BEST ACTOR OSCAR-WINNER Jeff Bridges: The Hollywood Flashback Interview

2010 Best Actor Academy Award-winner Jeff Bridges.

Editor’s Note: Congratulations to Jeff Bridges for finally getting his props with last night's win for "Crazy Heart"! He's now officially lost the title of "Most Underrated Actor of His Generation." In the spirit of Jeff's victory, we at The Interview thought it appropriate to share this article, which originally appeared in the July 1999 issue of Venice Magazine. Enjoy, and well-done, Jeff!

BUILDING BRIDGES
By
Alex Simon

Jeff Bridges is arguably the most underrated great American actor since the late Robert Ryan. A performer of incredible range, whose myriad of characterizations over the past 30 years leave the filmgoer with a continued sense of awe and admiration, Bridges' refusal to fit a mold on-screen might be the very thing that has kept him from becoming a conventional movie star. It's also the thing that has kept his work so fascinating, and so brilliant.

Born into a show business family as the second son of the late Lloyd Bridges and his wife Dorothy, Jeff came into the world December 4, 1949 in Los Angeles and made his first screen appearance at the age of four months, playing the infant in Jane Greer's arms in The Company She Keeps (1950). Bridges appeared on TV's "Sea Hunt" with his father eight years later and was an occasional performer, with older brother Beau, on "The Lloyd Bridges Show" in 1962.

After a stint in the Coast Guard Reserve and drama studies at New York's Herbert Berghof Studio, Jeff made his adult film debut in Halls of Anger, a B picture about student unrest, in 1970. This was followed by the unseen The Yin and Yang of Mr. Go (1970). Having paid his dues with two minor films, Jeff hit pay dirt with the classic The Last Picture Show (1971), portraying Duane, the town football hero and love of local bad girl Cybill Shepherd in Peter Bogdonavich's portrait of a small Texas town in the early 1950's. Bridges was nominated for an Academy Award as Best Supporting Actor for his breakthrough role, and he hasn't stopped working since. Other film highlights include John Huston's Fat City (1972), Robert Benton's Bad Company (1972), The Last American Hero and John Frankenheimer's film of Eugene O'Neil's The Iceman Cometh (both 1973). The Clint Eastwood actioner Thunderbolt and Lightfoot (1974, Jeff's second Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor), Rancho Deluxe (1975), Bob Rafelson's Stay Hungry (1976), Heaven's Gate (1980), Cutter's Way (1981), Tron (1982), Against All Odds (1984) and John Carpenter's Starman (also 1984, nominated for Best Actor), Jagged Edge (1985), Francis Ford Coppola's Tucker (1988), The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989), The Fisher King (1991), American Heart (1993), Peter Weir's Fearless (1993), and the Coen Brothers' comedy The Big Lebowski (1998). Jeff's production company, Asis Productions, produced the Showtime movie "Hidden In America" (1996), starring brother Beau, which dealt with hunger in America, a subject close to Jeff's heart. The film received a Golden Globe nomination in 1996 for Best TV/Cable Film and earned a Screen Actor's Guild award for Beau as Best Actor. Jeff, who moved his family to Santa Barbara after the '94 Northridge earthquake ("It turned out we had our own private fault line around the old house"), is also a gifted musician, and is putting the finishing touches on his first CD (backed by David Crosby and Michael McDonald), as well as being a prolific photographer. An exhibit of his photos is currently on display at the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Santa Monica.

The prolific Mr. Bridges has two new films on deck this summer: the home-grown terrorism thriller Arlington Road in which he co-stars with Tim Robbins and Joan Cusak, and Albert Brooks' scathing new comedy The Muse, co-starring Brooks, Sharon Stone and Andie MacDowell. Both films hit screens in July.

One would assume, based on his numerous portrayals of good guys, that Jeff Bridges would be a good guy in person. In fact, Jeff is so cool, laid-back and unassuming, that a bite to eat with him after a photo session feels like a friendly lunch with your next door neighbor or old college buddy. After a few bites of pasta, you forget you're talking to one of the world's great actors and almost want to ask him if he'd like to fire up a stogie and watch the playoffs on the big screen while you polish off the last of your old man's imported beer. We didn't, but it was tempting...

