missy

Daniel Robert Epstein: Other than Joel [Schumacher] why did you decide to do this?

Colin Farrell: Because it's just such an interesting idea and concept and it's a challenge. The primary reason is to work with Joel again of course. The script is just great.

DRE: Did you get claustrophobic after working in a phone booth for so long?

CF: Not claustrophobic but I was a nervous wreck for 2 weeks doing it. I wasn't sleeping much. It was great, the amount of attention that was supposed to be for the story and emanated for the character in mind it helped that it was in a phone booth. That was kind of agitating and annoying, I couldn't go anywhere and my ear was shot. I was helped by the fact that we shot in continuity, because if we had shot sense out of order it would have been really rough. The way we shot sense from start to finish the way it was written at the end of the day it just means that when you went home got a couple hours sleep and came back the next day you just picked up where you left off the day before.

DRE: How has success changed your life?

CF: I fly more.

DRE: Has all the notoriety that has come to you changed you at all?

CF: Not really. What the fuck am I going to censor myself for. If I was going to change, I'd change for the worse. And if I have to do that, if I can't just live my life and enjoy it and be who or whatever the fuck I am then all this good fortune isn't worth it. I should just leave it all now and go home.

DRE: Did you have any publicist in mind when creating Stu?

CF: None in particular. We've all met people like that; whether they work at Burger King, an actor, a publicist or a bus driver, who are unforgivingly kind of self-centered. I mean he's not evil yet, he could end up being a nasty piece of work in ten or fifteen years but college did him a favor and pulled him back a few points.

DRE: You made this movie a while ago have you looked back at this film and seen things about yourself that you were surprised to see or not see and things that you have learned since?

CF: Acting is tricky, you can never exactly finger what you have learned or how you have evolved or how you have grown or developed. Life has no rhyme or reason, for me it's very hard to be a third eye on myself. I really don't want to see it again.

DRE: Is there anybody you would like to threaten in a phone booth?

CF: Is there anybody I would like to threaten in a phone booth and pull a gun on them?

DRE: No not put a gun on them, just torture.

CF: Oh, ah. This is too easy, I can think of something worse I'm sure.

DRE: [laughs] Was there any frequent lines you had in Phone Booth?

CF: In Phone Booth, there is a scene, not because of me because of Forest, when Forest comes up and he says you had a bad phone call today didn't you, I said the worst, he says it all went down after that, and I say I've been falling ever since, he says when you touch bottom. You know that bit at the end, we had this line at the end, I'm on an important call can you come back later I'm busy. It's so ridiculous, so fucking ridiculous and stupid.

DRE: Would you like the opportunity to play an Irish character and get back to your roots a little bit?

CF: I did a gig called Intermission last September maybe and I got to play an Irish character, it was an independent film. On Daredevil I got to use my Irish accent. Yeah man it's great. I am fortunate that I get to come and work over here and play very American characters.

DRE: Do you laugh about the rumors that are blatantly untrue in magazines?

CF: Yeah mostly. And if they quote me as saying something, there is an Irish paper that quoted me as saying something 2 weeks ago; they said Colin advocates casual sex without the use of condoms. I was on the fucking horn in two seconds flat. I got a retraction because that shit is dangerous. Yeah what am I going to do? I'm not going to be able to control any of that fucking shit.

DRE: You've had so many movies come out and you've done so much press. Do you like doing interviews?

CF: I signed on the dotted line, I took the money, and I got on the plane in Dublin. I can't. do I want it to be this way, no. When I thought of being an actor I didn't think about sitting at a table and talking to people about a film for two days. but if it's going to be a fact of life, it's going to be a fact of life, still new to me man.

DRE: When you're reflection on the process of being an actor, talking to us do you ever get insights, like I never thought of it that way?

CF: I don't know. I have no idea; I won't be releasing a book anytime soon. All I know is that I'm lucky to do a job that I love to do, and I don't take it too seriously. Your real life always winds up affecting your work, always.

DRE: Do you try to draw from your own experiences and then put them into the character?

CF: It's not so much experiences as it is feelings. Like a character in a film I have to sympathize, with having a dog and the dog dying, I'll just be raw with emotion and pain. I had never had a dog die in real life so what would I do. We've all felt pain, it's not a particular pain it's a particular physical experience. It's like trying to be one with your own life experience. I have no idea I'm still trying to figure the fucking thing out.

by Daniel Robert Epstein.