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FRESH FACE INTERVIEW
Andrew Garfield
'Lions' actor certainly not a lamb anymore.
Making your American screen debut in a film that co-stars Tom Cruise, Meryl Streep and Robert Redford is certainly one way to get noticed. "I'm just lucky to be there working on the same project as them, although I don't really expect to be recognized later by audiences," says Andrew Garfield, who stars in the Redford-helmed "Lions for Lambs," a pic that examines what it means for a country to be at war, and why certain individuals choose to fight.
But recognition -- at least from Blighty theater critics -- hasn't been a problem for the Los Angeles-born Garfield. He was raised outside London, where he's spent most of his career. The thesp was named outstanding newcomer at the 2006 Evening Standard Theater Awards for his West End stage work, and this year shared the London Theater Critics' Circle Most Promising Newcomer Award with fellow thesp Connie Fisher.
"I've been really lucky," a modest Garfield explains. "Something artistic can just as easily go bad as it can go good, and I've been fortunate to work with great people in the theater."
The actor admires Redford's career path and would like to stay on a similar course.
"I sort of have his voice in my head about how not to get seduced by money, status or superficial things," says Garfield. "I don't really want to do 'American Pie 7,' and I see Bob as someone who was the heartthrob of his generation, moved away from the place where people wanted to pigeonhole him and made interesting choices."
As his career picks up momentum -- he'll co-star with Scarlett Johansson and Natalie Portman in "The Other Boleyn Girl" as well as British indie "Boy A" -- Garfield says he wants to avoid the kind of fame-seeking behavior taken in by some other young actors and focus on the work as the reward.
"All I've ever aimed for is just to be allowed to express myself," says Garfield "And that people seem to enjoy seeing me do my work is more than I could hope for. I don't take it lightly."
Movie Musings
An actor should always: "Stay true to your instincts. Hang in there and stick it out and find out if you have (what it takes) to do this job."
I'm inspired by: "Being able to affect someone the way other great actors have affected me."
Favorite film character: "Tom Cruise's character in 'Magnolia' was brilliant. I also love everything Dustin Hoffman has done. He was amazing in 'Lenny,' 'Kramer vs. Kramer' and 'Midnight Cowboy.'"
Article is from 2005
Age: 22
CURRENTLY: Appearing at the National Theatre in the triple bill of Burn, Chatroom and Citizenship (in rep. to 3 June) and J.T. Rogers’ The Overwhelming (opening on 17 May and booking in rep. to 8 August).
HOMETOWN: Though Garfield speaks with a fully-paid up British accent, he’s actually American. “I was born in Los Angeles and lived there for three years, till my parents moved over to Surrey, when I was three,” he explains. “My dad’s from California, but my mum’s from Essex, so I’ve got an American passport with the right of abode here.” He was brought up in Epsom Downs in Surrey. “I don’t really remember much of my time in America, obviously, though later we used to go on holiday over there when we could afford it,” he says. “But my dad has his accent still, and he brought us up as Americans.” He lives now in Willesden Green in North London, sharing with a couple of friends from drama school.
DISCOVERING ACTING: Garfield attended a private school and admits that he didn’t have much sense of purpose there. “I was very bored at school, like a lot of kids are, and I didn’t have much passion or drive for anything. I was very introverted and introspective.” He played a lot of sport and then tried drama class. Initially, he wasn’t too taken by it. “I really just fell into acting, and I wasn’t that excited by that either,” he says. “I didn’t realise how much I loved it until much later on.” It was the encouragement of his drama teacher and the teacher’s wife that made him realise that there was more to it than he thought. “They told me I could do this as a career, maybe, when I was 16,” he says. “It was someone finally saying that this could be my path that made me think, ‘Wow! That’s lovely!’ Of course I started thinking, too, about the other superficial things that come along with being an actor, and that excited me even more when I was that age—the fame and all that.” They convinced him to apply for drama school, and he was accepted to Central School of Speech in Drama in London.
