bridger, I can do too much research and know much more than he would have in his day. I can do more research to play the DA in the JonBenét Ramsey case, but my character at the time, let's say I'm in the third episode, doesn't know what I know, so you're always trying to be in the moment within each scene.
Your 2023 entry into the Mission Impossible franchise has a great story about how you actually came to get on the director's radar in the elevator one day.
Yeah, so there's one party a year that I go to in Hollywood. It is thrown by a guy named Josh Lieberman, and it’s for the Golden Globes. It's a fun party. So, I try to go to that one thing each year. I was doing this TV show called Homecoming with Sam Esmail and Julia Roberts, and it was a big departure for me, the character. People were kind of watching it… But I go to this party and I remember, I bring Tim Van Patten with me and my brother Jack, and we go in there, and there's [Robert] De Niro and Pacino and [Danny] Devito, right when we walk in the door, and you got everybody there. It's just really cool. I look across the room, and there is Christopher McQuarrie. I'm like, I'm not going to be too cool for school here, I'm gonna go over there and just say that I like what he does. I love The Usual Suspects. He's right out of the gate and he wins an Oscar for screenwriting.
So, I go over, and I say, “I am…” and he goes, “I know who you are. I'm watching Homecoming right now.” “Thank you very much, that means a lot.” We get to talking, and I say, “I love what you guys do on Mission Impossible. It's great. It has great stunts and all that, but it's not without great storytelling,” and he goes, “That's what we try to do.” I say, “Each one gets better with you in charge.” He goes, “I'm going to write something for you in the next one.” That was in January of that year. I said, “Oh, okay.” So, I kind of went back over, and I said to my wife and Tim [Van Patten], “He's going to write something for me. If I had a nickel for every time I'd be rich.”
The next night I see him at the Awards. I'm nominated for Homecoming, and he is also up for a nomination. I'm right in back of him, and he goes, “Get ready. We're going to do something.” The whole calendar year goes by. December of that year, so 11 months, and I'll never forget it; I'm sitting in this room right here, my reading room and I get a text. A very ominous text: “Is this still you? McQuarrie.” And I go, “Yes.” And I yelled out… I said, “This is either really, really good or really, really bad.” He goes, “I'm going to call you from an unknown number. Pick up.” I'm shaking. I'm like, “Okay, yeah.” I get on the phone, and he goes, “Hey Shea, this is Chris McQuarrie.” I said, “Hey, Chris, how are you doing?” He goes, “I got somebody who wants to talk to you.” I say, “Oh, okay.” Someone goes, “Hey Shea, It's Tom Cruise.” I go, “Like Tom, Tom Cruise?” and he goes, “Yeah, it's Tom Cruise. Man, how would you like to come do two Mission Impossibles back-to-back? I've been seeing all your stuff.” I get choked up man, and I had to put the phone right here (on his chest). I get choked up and can't even speak. And finally, I go, “Yeah, yeah, I've seen all your stuff, Tom!” or something stupid like that. (Laughs) I’m like, “I've seen everything you've been in man!” We had a nice laugh.
Then I get taken around the world with them doing this stuff, and you know, they work differently than anybody else. They said that on the phone call, he was like, “Look, we've talked to a lot of the directors that you've worked with. We know that you're intense in your research and you need stuff out in front of you to work on, but you’ve got to be willing to flow differently than that.” I said, “Oh, I got you.” And sure enough, man, it's been one of the great experiences of my life with them.
Is Tom as intense to work with as they say?
He is intense, and so is McQuarrie, and so is my approach to the work. I love that. These two guys are cinephiles. They know every movie. They know every film. While we're there, we're talking about great works of the John Houstons of the world. What people don't understand is that of all the death-defying stunts that melt your face, this is stuff that Tom is actually doing… People need to see it in IMAX. They need to see it large because they're not going to believe that is him. There is no smoke and mirrors there, that's him doing everything.
What I will also say is that he loves the intimacy of a great scene between two actors. He loves acting. I had him regale me with Gene Hackman stories, and Robert Duvall stories and early, early stories of him and Sean Penn, who I'd worked with a couple times. So, he was asking about Sean, they used to get together, get in Sean's car, and drive around, and Sean would go, “That's Jack Nicholson's house. We're going to work with him one day.” There's a romanticism to what we do, and [Cruise] loves it just as much today as he did when he was doing Losing It and All the Right Moves.
When you went to your first award show, the Oscars, or whatever it was, do you remember being starstruck at all or having stage fright?
Yeah, yeah, of course, but I'll tell you where I really had it, though. When I did Silver Linings Playbook, and I was actually on-set with Robert De Niro. Do you remember Chris Farley and Saturday Night Live? He would do that skit where he would have a famous person, and he wouldn't know what to say to them, and he would say, “So, do you like the color red?” or whatever. That's what I did to De Niro… I couldn't find words. Him and Bradley [Cooper] had known each other, and Bradley and I are playing brothers; he's our father. The first two weeks I didn't really even speak to him; he's shy. I'm shy. Then we started really getting in there, and I would just go in and call, “Hey pop!” and then he would call me son.