Arlington Road reminded me of the great paranoid thrillers of the 70's, like The Parallax View (1974).
Jeff Bridges: Yeah, I responded really strongly to the script right away when I read it. It was one of those situations where the writer was always ahead of you. The twists and turns were amazing. I read it completely cold, didn't know anything about it. It was a wonderful read just for that reason. Also, I knew Tim Robbins was involved and I had always admired his work, and knew this would be an opportunity to work with him, although when I read it, we weren't sure who was going to play what part. Tim's wonderful to work with. He's a really generous actor.

Your character was sort of a classic Hitchcock everyman thrown into an extraordinary situation.
Yeah, it had a lot of Hitchcockian elements, which I also liked. (Director) Mark Pellington was another reason I wanted to be involved. I met with him and saw a wonderful documentary he did on his father. The way he shot it was a real plus.

With your character in The Muse, you couldn't have two more different guys. Did you base your character of the wildly successful screenwriter on anyone?
(laughs) I was told that he was based on Jim Brooks (Terms of Endearment, As Good As It Gets), who is a good friend of Albert's. I've never met Jim Brooks, but this character was great fun, and I'm a big fan of Albert's. I loved Lost In America (1985), and a lot of his other films. People wonder how Hollywood works, and it's true that people in this town are always looking for that "special thing." I think the idea that there's this muse, feeding the writer ideas and inspiration is a wonderful one. And maybe it's true...(laughs)

Were you drawn to acting from an early age? When you were hanging out on the "Sea Hunt" set, did you know that this is what you wanted to do?
Not really. I was carried on-screen when I was six months old by Jane Greer, then worked with her again in Against All Odds, 30 some-odd years later. The scene where she carried me on, I had to be crying. And I was a real happy baby, so my mother instructed Jane to just pinch me to make me cry. So 30 years later, in Against All Odds, I went up to Jane before a really emotional scene and said "Could you just give me a little pinch?" (laughs)

Did it work a second time?
Yeah, it did. She's a wonderful actress, Jane Greer. She was in the film that Against All Odds is based on (Out of the Past, 1947), and her performance was so wonderful, so understated, especially for the times. It was a particularly bizarre shoot for us, though. Remember that Rachel Ward and I had some pretty torrid love scenes? All that stuff in Mexico was shot while she was on her honeymoon! (groans and laughs) Luckily her husband, Bryan Brown, is also a wonderful actor, and a very understanding one!

How do you wife and kids react when you have to do a torrid love scene on film?
I think it probably makes them feel uncomfortable more when people ask them about it, and how they feel. My wife is very supportive. I almost feel like she should get a credit up on the screen along with me. But you were asking about when I decided to act...I had done quite a few pictures before I finally decided to act full time. For a long time I had wanted to get into music...actually all my music is kind of resurfacing now. One of the great things about living up in Santa Barbara is that there are so many great musicians up there. So, I'm making an album. I've started a record label and am releasing it myself. It's a mix of rock, jazz, some reggae-type stuff. Three songs were written by a wonderful songwriter named John Goodwin, who's my oldest friend. We grew up together. Michael McDonald and David Crosby are my backup singers! (laughs)

Not too shabby.
No. We've been having a great time. So after thirty-five years of writing songs, it's finally come around. I play piano and guitar in the band.

Didn't your dad do some musical theater?
Yeah, he replaced Richard Kiley in Man of La Mancha and did Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls. He used to love to sing.

He also was a wonderful Shakespearian actor, right? He must've found it frustrating, always getting cast as action heroes.
Yeah, he loved doing Shakespeare. But he pulled off "Sea Hunt" so well, people actually thought he was a real diver, that he was Mike Nelson! So he was typecast as that. Years later, when I was doing Blown Away, there was this part of my uncle. So I talked the producers, and said, 'I know this really terrific actor named Lloyd Bridges who'd be perfect for this.' And they thought about it and said "Yeah but, isn't he really more of a comedic actor, like in Airplane?'"He pulled that off so well, spoofing himself, that finally that's how he was typecast.

