Institute for Robert Downey Jr Studies > Required Reading

The Father of the Man

The notion of originality is constantly being ballyhooed in Hollywood. But as everyone knows, originality is an unknown quantity that’s almost always more trouble than it’s worth. The great, creaky system of Hollywood movie/moneymaking doesn’t deliberately stamp out originality (that would take clear thinking); it mostly ignores or accidentally rolls over on it. Which does and does not explain something of why Robert Downey Jr. isn’t a giant movie star.

Downey is unquestionably an original. He’s also widely regarded as actor of literally immeasurable talent. Still, he’s never done a brilliant film. He’s only been brilliant in some of the good (Soapdish), interesting (Natural Born Killers, Chaplin, Short Cuts) and terrible (Less Than Zero) film he’s been in. Those people who care about quality in Hollywood have spent a decade shaking their heads over Downey—sometimes in awe one of his performances, sometimes in wonder at this failure to break through, and sometimes in fear and frustration at the drug problems that threatened last year to eclipse talent and charisma as the source of his great celebrity. Now having spent years making all sorts of movies and struggling to grow up to his own gifts, and having created his own family, including son Indio, is Downey ready to emerge as a fully adult actor? To be great in a great film—and perhaps to become the movie star he once seemed a sure thing to become?

Writer/director James Toback, whose roots go back to the most extraordinary stint of originality—tolerance that modern Hollywood’s seen—the ‘70s, in which Toback himself wrote and directed the classic Fingers—knows what gives with Robert Downey Jr. He worked with Downey years ago on The Pick-Up Artist, and saw then Downey’s potential for dealing with aspects of experience that are far outside the range of any of his contemporaries. For the low-budget, extremely personal, the 70s-weren’t-for nothing independent film Two Girls and a Guy, Toback wanted only Downey, and Downey signed on for a short, ultra-intense shoot with costars Heather Graham and Natasha Wagner. At the end of shooting, Toback sat down with Downey to talk about the many-layered collaboration they’d been through, and about his unusual star’s approach to acting, creativity, fatherhood, sonhood, Hollywood, money, sex ... Well, read for yourself.

JAMES TOBACK: Your character in our movie, Blake Allen, is charming, enjoyable, entertaining, brilliant, witty, musical, lonely, compassionate, duplicitous, contradictory, slippery. When I asked myself who could play him—

ROBERT DOWNEY JR: —You came immediately to the conclusion of Leonardo DiCaprio.

JT: (laughs) Yes, but he wasn’t available so then I thought of you.

RDJ: I think what happens is that you develop certain connections with certain people. If you’re lucky you get converge at the right time. You run into a person when you need to. Like when you showed up at the cast party for the Saturday Night Live I hosted and said, “Are you ready?” We hadn’t spoken in what, three years? And I knew you meant you had a movie for me and I said “Yes” to myself before you even told me what it was. It was totally intuitive. And that set the tone for how we’ve worked together. When we were doing a scene, once I’d given you what—

JT:—what you thought I wanted—

RDJ:—(laughs) exactly—I was free to let my sprit go. Over and over in the movies I’ve made, that’s the risk directors have promised me I could take, but this is the first time I’ve actually been allowed by anyone—including you on The Pick-Up Artist—to do it.

JT: I’m a slow learner.

RDJ: Don’t you think a director should give an actor the chance to hang himself? It’s the only way original stuff has a chance to come out.

JT: Some actors, like you, are great at it. Other perfectly good actors don’t know what to do when they’re let loose.

RDJ: Even if you give them time?

JT: Time is an unaffordable luxury on a film.

RDJ: We had all the time we needed on this film and it was by far the shortest shooting schedule I’ve ever heard of.

JT: We got lucky.

RDJ: I think it’s more than luck. I think that actors subconsciously reward a director with their best and fastest work if they’re given respect, trust and free reign.

JT: Actors in general or you in particular?

RDJ: (laughs)

JT: How do you feel about the erotic scene in Two Girls and a Guy?

