Kevin Spacey
speaker
258 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Jun 2024
last heard Jun 2024
Kevin Spacey’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
I don't really think there is any. I think there's just... you eventually learn about yourself on film. You know, when I first did like my first episode of The Equalizer, you know, it's just, it's just horrible. It's just so bad. But I didn't know about myself. I didn't, so slowly you begin to learn about yourself, but I think good acting is good acting. And I think that,
If a camera's right here, you know that your front row is also your back row. You just don't have to do so much. There is...
in theater a particular kind of energy almost like an athlete that you have to have vocally to be able to get up seven performances a week and never lose your voice and always be there and always be alive and always be doing the best work you can that you just don't require in film you know you don't have to have the same um It just doesn't require the same kind of stamina that doing a play does.
Yeah, but you have no idea what's going on on stage with the actors. I mean, I have literally laughed thickly through speeches that I had to give because my fellow actors were putting carrots up their nose or broccoli in their ears or doing whatever they were doing to make me laugh. So they're just having fun. They're having the time of their life.
And by the way, Judi Dench is the worst giggler of all. I mean, they had to bring the curtain down on her and Maggie Smith because they were laughing so hard they could not continue the play.
It can be helpful. But Improv is, I'm a big, such a big believer in the writing and in serving the writing and doing the words the writer wrote. That improv for me, unless you're just doing like comedy and, you know, like, I mean, I love improv and In comedy, it's brilliant. So much fun to watch people just come up with something right there.
But that's where you're looking for laughs and you're specifically in a little scene that's being created. But I think improv has had value, but I have not experienced it as much in doing plays as I have sometimes in doing film where you'll start off rehearsing and a director may say, let's just go off book and see what happens.
And I've had moments in film where someone went off book and it was terrifying. There was a scene I had in Glen Gary Glen Ross where the character I play has fucked something up, has just screwed something up, and Pacino is livid. And so we had this scene where Al is walking like this, and the camera is moving with him, and he is chewing me a new asshole.
And in the middle of the take, Al starts talking about me,
And I'm now, I'm literally like, I don't know what the hell is happening, but I'm reacting. We got to the end of that take. Al walked up to me and he went, oh, that was so good.
Oh, that was so good. You look like a car wreck. And I was like, yeah. And it was actually an incredibly generous thing that he gave me so that I would react. Oh, wow. Did they use that shot? Because you were in shock. It was my closeup. Yeah.
Well, he's the reason I got the movie. A lot of people might think because Jack was in the film that he had something to do with it. But actually, I was doing a play called Lost in Yonkers on Broadway. And we had the same dresser who worked with him, a girl named Laura. It was wonderful. Laura Beattie. And she told Al that he should come and see this play because she wanted to see me in this play.
I was playing this gangster. It was a fun, fun, fun part. So I didn't know Pacino came on some night and saw this play. And then like three days later, I got a call to come in and audition for this Glen Ross, which of course I knew is a play, David Mamet's play. And then I auditioned. Jamie Foley was the director who would eventually direct a bunch of House of Cards. Wonderful, wonderful guy.
And I got the part. Well, I didn't quite get the part. They were going to bring together the actors that they thought they were going to give the parts to on a Saturday at Al's office. And they asked me if I would come and do a read-through. And I said, who's going to be there? And they said, well, so-and-so and so-and-so and so-and-so. And then Jack Lemmon is flying in.
And I said, don't tell Mr. Lemmon that I'm doing the read-through. Is that possible? And they were like, sure. So I'll never forget this. Jack was sitting in a chair in Pacino's office. doing the New York Times crossword puzzle as he did every day. And I walked in the door and he went, oh, Jesus Christ. Is it possible you could get a job without me? Jesus Christ.
I'm so tired of holding up your end of it. Oh, my God. Jesus Christ. So I got the job because of Pacino. And it was really one of the first major roles that I ever had in a film. And, you know, to be working with that group,
Well, by that time, we had done Long Day's Journey Tonight in the theater. We'd done a miniseries called The Murder of Mary Fagan on NBC. We'd done a film called Dad. that Gary David Goldberg directed, with Ted Danson. So this was the fourth time we were working together, and we knew each other. He'd become my father figure.
And I don't know if you know that I originally met Jack Lemmon when I was very, very young. He was doing a production at the Mark Taper Forum of a Sean O'Casey play called Juno and the Peacock with Walter Matthau and Maureen Stapleton. And on a Saturday in December of 1974, my junior high school drama class went to a workshop. It was called How to Audition. And we did this workshop.
Many schools in Southern California were part of this Drama Teachers Association. So we got these incredible experiences of being able to go see professional productions and be involved in these workshops or festivals. So I had to get up and do a monologue in front of Mr. Lemon when I was 13 years old. And he walked up to me at the end of that, and he put his hand on my shoulder, and he said,
He said, no, everything I've been talking about, you just did. What's your name? I said, Kevin. He said, wait, let me tell you something. When you get finished with high school, as I'm sure you're going to go on and do theater, you should go to New York and you should study to be an actor because this is what you're meant to do with your life. And he was like an idol. And 12 years later,
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