Post by Dianne on Oct 18, 2008 5:18:13 GMT -5
Maybe I miscalculated. Before Gerard Butler and I order our lunch, I hand him the text of Mark "Rent Boy" Renton's blistering speech from the film Trainspotting. Butler gamely reads it aloud: "It's shite being Scottish. We're the lowest of the low. The scum of the fucking earth. The most wretched, miserable, servile, pathetic trash that was ever shat into civilization."
There was a point to this. Back in the nineties, long before 300, the overachieving swords-and-sandals epic that made him Hollywood's out-of-nowhere action hero, Butler played Renton in a stage adaptation of Trainspotting. I consider Trainspotting a pop culture landmark, a scary, pulsating piece of storytelling. Renton's speech is a highlight.
Key fact: Butler is Scottish; I'm not. "A Scottish person can slag off Scotland, that's fine," Butler says. "But if anybody else does, you'll get a punch in the face." He's looking at me with a solemn expression. Remember that scene from 300 where the Persian envoy insults the Spartans? Butler's King Leonidas gives him a long stare, and then horse-kicks him into a bottomless pit. Seconds pass. Finally, the actor breaks into a boyish, mischievous grin. Relief. He's having me on. He lets out a big laugh.
Quick with a joke or a funny story, Butler is a playful guy with something of a roguish streak. ("I'm 38, but I feel like a 24-year-old," he tells me.) That made him the perfect companion for the four-day juggernaut of men's fashion week in Milan last summer. "I'm not a fashion guy," he warned, but went on to prove to Men's Vogue that he was up for anything: runway shows, late-night parties, and even letting a photographer chase him around labyrinthine Milan in an array of choice navy suits. "Man, those suits," he tells me now, wistfully.
His affability also makes him a natural fit for RocknRolla, the latest London gangster flick from Guy Ritchie, and something of a return to form for the director who gave us Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. Ritchie's new movie has an ensemble cast; a twisty plot involving a Russian oligarch, a rock star, and a stolen painting; a couple of bravura action sequences; and a healthy dose of laddish humor — largely thanks to Butler's small-time crook, One Two, and his partner, Mumbles (played by The Wire's Idris Elba). The pair look like bulldogs but would rather have a laugh down the pub than rough anyone up.
The RocknRolla script came to Butler soon after he finished 300. "I read it and loved it," he says. "To see Lock, Stock — it was so cool, so hip, I thought everybody involved would be part of some little clique. It's a gang you don't break into. But it really wasn't like that at all. Guy is so easygoing. I was amazed at how open he was."
Butler splits his time between Los Angeles and a big bachelor's loft near where we're having lunch in Manhattan's SoHo district. Both are a long way from Paisley, the suburb of Glasgow where he was raised by a hardworking single mother. "It wasn't the most upper-class of areas," he says. "You had to be tough to survive there, you know?" His mother encouraged Butler to make something of himself ("She's the driving force for most of the things in my life"), and so he studied law at the University of Glasgow, got his degree, and started working at an Edinburgh firm. A week before he was due to qualify as a solicitor, he was fired. "They did it in a very nice way: 'You're not cut out for this. Your heart's not in it.'"
True, Butler wanted to act (something he'd dabbled in when he was younger), but there were other distractions as well. "That period from 23 to 26? I cannot believe I'm still here," Butler says. "I have about 200 stories from that period, any one of which could just as easily have ended with me in the morgue."
"You're talking about booze and — " I ask.
"Yeah, yeah, all of it. I was in a pretty dangerous place." He describes the classic fear, angst, and depression of an angry young man. "You'd go out and be having drinks with everyone and you don't give a shit and you're scared of nothing. None of those deep-seated anxieties are there. But the next day you wake up, and they're there a little bit more. Some people would go, 'Oh, I won't do that again.' Some people go, 'Well, I remember what worked the last time.' Some people go, 'And it might work this morning!'" He lets out another big laugh. "I ended up the morning guy. I ended up, why choose? Let's just do it the whole time."
These days, Butler doesn't drink or smoke. For lunch he contents himself with a Mediterranean salad and Pellegrino. And yet, as he describes his turbulent past, I pick up a restlessness, an itchy unfulfilled air. "Are you the marrying type?" I ask.
"I would like to be one day," he says, and pauses. "I'm historically not someone who's been amazing in relationships." The gossip sheets have tied him to Naomi Campbell, Rosario Dawson, and Cameron Diaz. I ask him if he's dating anyone now.
"Yeah. A nice girl...It's not an area I'm very mature in."