RDJ: Well, it was certainly a first for me. I’ve made over 20 films and altogether they’ve included four kisses, an obscured blow job in Less Than Zero, and nothing else I can remember.

JT: It’s not as if you haven’t been asked to do it because you look like Lou Costello.

RDJ: I have to admit that sometimes if I’m watching something that’s sexually explicit I cover my eyes because some part of me still thinks it’s shameful.

JT: No kidding? Give me an example.

RDJ: Well, watching what Heather and I did was very unnerving to me.

JT: That may be because you were in the scene.

RDJ: Heather was in it and she didn’t seem at all unnerved. It’s strange, because I’m certainly not a prude. By the way, I found it interesting that you didn’t describe this scene specifically in the script. We just sort of decided what was the right way to go.

JT: I don’t think sex is an area where you can tell actors what to do. If it’s not something that comes naturally to them it will feel false and embarrass everyone.

RDJ: It’s odd, though. People are always saying, “Why can’t they just suggest it, we know what it’s like.” But when there’s a brutal hit on the mobsters in Last Man Standing, we don’t just hear that from outside. No, you see guys blown up at the dinner table.

JT: Sex is the only area where everybody says, “Wait, let’s pretend it’s radio.”

RDJ: What I loved about the erotic scene in Two Girls and a Guy is that it’s quite specific, but it actually reveals very little flesh. You know why I love Peter O’Toole so much?

JT: When I asked you 10 years ago who your favorite actor was you said Peter O’Toole.

RDJ: You bet.

JT: Why do you love him so much?

RDJ: Because he expresses as self-assurance in his sexuality without having to lay an organ on anyone.

JT: What other actors do you particularly like?

RDJ: Malkovich is a genius. I saw him in a play in London that was one of the greatest things I’ve ever witnessed.

JT: What play?

RDJ: I forgot what it was called. (Laughs)

JT: Anyone else you like whose work you can’t remember by name?

RDJ: Leonardo Di-hummmmmmmm.

JT: You know, I know him very well.

RDJ: I know you do. I’m kind of angry that you’re friends with him, too.

JT: People compare you two and say he’s the new you.

RDJ: He scares me.

JT: He shouldn’t. You and Leonardo both have talents that I’d say are beyond almost everyone else near your ages. But even though you share certain qualities—wit, intelligence—

RDJ:—Don’t say he’s in a league of his own. I’m not prepared for that. (Laughs)

JT: Looking back to when you were Leonardo’s age, how do you see yourself in relation to your own generation of actors?

RDJ: I thought I was somehow outside my generation of actors. There was the “Brat Pack” and a couple of other guys, and the there was me. I thought The Pick-Up Artist would give me a chance to have a real career, and it didn’t turn out that way. When I did Chaplin I thought, “Well, this has got to do it!” But it still didn’t happen. It still hasn’t happened. It really pisses me off. But I have to say, I haven’t been in a film that’s been a ... a hit. And I guess that’s the game.

JT: Any other actors you want to mention?

RDJ: Christopher Walken. I saw him on [Inside the Actor’s Studio] last night, and almost everything he said I identified with 100 percent. Including when they asked him what his favorite word on the set was and he said Lunch. He’s a great actor. Why is it that someone who’s as good and as versatile as he is—let also that Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire said that he was a good tap dancer—isn’t a major player?

JT: Strangeness of physical appearance.

RDJ: That’s what Walken said, and that’s what I think is going to be different. Someone like Chris Walken, the real cream of the crop, is going to be able to assume a power position in this industry if it’s going the way it seems to be going.

JT: What’s different about film in America today from the way it was when you first started making movies?

RDJ: Movies are better now, more personal. I think the idea of the auteur is coming back—not self-conscious “art,” but film as a way of saying something personal and intense. I’ve seen movies go from being an actor’s medium to a producer’s medium to a director’s medium.

JT: Which it was in the ‘60s and ‘70s when your father, Robert Downey Sr., was in a vanguard group of American filmmakers.

RDJ: I want to get on that bandwagon.