Let's go back to how you decided to stick with acting.
I remember the moment. It was right after The Last American Hero. Usually after a film, because acting uses a certain emotional muscle, I feel pretty wiped out and don't want to act right away again. Thank God that feeling passes! (laughs) So my agent called me, and said that John Frankenheimer was doing a film of The Iceman Cometh with Robert Ryan, Lee Marvin and Frederic March and wanted me to be in it. I said 'No man, I want to get back to my music. I've got other things I want to do.' A couple hours later, Lamont Johnson, who'd just directed me in The Last American Hero called and just read me the riot act: "You call yourself an actor?! How can you turn down this opportunity to work with these masters of your craft?!" So I decided to do a little experiment on myself to see if I really wanted to make this my full time job. I figured professionals are supposed to do it, even if they don't feel like it. So that's what I'll do. And it turned out to be a really great experience. It was all shot on one set. Usually on a film you might rehearse for a week or two then spent eight or ten weeks shooting. On this, we rehearsed for eight weeks and shot for two weeks. It was all of us sitting around a table, all these great actors. All my scenes were with Robert Ryan, who's a guy who kind of stands alone. He's such an underrated actor. So it was hanging out with all these great actors and learning from them. It was kind of like a play that we could have taken on the road. John Frankenheimer did such a masterful job of shooting it, keeping the camera moving. The cameras used these huge magazines that could do ten minute takes...I'm not that knocked out by my performance, looking back (laughs). But it was great working with all those guys, and working with them made me realize that this is what I wanted to do.

Let's start with The Last Picture Show. Apparently there was as much drama going on behind the cameras as in front.
It was a great experience. I was 19 or 20 years old, getting to do kissing scenes with Cybill Shepherd...

That must've been tough.
(laughs) Oh yeah, it was. Everyone was in love with her. Peter (Bogdanovich) was so wonderful. The cinematographer, Robert Surtees, was incredible. He was a true master. The whole cast was great. I always felt that Tim Bottoms never got enough acclaim for his work in that picture. He's a wonderful actor. My favorite scene in that movie is the last scene between he and Cloris in her kitchen...Peter had such courage as a director to let the silence in the scenes just hang there. It was amazing. We had a great time going back 20 years later to do Texasville (1990), which was also written by Larry McMurtry. It was just like we'd had a long weekend, and then came back to work...Larry McMurtry just wrote a new book, the third installment, called "Duane's Despressed." (laughs)

He's turning into John Updike. Your character is like Rabbit.
That's right! (laughs) I'm looking forward to reading the book, hoping that down the line we can all get together and do it again, although Texasville didn't do that well, so it might be kind of tough. Peter's original idea for Texasville was to have it on a double bill with The Last Picture Show, which would have been interesting, but that never happened.

Tell us about working with John Huston.
I'm flooded with so many memories...the first thing I remember is the interview. I think Beau got me that gig. Huston thought he was too old for the part, so Beau said 'Why don't you check out my younger brother?' So I had the interview in Madrid, Spain. The night that I landed, I met this girl in the lobby and she took me out on the town and we ate all this great seafood, drank and really had a ball. The next morning I was feeling rather peculiar. All of the sudden when I got to the interview, it turned out that I was really sick. It turned out that I had food poisoning, from the shellfish. The interview was at this museum. John showed me all this fine art while I was vomiting with my mouth closed and swallowing it, trying to maintain! (laughs) He didn't notice at all, just kept showing me all his favorite paintings! I went back to the hotel and was so weak, I couldn't pick up the phone to call for help. Who saved my life, but James Mason, who was staying at the hotel and with whom I'd done a rather obscure picture called The Yin and Yang of Mr. Go, which was directed by Burgess Meredith. Funny story about that: James played a Chinese Mexican in the film...the money fell through and we finally all had to leave Hong Kong and come home. Fifteen years later, I'm flipping through a film catalogue and there's the film! I called Burgess and we had a screening. It was the saddest, funniest thing I've ever been involved in. All the scenes that we left out, they made cartoons out of! (laughs) Then they invented another character played by Broderick Crawford and just spliced him in! (imitating Crawford) "Yeah, I saw him over there, over at Sally's!" Then they'd have a cartoon of me and James Mason...we were laughing and crying at the same time, because this was Burgess' baby.

