CIARAN HINDS: The Hollywood Interview

(Ciaran Hinds in The Eclipse, above.)

By Terry Keefe

“Starring Ciaran Hinds.” It’s about time.

The very talented Belfast-born actor has been the lead in numerous prominent stage productions over his career, but on-screen, he is better known for some of the best cinematic supporting work of the past ten years: as the under boss of sorts to Daniel Day-Lewis in There Will Be Blood; the slightly nerdy Mossad agent who falls for the absolutely wrong undercover woman in Munich; the President of Russia in The Sum of All Fears; and as an imposing, regal, but also very human, Julius Caesar in the HBO’s “Rome,” amongst many others. With The Eclipse, Hinds steps up to the top of the marquee, and the new suit fits him well. I just hope that he doesn’t swear off supporting roles in the future now, because Hinds has added an extra level of quality to more films than I can list, just by appearing in a few scenes.

The Eclipse was co-written, and directed, by Conor McPherson, who is also famed for his work as a playwright which has earned him three Tony nominations, and the film was based on a story called “Table Manners,” by Billy Roche, who co-wrote the screenplay with McPherson. Hinds plays Michael Farr, a recently widowed father of two, who was once an aspiring writer and is volunteering his time at a literary festival held in his seaside Irish town. Farr has been given the job of driving about an author of ghost stories named Lena Morelle (played by Iben Hjejle, last seen by most American audiences as John Cusack’s girlfriend in High Fidelity). The older man and the younger woman take a fancy to each other, and bond further when Farr asks her advice on the topic of ghosts…as he has been seeing a few ghosts of his own since the death of his wife. The ghosts may be true spirits, or they may be a manifestation of guilt, or both, and their presence lurks throughout the darkest corners of the film. Aidan Quinn plays a famous, slimy American author named Nicholas Holden, who is courting Lena as well. Holden likes to drink, and has read too much Hemingway, because he also thinks he can fight, something which the otherwise quiet Michael will test him on later in the film. Hinds, whose screen presence generally reads “Don’t screw with this guy,” isn’t the first person you would think of to play a somewhat passive, almost meek, character, but it was a deft choice by McPherson, because when this aging, slightly wounded lion does growl again, the transformation is quite powerful.

Hinds will soon be seen in two major studio films, John Carter of Mars, and in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 & II, as Aberforth Dumbledore.

I reached Ciaran (pronounced Keer-un) by phone when he was staying on the east coast of the U.S., during one of the worst snow storms of the past few years.

Hi, Ciaran.

Ciaran Hinds: Hello, Terry, how are you?

I’m well, thank you. You’re in New York right now?

I am in New York. In a bit of a blizzard [laughs].

Had you known Conor McPherson prior to The Eclipse, from your mutual work in the theater?

Yeah, yes, I had. I was being directed by him, in New York, on Broadway. We had just gotten into previews on his play, The Seafarer, and he asked, “Will you read this for me?” He came to me with this very slim, meager draft of just a few pages, based on a short story written by a friend of his. I read it, and there weren’t many pages, and what pages there were…there wasn’t a lot of “black” on it. But knowing Conor, and having worked with him, I knew he has an awful lot of it in his head. A lot of psychology, but he’s very economical. So, I knew this would be a great adventure to go on. I just knew it. I trusted him because of our work in the theater. It was a real pleasure to be asked to do this.

(Hinds and Hjejle, above.)

Something unique about Conor’s directing style is that many of his shots are very complex, and elaborate…but subtly so. There’s a lot going on in the corners and backgrounds of the frame often - sometimes small things are happening out the window in the rear of a shot - but he also doesn’t go out of his way to draw much attention to those elements.

I’m glad you thought so! I think he knows very well how to draw you into an emotion, or create a feeling, without making a huge statement about it. I think he filmed it brilliantly, I must say.

In terms of blocking, did he let you, and the other actors, know much about what he had planned for his shots, in terms of the more subtle visual elements that are happening in addition to the main action of the scene?

No, not really. I suppose because of the nature [of the piece], and the very short amount of time we had to shoot it, he was trying to be economical, at times, with the camera, and also not to be too fussy with it, around certain issues. He didn’t try to accommodate that much camera movement. He actually kept the camera still a lot of the time, and people expressed themselves within that [frame]. He also didn’t use a lot of close-ups.

That’s true. He stayed wide often.

Because he wanted to give you a “place” to watch these people move and see them how they interact, and how they relate, and a lot of how people relate is physically, not just with a camera showing their face acting, or emoting.

He didn’t shoot a lot of close-ups, also, because he wanted to give the audience that atmosphere of landscape, of these people within that landscape. The landscape also adds to the emotional sense of what the audience picks up, which you can’t do if you’re only offering up the emotion of a face contorting itself through whatever heightened emotions there are. There is something about observing the entire physical presence of people.

It was kind of a very European way he shot it, but at the same time, I think he was very honest about what he was trying to say in the story itself, and he was prepared to trust that whatever we were doing would come out without the need for close-ups.

(Director Conor McPherson, above.)