CRISIS OF CONFIDENCE: Drama school wasn’t plain sailing, however. “I had a tough time there,” Garfield recalls. “My first year was great, but the second year wasn’t so great. I lost all my confidence, as a lot of people do in drama school. In the third year, I hit a breaking point and thought, ‘If I don’t get what I want out of this, who knows what the hell I am going to do with my life?’ When an agent signed Garfield after seeing his first play, some of the self-doubt was restored. “Having someone believe in me as a marketable actor boosted me,” he notes. “I took that into auditions, and I had two jobs lined up just before I left drama school.” His first gig was in a new play called Mercy at Soho Theatre. “It was like a dream. Until then, I was so scared, I thought I was not going to get anything.”
LEADING MAN: The day after Mercy ended, Garfield went straight to his next job: starring in a stage version of the iconic film Kes at Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre. “I didn’t watch the movie before I did it,” he says, “I wanted to so much—I had my finger next to play button all the way through rehearsals—but I told myself I couldn’t!”
WHEREFORE ART THOU: Garfield returned to the Royal Exchange a year later to play another iconic part, Romeo in Romeo and Juliet, last September. “That was really, really tough, to take on that role at such a young age,” the actor proclaims. “I was just 21, and it was exhausting, physically and emotionally.” His Juliet was Gugu Mbatha-Raw, “a beautiful, beautiful girl and it’s really lucky that we got on,” and they got the reviews to prove it that they were a hit. The Guardian’s Lyn Gardner wrote, “Love here is a dangerous thing and on occasion not even very pretty: it is giddy, hot-headed, sweaty, and sometimes even snotty. Garfield's Romeo can certainly throw a teenage tantrum, and when he guns for Tybalt after the death of Mercutio it is with ugly rage and passion. His performance has that no-brakes whiff of danger that marks out the interesting Romeos from the indifferent ones.” She also said of Garfield, “it is a brave performance compelling to watch, and he and Mbatha-Raw—an intense slip of a Juliet—work very well together in a can't-keep-their-hands-off each other way.” Garfield says he’s keen to do more Shakespeare now. “Shakespeare is my favourite writer in the world, but then again doing new writing is equally inspiring,” he notes.
WIDE RANGE: In between his two Royal Exchange roles, Garfield starred in a London revival of The Laramie Project at the Sound Theatre, and after playing Romeo, he returned to the Sound to do a new production of Jonathan Harvey’s play about gay teenagers coming out on a Thamesmead council estate, Beautiful Thing. “I love working on such different characters. I find it really interesting and feel so lucky that I’ve been given the opportunity to explore these people who are quite far away from me. I’m not gay, I’m not working class, and I’m not 15!” he adds.
OVERWHELMING MAX STAFFORD-CLARK: While he was rehearsing for the triple bill, Garfield read The Overwhelmingand went to meet the director, Max Stafford-Clark. “He hated me immediately.” Garfield recalls. “I went in chewing gum, and he told me to take it outside. I came back in and he said he was going to offer me a cup of tea, but he wasn’t going to anymore. We got off to a bad start, but by the end of it, I think I managed to bring him around.” He plays the teenager son of an American academic and his wife who go to Rwanda. “It’s about how these three Westerners get weaved into the other worldliness of this place and how different and dangerous things are, and the play ends on the brink of the genocide that is beginning there.”
UNSTOPPABLE: “It’s been amazing, absolutely amazing!” Garfield says of his career to date. “Toward the end of drama school, I started to realise how important acting was and the whole fame thing went out of my head. I let that kid go. I am so happy with my theatre CV now. Every single play I’ve done has been important—each has had a story that had to be told. And I feel so lucky—I feel I’m learning so much, just by doing and doing and doing it. It’s great!”
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CURRENT PROJECTS
BOY A
Role: Jack Burridge
Genre: Film » Drama
Status: Completed
Release: July 23, 2008 (limited)
Site: imdb | official site
LIONS FOR LAMBS
Role: Todd Hayes
Genre: Film » Drama
Status: DVD
Released: November 8, 2007
Site: imdb | official site
THE OTHER BOLEYN GIRL
Role: Francis Weston
Genre: Film » Adventure/Mystery
Status: On DVD
Released: February 29, 2008
Site: imdb | official site
IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS
Role: Anton
Genre: Film » Drama
Status: Post-Production
Release: TBA
Site: imdb | official site
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