Let's talk about your photography.
I've been taking pictures for years now, usually on the sets of my movies and at the end of the shoots, I make up books of the pictures and give them to everyone as souvenirs. I've been using a Widelux camera, which is a panoramic camera, sort of what a letterboxed film looks like on video or DVD. I'm putting together a coffetable book of pictures which should be available in a year or so. I'm also getting into the web a little bit, and have a website up (http://www.jeffbridges.com/) if people are interested in what's cooking with either one of those things. It's funny, because I'm not a computer guy at all. I was sucked into a computer in Tron once, but that's another story. (laughs)

Tell us about working with Clint Eastwood on Thunderbolt and Lightfoot.
Well, it was Michael (The Deer Hunter, 1978 Best Picture) Cimino's first film. Clint produced it, and was giving Michael a directorial shot after he'd written Magnum Force (with John Milius) for Clint before that. It was the first film I did up in Montana, and I fell in love with that state. Later, I bought some property and built a house up there. It was a great experience. Clint likes doing very few takes, one, maybe two at most, whereas Michael likes to do a lot, but couldn't since Clint was the producer. So there was one scene where I wasn't happy with the way it was going, and we'd already done a couple takes. So I went to Michael, and said I wanted to do it again. Everyone got really nervous, including Michael, who said "I don't know man, I'm gonna have to ask the boss," meaning Clint. So this hush sort of falls over the set when Clint comes back. He looks around, looks at me, looks at Michael and says "Give the kid another try." (laughs)

How different was Cimino on Heaven's Gate? Did it feel like a disaster?
No, not at all, and I still think it's a terrific film. Michael was very hot off The Deer Hunter, which had won all these awards, so he pretty much had free reign to do as he pleased. He'd shoot dozens of takes, sometimes 50 or 60. The problem with that is, you never know on which take you really have to be "on" as an actor and it sort of threw a lot of us out of synch. The other thing I remember was during the big shoot-out at the end, we all had to ride in a circle, half going one way and half the other. Now most of these guys playing cowboys were real Montana cowboys. And Michael must've had us do two dozen takes of riding around in circles--right at each other! I remember right before every take just going 'Please God, let me live through this one!" (laugh) One of the saddest memories I have making films is going to the premiere of the film in New York and the reviews the next morning. And that terrible sound of a smattering of applause at the end. I notice that every time I've seen the film, I enjoy it more. I think that might be a function of starting to relax into the film's pace, knowing what I'm in store for. I think it's very American, especially nowadays, to be used to seeing cut, cut, cut up on the screen. Even if you're not realizing what's making you uncomfortable, that's what it probably is...a big part of how much a person enjoys a film is what they know about it going in, either from the trailer, the ad in the newspaper or the reviews. And with Heaven's Gate, the reviews were so terrible! Talk about preparation going to see a film! And the reviews were so personal. One review said "If they shaved Michael Cimino's head, they'd find three 6's." I mean, what the fuck is that?! It'll be interesting to see, 10 or 20 years from now, how that film is received. On a positive note, Cimino gave me the whorehouse and that barn on that huge ranch at the end of the shoot, and that's now my house in Montana. The barn's my studio.

Winter Kills is a really crazy, interesting movie.
Yeah...boy. That was another first-time director, Bill Richert. It was all kind of a fictitious version of what happened with the Kennedy clan, sort of crossed similar territory that Oliver Stone's movie did ten years later, in a sort of weird way. That was an interesting film because, here's this young director, who was so charismatic...do you remember the cast he assembled? John Huston, Elizabeth Taylor, Toshiro Mifune, Sterling Hayden, Thomas Milian, Jack Elam, Belinda Bauer, Richard Boone...just a wild, wild cast! He got all these people just out of his sheer excitement about the project. It was interesting on a lot of levels. I had a chance to work with John Huston as an actor as opposed to a director, which was quite different. During Fat City he kind of kept me on my heels. He and Stacy Keach, who did the lead, were very close, but he kept me on my heels, saying things like (as Huston) "We've scheduled some fights for you, Jeff. We're going to turn you pro..." I was so in awe of him. During Winter Kills it was just the opposite. We sort of hung out and you always got the feeling that he was giving the actors lessons in how to work with a director. He was so deferential to Bill Richert, who'd never directed a film before. He was really wonderful. I feel so blessed to have worked with him on both those films. I keep waiting for an opportunity to work with Angelica now, I love her work so much.

