There are few ways to get really close to the stars at film festivals. Maybe that’s why Javier Bardem gave it his all when he took a full hour and a half to talk about his impressive career, his first impressions of the Dune 2 script and a little bit of life itself during a panel discussion in Cannes in front of a packed cinema auditorium. And let it be known that he not a fan of method acting ultras who appropriate only the most tragic aspects of their character.
For Dune star Javier Bardem, there is no character made entirely of pain
Towards the end of the master class, the audience was allowed to ask the star questions themselves. When asked by a young actress how to take care of yourself not to get lost in abysmal figuresBardem found a clear answer.
“I did a movie, The Roads Not Taken, where I play a guy with dementia. Before that I had all sorts of tests done by my doctor to make sure I didn’t have dementia myself. Before Biutiful me myself be screened for prostate cancer. I need to know I’m healthy so I can play someone who’s sick.”
It is important for the Dune-Star to have a clear border between one’s own self and the respective role to pull. Especially when it gets dark. “Other than that, I’m so connected to the character’s pain that I can’t see anything but the pain. There’s no character that’s just pain.”
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This is a clear antithesis to the kind of method acting that Actors like Succession star Jeremy Strong and – above all – Jared Leto represented, and in which the aim is not to play something, but to experience it firsthand in order to be able to present it authentically. We remember: Leto only walked around on crutches during the shooting of Morbius in order to be able to better empathize with his ailing character. And thus stopped the whole production.
Jared Leto lost himself as the Joker in his character’s madness
The most notorious Leto action will probably always remain his attempt to transform into the Joker for his ultimately very manageable role in Suicide Squad. For months, the actor terrorized his colleagues, sent them dead animals and generally seemed to behave unbearably away from the cameras.
By the way, it didn’t help the film. Jared Leto’s Joker is still the running gag of his career to this day. Maybe he should have talked to Javier Bardem beforehand, because he said in Cannes:
“If you focusing too much on a character’s madness, you lose perspective of what he actually stands for as a person. If you’re playing someone insane, go see a psychiatrist and make sure you’re okay. Then you can play madness with creative freedom and joy.”
Bardem knows what he’s talking about. Eventually he became for his terrifying psychopath role in No Country for Old Men won an Oscar. And let’s put it this way: He doesn’t seem to have terrorized his co-stars for it.
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Who do you think plays the better villains: Javier Bardem or Jared Leto?