The ghosts in The Eclipse are obviously not presented in a traditional horror film sense of going for a big scare, other than in one scene. They are more part of the landscape, to borrow that term. Sort of co-existing with the living, if they are in fact actual spirits, which they may not be. What sort of conversations did you and Conor have about how the ghosts were to be perceived in the film?

I think he wanted to play with the idea of these things that arrive…I suppose there are a couple of forms of them…one of them is pretty malign, and the other is benign, if you like…and leave [open] whether they are self-manifested, through imagination, or if they are in fact a visitation. I think that is open to interpretation, and I do believe that Conor wanted to leave it that way. Because, as human beings, we all see things differently. We all have different sensations, and you don’t want to define exactly what it meant. At the same time, he’s been pretty bold, I feel, with the choice of what he’s offered up. The idea of one [ghost] being this malignant, bilious, raging, dark thing….a sort of sense of guilt that I think that Michael has, and a sense of sudden panic that goes off; whereas the other one is a kind of comfort, a kind of cathartic relief that he needs.

(Hinds and Hjejle, above.)

Partially because of your character’s amateur boxing background, as well as his hidden strength, I wanted to ask if the classic Irish-based short story “The Quiet Man” (by Maurice Walsh, later made into the John Ford film with John Wayne,) was discussed as an inspiration at all for The Eclipse?

[laughs] No, it wasn’t. That was shot up in Galway. I didn’t know it was a short story, actually. Conor did take the idea from a short story, “Table Manners” by Billy Roche, which was also set in a small town during a writing festival, and it was about a man, a woman, and another writer. But it was a different sort of man, because this Michael Farr was married, and sort of thought he was a writer too, and started sort of stalking, and obsessing about this female writer, much like the way the Nicholas Holden character does [in the film version]. Conor’s wife read it and said, “There is something odd about this.” You may, in a story, go into the mind of a protagonist, say, and whether you like him or not, you can follow it. But you put that on screen, and people will say, “What type of person is this? He’s obsessing about this other woman, but he’s got a wife.” She suggested that maybe Michael be a widower, and change the whole nature of the character, in a way. Because if he’s a widower, and going through some type of grief, then he’s not really himself, and at the same time, Conor went, “He can be haunted.” I’ve been in a couple of Conor’s plays, and there is always the sense of the other. Of the outside. Of the things we don’t know, even though we believe we do. There is a lot of stuff humankind can’t really work out. Conor feels that even if we aren’t aware of it, it is still, in a way, ever-present. He uses that.

You’re often cast in roles where your characters are quite tough. Was there any significant process you had to go through to play Michael Farr, who is tough, but softer on the outside?

I think the answer to that is Michael Farr is a much more like me than all the other ones [that I’ve played]. I think Conor would say that’s why he offered me the part, because, having worked with me, he knows that I’m warmer [than many of my characters] and more open, and not quite sure of the next move, or how it should go, and have some doubt. That’s more who I am. He wanted to use me as a template for the character.

Did you find the need to create much additional back story for Michael, or was the script enough in that regard?

The script was enough. I decided to use my imagination. I don’t think there are many books you can read as to how you’re supposed to behave while you’re under psychological pressure. What was very important to me was that, with the two kids Eanna (Hardwicke) and Hannah (Lynch). I wanted to make sure that we felt like a real family. That I could make them feel I loved them. And generally, I did. They suffered me as a father for a few weeks [laughs].

You had a great fight scene with Aidan Quinn, which Iben was also in. What type of blocking and rehearsal went into it?

It was crazy, we had one day to shoot that.

Really?

Yeah, it was a very small film, and so we had to listen very carefully to Andy Bradford, the stuntman, who came over for the morning and said what are we going to do and who is going to do it, and sort of choreographed it.

It’s also in the characters [the fight]...it’s a great expression of who these people are, really. It’s not just a fight. It’s how they fight. When they punch, or don’t punch. Even Iben, who I think is a dynamite actress.

Did anyone get hit accidentally? It looked pretty rough.

I tell you, we shot between 7 and about 9:30, and I think Iben stubbed her toe on a piece of furniture, or something. We found out it was broken later on, but she just taped it to the other toe and carried on. Because there’s no point. She said, “We can’t stop. There’s no time. Tape it up.” [laughs]

(Aidan Quinn as best-selling author Nicholas Holden, above.)

Career-wise, are leads something you’re deliberately seeking out more right now?

No, not really. I don’t have a particularly design. In theater, people ask me, “Do you want to play Hamlet? Do you want to play Macbeth?” And [my answer is], “Not really. But it depends with who.” I suppose I’m more of a collaborator. I’m always, “What’s the story?” If the story grabs me, it’s always nice to be a part of something. Sometimes you have to take more responsibility than at other times. But it’s not like this is my calling card, or anything. Conor chose me, and I’m glad that it seems to have worked. But I wouldn’t be adverse to working with Conor again in a film where I wasn’t the lead.

The Eclipse opens today, Friday March 26th in New York and Los Angeles, via Magnolia Pictures.

The official site of the film and the trailer can be found here.

Some of the Many Other Faces of Ciaran Hinds, below:

(In "Rome," above.)

(In There Will Be Blood, above.)

(In Munich, above, with Daniel Craig, Eric Bana, and Mathieu Kassovitz)