Beau starred in Hal Ashby's first movie (The Landlord, 1970) and you starred in his last (8 Million Ways to Die, 1986). Tell us about Hal Ashby.
He was really one of my favorite directors I've ever worked with, a real master, and such "art balls." He would have such faith in the actors and himself and the whole process, that he would be so relaxed that it would seem to an outside person that he was unprepared. It was really just this faith in the artistic process. You just have to look at his work to see it. One of the sad, and tragic things about 8 Million Ways to Die, was the producer had hired this brilliant director who presented the script to me. I said 'Why does Hal want to do this? It seems like kind of a cop, shoot-em up picture.' Hal said "No, no. I want to get into the character's obsession with alcohol, and a whole different thing. I don't really know why I want to do it, which is maybe why I want to do it. The only way I'm going to figure out why is to get inside and examine it." I was eager to work with him, so I got in there. The way he worked, I can understand why the money guys would get frustrated. He would throw out a lot of the script and do a lot of improvisation. Coming from being an editor, which is another great place for a director to come from, he would draw on that skill. I remember him saying the secret to being a great editor is to making yourself so familiar with all the film that you've got, and just sit there and go over, and over every single piece. So the producer was on the set often, had no respect for Hal's process at all. Hal was very smart when one of the producer's guys came to the set to spy on Hal. Hal hired him into his camp to be my technical adviser because he was a recovering alcoholic! He was a wealth of information and most of my speeches were worked out with him...somehow, miraculously, Hal shot the film the way he wanted to shoot it. Then it got down to the last weeks of shooting, with a few days left, and the producer comes down and says "You've got one more day." So Hal, very brilliantly, made us all feel like we had all the time in the world. He let Andy Garcia, whose first film this was, do a bunch of takes for the bit he did on the phone. He wouldn't rush him. He said "Let him discover the scene." And at the end of the day, Hal got everything he needed! Hal was going to take some time off and he gave the film to his editor. The producer came in, fired Hal, came after the negative, then proceeded to cut the entire film against the grain that Hal shot it. Hal was making all these editorial choices in the camera while he was shooting. I remember asking Hal 'Are we going to do much looping in this film?' Hal said "I've never looped a film in my life! I'm an editor. I know how to take a razor blade, shave the emulsion off the film, and splice sound in." I ended up looping about 100 lines after the producer re-cut it. It broke Hal's heart, it really did...We didn't know that he was sick at the time, but he probably was.

Cutter's Way is a very underrated film.
Yeah, I think so, too. Ivan Passer directed it, who's wonderful. We shot it up in Santa Barbara, which is when I really fell in love with it. Ivan was, I don't want to say passive, but he said very little and created this wonderful sort of atmosphere where it could all take place. Jordan Cronenweth shot it beautifully and Jack Nietzsche did a beautiful score done entirely with German women playing champagne glasses. It was amazing. John Heard gave a really remarkable performance. He should have been nominated for an Academy Award.

What was it like acting against a computer in Tron?
It was a mammoth undertaking. It was shot on 70 mm, black and white, then hand-tinted in Korea. At the time it was very innovative, although I think it looks kind of dated now. Wendy Carlos did a great score for it. It was maddening, man. It was a long shoot, four months. I had to go to work every day and put on a dance belt, which is like a jock strap with only one strap--right up your ass! So sitting down or doing any sort of...it was terrible, man. All the sets were black velvet and we were wearing white clothes. After a month in there...I wish they'd explored the love triangle a little more.