JT: You’ve been in some of your father’s movies, including the upcoming Hugo Pool. What’s it like being directed by him?

RDJ: It enables you to say “I gotta get out of here early today,” and know that every effort will be made to allow you to do so.

JT: Why might you want to get off early?

RDJ: To play with Indio.

JT: The father lets the son go to be a father to his son?

RDJ: You bet. Indio’s happy when he can spend continuous time with me. It shows up in his expressions. If you love someone he can spit in your face six times and you can still laugh.

JT: Does Indio expectorate in your direction regularly?

RDJ: Absolutely. He thinks it’s quite funny. You know what he asks me every day? “Dad, do I have a diaper on?”

JT: To which you reply?

RDJ: Check it out and see for yourself.

JT: Do you talk to him as if he were an adult?

RDJ: To a fault. I have to remind myself that he’s been on the planet now for only 1,200 days.

JT: What do you feel more like, a father or a son?

RDJ: A father.

JT: Your father strikes me as the sort of parent who observed his son with curiosity instead of trying to mold him into some personally preferred shape.

RDJ: That’s true.

JT: And that’s your way with Indio?

RDJ: I’m happy to observe, but I have high expectations.

JT: Does he look to you for approval?

RDJ: Constantly. Just as I always looked to my dad. I always like amusing him. I still do. Which raises a point about working for my dad as an actor. I’m always looking for the approval of my director, but with my dad I know I already have it.

JT: What recent movies have you like in particular?

RDJ: Sling Blade. speaking of which, I love the way Billy Bob Thornton just showed up today on our set. I said to myself, “Look at this guy, he’s sitting there just watching, enjoying himself like a kid having a ball. This guy is a complete dynamo.”

JT: You are aware of how much you wanted to impress him aren’t you? He inspired you to do your best work so far.

RDJ: Let me put it this way. In any future movies we do together, I think you should always tell me that Billy Bob is visiting the set and then just obscure the monitor so I can’t see who’s actually around.

JT: Tell me, do you usually get depressed when you’re making movies?

RDJ: Yes.

JT: Why?

RDJ: Useless repetition of mediocrity.

JT: Do you express your frustration to your directors?

RDJ: No, I just shut down.

JT: Are you playing private games as they amble on obliviously?

RDJ: Yes. Every male director should realize that he’s a father figure and act accordingly. As Robert Bly would say, “Is he going to be the twisted father or the good father?” The good father lets his son play, and the twisted father tries to control him.

JT: And you respond to the twisted father by—figuratively, of course—shooting him behind the left ear.

RDJ: (laughs) Yes, I’m amicable—I’m not locking myself in my trailer or dressing down the director in front of strangers, but there’s some real subconscious tennis going on. I just want the director to watch me serve, and tell me what a pro I am. A lot of people think actors are in a self-centered haze most of the time, but I think that at their best they’re alive with clarity.

JT: Your humor and charm easily blind people to the rage that’s mingled with your intelligence. Pouting is much more obvious to a director who’s on watch for a patricidal actor. And all directors, no matter what they profess, are on watch.

RDJ: They love strangling actors. I have to say, when I direct films myself it’ll be hard for me to be as flexible, selfless and attentive as you have to be. The film is a kid that doesn’t talk, and you’ve always gotta be looking for the surprises. William Goldman said that the director’s there to help everybody, and I thought, “Horseshit!” But that’s exactly what the directors I’ve enjoyed working with have done. They let you go to the banquet and eat with your hands first while standing in line.

JT: For you, particularly, more than most other actors, I think it’s harmful to work when you’re not excited or when you are too angry.

RDJ: I have a perhaps paranoid suspicion that many people in power in this industry like to see other people do things that are beneath them, and do it with a smile. I always want to explain it as my own fears dumped on the imagined ill will of others, but I think it’s true. I really do. And I think that if there’s anything that gets me down it’s that there are no champions of the artist today. I don’t see any evidence of people just going on faith. Sometimes the attitude is, “Why should you be allowed to do anything you want? You’re a cocksucker. And if you aren’t one yet, you should be and you will be.”

