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Billy Crudup on becoming the man behind the notorious Stanford prison experiment

Billy Crudup’s built an interesting career for himself. As likely to show up in big studio projects like Public Enemies (as J. Edgar Hoover!) or Watchmen as he is to do smaller pictures like Glass Chin or Rudderless, he’s also carved out some space for himself as a stage actor, winning a Tony for The Coast Of Utopia.

This week, you can see him as Dr. Philip Zimbardo, a psychologist who sets college students against one another in Kyle Patrick Alvarez’s harrowing The Stanford Prison Experiment.

What attracted you to the project?

It was fascinating material. I didn’t know anything substantial about this, other than maybe something I superficially remembered from a Psych 101 class. But it was a phenomenal script, and that cast of young actors was superb, so it was kind of a no-brainer. I mean, the only major challenge is the fact that they shoot in so few days now that it’s a whirlwind of making the film.

How few are we talking about?

Eighteen days. And it’s incredibly disjointed. The first time I walked on set, the first scene – actually, you see the first shot that I had playing Zimbardo was the moment he walks into the experiment and breaks it up, telling everybody to go home. [laughter] That’s how disjointed it all was.

Yeah, I was sure that’s a film that would have to be shot in sequence, if only to track your character’s progression. So much depends on Zimbardo’s understanding that he’s as much a part of the experiment as his subjects.

It’s funny – in talking to him, he still carries some shame and guilt about it. And the thing that I think makes it manageable is him being able to talk about it extensively, and then talk about what he also feels are the true revelations of that experiment.

Did you find yourself studying him for your performance?

No. I only met him when he came to set after we’d been working [for] a week or so. I kinda wanted to get my feet under me before I was affected by meeting him. Because [the movie’s] not a character study of Zimbardo it’s really about the actual event. And Zimbardo was a pretty eccentric character. I mean, he used to wear a cape to class. He loved this idea of performance, and he had this Mephistophelean beard, so I had some idea that if we spent much time together I would begin doing a pretty extensive re-creation and mimicry of him, which might ultimately be distracting. [laughs]

You play another real person in Tom McCarthy’s Spotlight – attorney Eric MacLeish – and he’s also someone who occupies sort of a morally cloudy space.

I confess, this is not the character I wanted to play. I went through a period of time when I was offered opportunities to play David Koresh, Ted Bundy, Adolf Hitler, Charles Manson – three times! – and Jeffrey Dahmer. And I thought, “I don’t really want to get onto the bad-guy run right now.” And MacLeish has so many of those elements, certainly narratively, but it turns out he’s a much more complicated person. Google him and look at his story, because it is fascinating what happened to him after [the events of] the movie. But I was so dead-set on working with Tom, because his movies aesthetically and his ambition narratively are inspirational. It’s the kind of work I want to be doing, the kind of director I want to support. So I was like, “Sure, I will do whatever.” And then I got there, and working with him on this part – despite the fact that it was just, like, three or four days – was one of the most gratifying experiences I’ve had. He is exactly as advertised, interested in complicated nuance. And we explored so many aspects of how this guy tries to get through the day. It’s only a supporting character but for him to take that kind of care and attention, I thought, was really exhilarating.

See our review here.

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