How did you approach your characterization in Starman?
I remember going in and reading for John Carpenter. I almost gave myself one of these adjustments that actors give themselves. It was almost like I became a small being inside this huge body and I had to kind of steer it around, you know? I was always trying to "act appropriate," as human as possible. If he was crossing his legs, his legs would be crossed, but his weight wouldn't be quite on them because they weren't being crossed for the same reason that we humans would cross them.

He almost seemed like a baby.
Yeah, and I thought if I could get that initial scene when he's being born, if I could get that together and make that as real as possible, then it would just be a process of him getting more and more human towards the end. I have a dancer friend. One of the things I do to prepare for roles is get a role model, so I'll look through my phone book and find someone who reminds me of the person I'm about to play. So with Starman, I looked through my book for strange friends who I wouldn't be surprised to find out that they were an alien. (laughs) So I came across this guy named Russell Clark who I'd been friends with for years. So I had the studio hire him and we worked for about a week and videoed the work, doing a lot of body work for the birth scene. One of my fond memories of making that film was, I was in my study, reviewing all the tapes I'd made. And I was in there, naked, doing that opening scene of Starman's birth and my wife opened the door, came in, and saw me huddled in the corner, nude. (laughs) She had a very strange expression on her face and very quietly closed the door and left me alone! And also my daughters were small at that time, and I observed how they were in their bodies. I looked at different birds also, that kind of thing.

Who was your role model for your character in Jagged Edge?
I read a book by M. Scott Peck called "People of the Lie." And it was his study of evil people and what evil was all about. It was about selfishness, putting the self above everything else. So that book helped me a lot. As far as people I modeled him after, I really looked into myself, my own dark side for that. I tried to imagine what it would be like to be a sociopath. There's something about that idea that's very attractive to most of us, to do just exactly what you want to do. To just satisfy your own impulses. To me the theme of that character was what that kind of evil costs, because ultimately what we all want is love. To be loved and to express love. Of course when you're that evil and self-concerned, you're the most unloveable that you can be. What you really want, you can't have, because you can't let somebody know who you really are.

On the opposite end of the spectrum from that character was Preston Tucker. He was a really fascinating guy. It was also the first time in a feature film that you got to work with your dad.
That's right. One of the remarkable things about doing that film, was that it was done with the blessing of the entire Tucker clan. I was able to ask them things like 'What was the expression on your father's face during the trial?' So it was really great to have that support from the family. Another interesting thing that happened, about a week into the film I was doing the scene where I get very upset with my crew and I'm trying to get them to finish the car and I was supposed to bang my fist on the bulletin board...the last rehearsal before the take, I hit the thing too hard, and I just felt my hand break. I thought 'Oh shit, I'm gonna be fired now and they're gonna replace me...' I had to go right to the hospital. They put it in a removable cast and I told Francis (Coppola) that I wanted to keep shooting and that I'd try to hide the other hand. So I did the take again, and almost broke my other hand! So for the rest of that film, I had to act with a broken hand, and Preston Tucker was almost Italian with his hand gestures! Plus there were lots of crowd scenes where I had to shake hands with people...it was tough. There's only one scene now where I notice the cast, where I'm spinning around in a chair in an ice cream parlor. But nobody ever noticed it, and I had to use all my willpower not to mention it when I was doing press for the film.

How was it working with your dad on that?
It was wonderful. I'm so glad that Francis hired him. I don't know that you're ever a peer with your father, but...he was my teacher and everything, so we approached the work in a very similar way. He approached the work with so much joy. He loved the process. It was so much fun just pretending with him like that. We'd come up with ideas for each other. We had a wonderful time.

How was it doing Baker Boys with Beau?
That was a dream, both to get to work with Beau, and also with Michelle (Pfeiffer). Steve Kloves, the director, must have written that when he was about 24 years-old. It's one of my favorite films that I've ever done. Another great element of that was the producer, Mark Rosenberg, who was a champion for Steve and held out for him to direct the film.

Was it tough playing someone who was such a shit to his brother? I know you and Beau are very close.
Unfortunately I got a little out of hand during that fight scene. We cut the shit out of ourselves on that chain link fence. During the fight scene, we didn't have a word to say to each other during the scene in case things went too far that would get us to stop. When I'm about to break his fingers, he was saying "No! Stop it! Stop it!" (laughs) I thought he was acting, man! And he wound up having to go to the hospital that night. (laughs) I don't think I broke his fingers, but I sure sprained them badly.