JT: So, is the wave of independent moviemaking you described as personal vision really there, or is it just a hustle?

RDJ: It’s a transitional time, pre-revolutionary. And even if I consciously knew what the nature of the revolution was—which I don’t—it would not be a good idea to say it.

JT: Do you feel that you’re still working when you’re between movies, that there’s a kind of continuum and that all your life is part of your art?

RDJ: Usually I feel like movies are interrupting what I’m trying to get off the ground creatively. (laughs)

JT: I hope you don’t include our movie in that slur.

RDJ: No, this was a quick stint and totally different.

JT: A brief interruption in your journey.

RDJ: A minor affront to my primary purpose. (laughs) I’m not big on planning ahead but I’ve been developing stuff for 10 years, and there’s been music all along. So I’m never really taking a break. And there’s my family now, and loving them has changed everything. I’d be really just be happy if I could do a bunch of films and then realize these dreams of mine. The order would be: family, dreams and them jobs.

JT: Do you think directors and writers and actors are so mindful of their next job that they incorporate Hollywood’s expectations almost unconsciously?

RDJ: Absolutely. It’s the rule rather than the exception.

JT: Have you ever been aware of doing that?

RDJ: No. As a matter of fact, I think that’s part of the reason I have not advanced as quickly or as far as I would like. I don’t have any 10-year plan. And I don’t like the idea of being relentless, which I must be in order to attain my goals. I guess I came to believe I wasn’t going to be in one of those monster hits and that, therefore, I wasn’t going to make that transition into being a real big deal.

JT: Why would you want to be a real big deal?

RDJ: To make things easier.

JT: Does that mean doing big-budget movies and getting paid a lot?

RDJ: Well, I don’t think that just because you’re doing a film where luxury is provided that means it’s not going to be something great and original and uncompromising. And just because you’re doing a film that’s coming from the “right place” doesn’t mean it’s not going to suck.

JT: I wouldn’t argue either point.

RDJ: It usually gets endlessly mixed up. I did Air America for two reasons: to be in a movie with Mel Gibson, and to make a bunch of money. And then underneath was the hope that in doing this formulaic thing I would be launched into a whole new realm of opportunity to do A-list movies. By the time we were done, the only positive thing was meeting Mel Gibson.

JT: It’s odd that with you and him together and with a talented director like Roger Spottiswoode, Air America didn’t turn out better than it did.

RDJ: It was complicated. A lot went down. Good intentions, sad result.

JT: So the problem is that in a movie of that size and expense, all kinds of muddle can take place.

RDJ: Right. And for me, the lesson was that sketchy motives result in nightmares.

JT: Give me an example of a movie that was expensive where you had a great experience.

RDJ: Natural Born Killers. I had never been in a situation where there was more than enough money to do whatever the director wanted. It was very experimental in a lot of ways, and it was just really fun.

JT: Oliver Stone is an exception, and that movie was an exception in every way. How much money do you need?

RDJ: After I did Restoration I learned a valuable lesson, which is: sometimes folks are dead-on when they say they can’t afford to do a movie. They are actually in touch with how much they are spending and how much they have to make in order to continue spending the way they’d like to without getting in trouble with the basics.

JT: I’ve always felt that when your house becomes more important than your work, the time has come to switch professions to interior decoration.

RDJ: That’s honorable. But it’s not my experience.

JT: What happens when you come upon something that eats at you and makes you feel: either I make this or I go insane?

RDJ: Well, I wasn’t worried about whether I was going to go insane, I was very well aware that I was insane. And I found great solace in material possessions, in “the finer things in life.” And more than anything else, I felt I had to provide for those I’m responsible for.

JT: What, that’s honorable, but it’s not my experience.

RDJ: There is only so much value in being smart with money. But there is great instant gratification to be had in spending it as fast as you make it. You literally say, “I went to the set, we rehearsed the master, we shot 11 takes, I went back to the trailer, it started to rain, and I earned enough to buy this 740 IL.” I want to be able to break down the day-by-day schedule and go out and see exactly how much I earned today—in a different shape than that of a production company check.

