Kevin Spacey plays it
different in 'Pay It Forward'
By Michael Okwu, CNN
NEW YORK (CNN) - They are a producer's dream, the trio that stars in "Pay It
Forward," a movie about a big movement with small beginnings.
Oscar-winner Helen Hunt ("As Good As It Gets," 1997) is a struggling waitress
and an alcoholic mother on the mend. Oscar nominee Haley Joel Osment ("The Sixth
Sense," 1999) is her lonely son who conceives a fanciful idea to change the world.
And two-time Oscar-winner Kevin Spacey is his inspirational teacher.
Inspirational, but complicated. Years ago, Spacey's character was burned in a fire, and
the multiple scars he bears on his face mirror the emotional damage he suffers inside.
Spacey has played memorable parts "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil"
(1997), "L.A. Confidential" (1997) and "The Big Kahuna" (1999), among
other films. He also starred in "The Usual Suspects" (1995), for which he won a
best supporting actor Oscar, and "American Beauty" (1999), for which he won the
Oscar for best actor.
With "Pay It Forward" poised to open this weekend, Spacey recently spoke to
CNN Showbiz Today about acting, starring with such talented actors, and his obsession with
getting everything right - even down to the scars on his face.
CNN: With those fake scars off your face, you look like Kevin Spacey again.
Kevin Spacey: It (applying burn makeup) was pretty interesting. It was a
five-and-a-half-hour process every day, which wasn't so bad; it was just the process. We
rejected about six screen tests where my head looked like it had been dipped in bees' wax,
and I just couldn't live with it.
So that was very, very difficult, and we finally managed to find this look. I was
pretty pleased with it, because at a certain point in the film, I think you begin to look
beyond on them (scars) and start to forget about them. And I felt if that began to happen,
then the audience would begin to encourage him to forget about them -- which he's never
been able to do.
CNN: You talk about your role as if playing him was an interactive experience with the
audience.
Kevin Spacey: I think all films are; the good ones are interactive.
CNN: Do you have that sense, when you're on a set and there's no audience around you,
that you're interacting with an audience?*
Spacey: Yes, because if you're telling the story, (it) has sort of an arc to it, and
the characters are learning things about themselves that maybe the audience already
recognizes. You know you're laying in clues every now and then -- you're giving them sort
of a road map -- so that when things happen during the course of a film it won't come out
of nowhere. It has to be rooted somewhere so that an audience can say, "Ah, now I get
it."
And therefore they can go further into the movie, rather than say, "Where did that
come from?" That's how, as an actor, you try and figure out: What does a character
know? CNN: What was it about this role that made you decide to take it on? There some
people who, when they heard this plot, probably said, "Oh, corny."
 Spacey: Yeah, well there were risks in a
movie like this. I haven't seen it yet, so I don't know its level of goo, but I can tell
you that we tried pretty diligently to kind of drain it of all of that kind of unfocused
sentimentality.
I don't mind things that have sentiment. I mean, we're (emotionally) moved constantly.
But, you know, films that have a sort of do-gooder quality make your shoulders go up, and
you're like, "Oh, geez, can't I just have a beer?"
I had unbelievable teachers in my life. If they had not taken me by the shirt collar,
and sometimes taken me down a path kicking and screaming, my life would not have turned
out the way it has. And I wanted to portray a teacher in a very positive way, who had a
very positive effect on his students - and, in a funny way, the students had a hugely
positive effect on him.
CNN: Was it daunting for Haley Joel Osment to perform opposite you and Hunt? Or was it
daunting for you two to act opposite him?
Spacey: Let me tell you something: He's 12 years old and he does things that I wish
actors five times his age (would do). He stopped a scene once -- we were done, I was
finished, I was like, "I think we got that," and he was like, "Can we do
one more? I wasn't there for you, I just wasn't there for you" And he was right.
The fact of the matter is, he's this incredible little actor, but he's also a kid. He's
got his feet on the ground -- it's an example of great parenting. And whether he continues
to be an actor for the rest of his life, or he decides to do something else, he's going to
do it with the same degree of intelligence, and the same degree.
And I think Helen was extraordinary in this film. She's just like a force of nature,
and I really believe they (she and Osment) were related. I really believe that he could be
her son. So we became a very close set -- a unit. It was just a pleasure to come to the
set every day. |