A guy named Paul Herman, who has since passed, was his good friend, and he's in it. He's the one who's always betting with Bob in the movie on the Cowboys. Paul really made the introduction to De Niro, because I was too scared, but by the end of it, man… By the end of filming he would go, “Come here,” and he would give me stories on The Deer Hunter, stories on Taxi Driver. There's a famous story… Meryl Streep was dating John Cazale, and at the time, De Niro and John were tight, and Cazale was dying of cancer. They wanted him for The Deer Hunter, but they were afraid that he might die while filming. I heard a story that De Niro had to put up his own money as insurance in case something happened. So, one day I got to talk to him about that, and he's like, “Yeah, it's true.” That, to me, is why I am an actor. Even now it moves me to even think about it.
So anyway, I do get starstruck, but in a healthy way. It’s not starstruck. It's more like complete reverence for people that are craftsmen.
You have four kids, right?
I do.
How has being a father influenced your work, especially in terms of what you bring to your characters, the way you approach your craft, and the roles you take on?
It can't help but affect you. It's the most important thing we'll ever do, be a father. You do the best you can. When they're hurting, it's way worse than if I'm hurting. You know what I mean? If I had Sophie's choice, I'd take a bullet. It wouldn't even take a second.
Are your parents still alive?
They're both alive. Knock on wood, man.
Did you take a lot of lessons from your own dad into being a father?
Oh, every day. Every day. My brother and I got a chance to follow what we wanted to do, and that's what I try to instill in my kids. I'm like, “You don't have to be perfect. You don't have to go to college if you don't want to, if that's not your thing, or you'll find it later. But whatever you do, you have to try to be good at it, and good to the people around you that you're in contact with, that's what matters.”
Your daughter, Giorgia Whigham, is following in your footsteps and pursuing a career in acting. Were you nervous when she made that decision?
Oh, yeah, of course.
It's a tough industry.
It's a brutal industry. It's brutal, man. There's a misnomer that I can somehow get her a gig. It actually works opposite to that. She has to follow in my footsteps. It's not who you know at the end of the day. My advice is always love what you do and learn how to really get good at it. It takes 20 years to learn how to really become an actor. That's where I have so many problems… you can win a Gordon Ramsay show, and then you can just be a chef all of a sudden. When that guy toiled and toiled under the greatest. You can win a singing contest and all of a sudden, you're a rock star instead of, you know, going to the corner of Greenwich Village like Bob Dylan or Springsteen. I think that you have to be careful with that, because it starts to beg the question, what is acting? For me: move me to laughter, scare the hell out of me, move me to tears, but make me feel something. Whether it's acting or it's a song, I want to feel something. I think if we're not careful, that will become a lost art, like storytelling.
You've achieved a lot in your career and personal life, and now at 56, you're navigating a different stage—both as a husband, father, and accomplished actor. How are you adjusting to this chapter and does your experience of success later in life shape how you view your future and your work moving forward?
That's interesting. I didn't have success until… I didn't do Tigerland until I was 30 years old. Do you know what a depression era baby is? You grew up in the depression, you think that you never have enough money. You can become a multimillionaire but… I think I'm kind of like that, in the way that I had some success late, so I'm just trying to take any great story. For me it's about writers and directors. It's weird, I'm 56, but if you ask me, I feel 36. I don't know if my best work is ahead of me, but I'll just keep taking chances.
What was the first big ticket item that you bought once you started to make some money?
I'm sitting in it. My house. We were basically living out of cardboard boxes. My missus, she looked at me one day, I remember, and she goes, “You know, it'd be nice to have a house someday.” So, I said, “I'm going to go do Kong: Skull Island, you find the house,” and when I got back, we bought this beautiful little house for the six of us.
What's the most inspiring book you've ever read?
I'll tell you one that I love: The Tender Bar, about a kid who's brought up in a bar. True story. But he ends up going to Yale, and he wins the Pulitzer Prize, but he's brought up in a bar, and you know, all the barflies teach him how to work hard in school, how to deal with a woman, how to play sports. J. R. Moehringer is his name.
Is there a particular role you didn’t land that still sticks with you?
No, I'm not coming up with anything. I think that it works out the way it works out. You know what I mean? There's nothing that screams at me that I lost out… Okay, I was very close to No Country for Old Men.
Oh, great movie, for which role?
Josh Brolin’s role. I went in and I met the Coens twice. Brolin, by the way, he was incredible. He put his stamp on the role. It was close, and I kind of got to know the Coen brothers a little bit, but it didn't hurt, but it was close.
What role are you most proud of that you've done?
Oh, man, that's like asking me which one of my kids is my favorite. Okay, I'd say, Eli, but that's the easy one. I would say, Tip, from All the Real Girls. It was early on, and I was trying to find my way, and that led me to more young directors like Jeff Nichols and Damien Chazelle and Cary Fukunaga. I had meetings with them early on, and they would say, “I wanna put something together with you because of that.” So that was really instrumental. I don't know, though, and then I go, Wilson, from Tigerland… I don't know, man, I don't know. All right, let's go, Eli, from Boardwalk. (Laughs)