Payback time for little brother?
(laughs) That's right! He used to tease me unmercifully when we were kids.

I think one of your best films is Peter Weir's Fearless.
It was a really remarkable experience working with Peter. He such a wonderful person and a wonderful director. He's very inclusive, really encourages the actors to give as much as they can to the project. I remember one time I found myself being moved to go out and buy myself a lot of art supplies and I found myself pasting all these drawings up on the wall to try to draw what my feelings about the plane crash were. I drew all these crazy, kind of swirling things, then presented them to Peter the next day. He incorporated a lot of them into the film. He's very musical. He loves music so much and would always have music on the set while we were working. He would have a big boom box with tapes that he would play to not only put the actors, but the crew into the mood that he was trying to create. He would also bring the boom box into the screening room when we watched dailies that day, so he would score the dailies! He also assembled a lot of people who had survived plane crashes for us to speak to, and that was very helpful. Also, speaking about role models again, another fella who was very helpful during that was Gary Busey, who's an old buddy of mine. He had read the script and was very moved by it, and wanted to be a part of it because he felt he'd been given a new chance at life after his motorcycle accident. He helped me out a lot.

Was your character of The Dude in The Big Lebowski based on any of the people you grew up with here in L.A.?
Yeah, myself! (laughs) Probably about 50% of The Dude's wardrobe was out of my closet: the jelly shoes, a lot of the t-shirts.

Tell us about your philanthropic work.
I've been involved with an organization called The End Hunger Network for about 20 years now. Originally it started out to be about the issue of world hunger, but over the last 10 years we've shifted our focus to hunger here in the United States because it's gotten so bad. It's hard to imagine that, but the United States ranks last among the top 23 industrialized nations in how it takes care of its poor and its hungry. It's really mind-boggling. You read the paper about how the economy is booming and how many jobs we all have. I keep reading on to find where they mention all the hungry people we have here, and it doesn't say anything about that. So we've shifted our focus here, specifically to children. One out of five of our kids live below the poverty line here in the U.S. and poverty and hungry have a very close relationship. So we're working with other hunger organizations and are in the process of forming a new coalition to bring about political changes. One of the reason it's gotten so bad over the years is that all the programs that were doing such a wonderful job feeding the hungry in our country have had their support systems shot to hell. So we're trying to do a lot of lobbying to inform the public about what's going on. One thing I'm really proud of is a movie called Hidden in America that I produced starring my brother Beau. It was a tough assignment because we didn't want to make a long (public service announcement) about hunger, but a story that generally moved people. Everyone did a wonderful job. Martin Bell and Peter Silverman, who respectively directed and wrote American Heart, directed and wrote Hidden. We're getting Hidden out to 20,000 schools along with a study guide that we've also made to teach kids about this issue. The cure for hunger is all in place. We know how to end it. It's just a matter of getting support for the programs that will put it in place. There's a web site, endhunger.com, that people can go to if they'd like to get involved.

Did you get your social conscience from your parents?
I think so, yeah. My parents have always always viewed themselves as part of the family of man, one big family, and have related to others that way. My father worked with CARE in Africa for a while, which was very inspiring to me. I turned him on to the whole hunger issue and the next week he tells me "Yeah, I'm going to Africa with CARE." (laughs) He was amazing that way.
What's next on your slate?
I'm working on something I'm really excited about called The Contender. It's being directed by a fella named Rod Lurie, who's a former film critic. Most critics, I always found myself thinking 'Well, you didn't like that movie, what can you come up with, hot shot?' you know? (laughs) He came up with a brilliant script. I saw another piece of his that he directed that I was very impressed with, so I'm excited about it. Rod got into the business with the idea that he would become a filmmaker, so he became a critic first, taking the same route as François Truffaut and Peter Bogdonavich. Joan Allen and Gary Oldman are in it, also and they're both amazing. We start shooting in mid-August, and until then I'm finishing my overdubs for the album, so I can get it out sometime over the summer.