JT: What effect has acting had on your personality? Do you feel, for instance, that playing many different roles has splintered you, or that you were splintered to begin with, or that you’re not splintered at all?

RDJ: I only know that I love doing characters, and those characters light up an archetype in me, and when that happens I feel I’m just a conduit for an idea, usually ancient in origin.

JT: So, you are like a medium when you’re action?

RDJ: Sure. Nothing makes me happier than sitting down with some friends and going through 10 different characters in the course of an hour. All representations of different personality types. Most of the characters I do are pretty sick.

JT: I felt that the only way to get you to become Blake Allen in Two Girls and a Guy was to let you feel as if he were your character.

RDJ: There’s nothing worse that when a director tries to tell you about a character, walking you around saying, “Shut your mouth!” I used to internalize it and then take care of myself by pulling an all-nighter, and then go to the set defeated and ashamed only to convince myself that this guy must know better and that I should just take direction.

JT: But you’ve never believed that.

RDJ: No. And now there’s no excuse for me. I’ve learned. And I’ve grown. But I’m of two minds. One is that you shouldn’t have to sell someone what you need, because if you do it was ill-fated to begin with. On the other hand, ultimatums work because either you get what you need or the situation is over.

JT: You may not like confrontations, but what you get by avoiding it is much worse that the momentary awkwardness of making a person hate you—which is really what you’re afraid of.

RDJ: Right. And I also like to be nice to people because I like people to be nice to me.

JT: But I don’t understand your fear of confrontation, because it usually occurs in people who have a history of brutal fathers. Your father was the exact opposite, wasn’t he?

RDJ: He was. But for me the problem is different. Before you go into the ring with somebody, you should have a pretty good idea you’re right, but something I learned from acting is that you should always be ready to admit you have no idea what you’re talking about. What I do in moments of confrontation is second-guess myself.

JT: That reminds me of something the great basketball player John Havlicek said. He was one of the great pressure-players in the game, and his answer for how to deal with moments of huge importance was to take a second and say to himself two things simultaneously. The first was, This is the most important moment—in the game, or the season—and I must succeed. The second was, This is just a basketball game and it means nothing in the larger scheme of things so it doesn’t matter whether I succeed or not. Holding that paradox in his head always raised him to his greatest skill and power.

RDJ: Giving them both equal weight, so that neither truth is diminished. Mel Gibson’s like that. He definitely has that. I learned a lot from him. He’s someone who has lots of integrity and lots of child energy, which is the best combination.

JT: How would you spend the next year or two if all of a sudden you did not have to work for a living at all?

RDJ: I’d be recording all the music that I’ve written over the last 15 years. I think it’s the most personal mode of expression I’ve ever found.

JT: I always think of films a partly musical expression. I can’t imagine a film without specific music that I’m choosing. Would that not be a way of doing it?

RDJ: I bet in 20 years we’ll look back at this period in filmmaking as the time just before the great awakening, which is recognizing that visual images and music can combine to achieve transcendent spiritual heights. I don’t know exactly where it’s going to go with all of the computer shit. What do they call it?

JT: If you’re asking me, you’re asking the wrong person. Are you into high-tech stuff?

RDJ: I’ve tried to be. But this computer thing has got me miffed. I’ve owned enough computer equipment that I could have launched the space shuttle from my desk. And now, I swear to god, I can’t even get into my Rolodex.

JT: “Techno” is a current buzzword in music, coming mainly out of the London rave scene but really coming out of Edgard Varese, the grandfather of electronic music. It seems to express the sleek, impersonal digital sensibility of the future. Do you feel like a misfit in that culture?

RDJ: I think I know my strengths and weaknesses pretty well and I don’t believe that this techno future—if it’s coming—is going to render whatever skills I have outmoded. I just have to use those skills reliably. And I will. If there’s one thing I know about myself it’s that I have never and will never drop the ball when the chips are down. I pride myself on that. The higher the stakes, the happier I am, the better I will be.