We're lingering over coffee. The restaurant is starting to clear out. Butler's next appointment is with the director Lasse Hallström (The Cider House Rules, Chocolat) to discuss a possible project. But with time to kill, that restlessness surfaces. Maybe he should come uptown with me, Butler wonders aloud. Or just knock around SoHo a bit.
I ask him how hard it was to quit drinking.
"Smoking took a lot longer," he says, and grins. The patch didn't work; nor did hypnosis. He even prayed to quit in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. "I'm thinking, if this guy can die for mankind, the least I can do is quit smoking," Butler says. "I really felt an epiphany was happening. I even thought I saw light around me. Four hours later, I bought a packet of Marlboro Reds." That big, infectious laugh emerges one more time. "Who am I kidding? I need a cigarette."
There was a point to this. Back in the nineties, long before 300, the overachieving swords-and-sandals epic that made him Hollywood's out-of-nowhere action hero, Butler played Renton in a stage adaptation of Trainspotting. I consider Trainspotting a pop culture landmark, a scary, pulsating piece of storytelling. Renton's speech is a highlight.
Key fact: Butler is Scottish; I'm not. "A Scottish person can slag off Scotland, that's fine," Butler says. "But if anybody else does, you'll get a punch in the face." He's looking at me with a solemn expression. Remember that scene from 300 where the Persian envoy insults the Spartans? Butler's King Leonidas gives him a long stare, and then horse-kicks him into a bottomless pit. Seconds pass. Finally, the actor breaks into a boyish, mischievous grin. Relief. He's having me on. He lets out a big laugh.
Quick with a joke or a funny story, Butler is a playful guy with something of a roguish streak. ("I'm 38, but I feel like a 24-year-old," he tells me.) That made him the perfect companion for the four-day juggernaut of men's fashion week in Milan last summer. "I'm not a fashion guy," he warned, but went on to prove to Men's Vogue that he was up for anything: runway shows, late-night parties, and even letting a photographer chase him around labyrinthine Milan in an array of choice navy suits. "Man, those suits," he tells me now, wistfully.
His affability also makes him a natural fit for RocknRolla, the latest London gangster flick from Guy Ritchie, and something of a return to form for the director who gave us Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. Ritchie's new movie has an ensemble cast; a twisty plot involving a Russian oligarch, a rock star, and a stolen painting; a couple of bravura action sequences; and a healthy dose of laddish humor — largely thanks to Butler's small-time crook, One Two, and his partner, Mumbles (played by The Wire's Idris Elba). The pair look like bulldogs but would rather have a laugh down the pub than rough anyone up.
The RocknRolla script came to Butler soon after he finished 300. "I read it and loved it," he says. "To see Lock, Stock — it was so cool, so hip, I thought everybody involved would be part of some little clique. It's a gang you don't break into. But it really wasn't like that at all. Guy is so easygoing. I was amazed at how open he was."
Butler splits his time between Los Angeles and a big bachelor's loft near where we're having lunch in Manhattan's SoHo district. Both are a long way from Paisley, the suburb of Glasgow where he was raised by a hardworking single mother. "It wasn't the most upper-class of areas," he says. "You had to be tough to survive there, you know?" His mother encouraged Butler to make something of himself ("She's the driving force for most of the things in my life"), and so he studied law at the University of Glasgow, got his degree, and started working at an Edinburgh firm. A week before he was due to qualify as a solicitor, he was fired. "They did it in a very nice way: 'You're not cut out for this. Your heart's not in it.'"
True, Butler wanted to act (something he'd dabbled in when he was younger), but there were other distractions as well. "That period from 23 to 26? I cannot believe I'm still here," Butler says. "I have about 200 stories from that period, any one of which could just as easily have ended with me in the morgue."
"You're talking about booze and — " I ask.
"Yeah, yeah, all of it. I was in a pretty dangerous place." He describes the classic fear, angst, and depression of an angry young man. "You'd go out and be having drinks with everyone and you don't give a shit and you're scared of nothing. None of those deep-seated anxieties are there. But the next day you wake up, and they're there a little bit more. Some people would go, 'Oh, I won't do that again.' Some people go, 'Well, I remember what worked the last time.' Some people go, 'And it might work this morning!'" He lets out another big laugh. "I ended up the morning guy. I ended up, why choose? Let's just do it the whole time."
These days, Butler doesn't drink or smoke. For lunch he contents himself with a Mediterranean salad and Pellegrino. And yet, as he describes his turbulent past, I pick up a restlessness, an itchy unfulfilled air. "Are you the marrying type?" I ask.
"I would like to be one day," he says, and pauses. "I'm historically not someone who's been amazing in relationships." The gossip sheets have tied him to Naomi Campbell, Rosario Dawson, and Cameron Diaz. I ask him if he's dating anyone now.
"Yeah. A nice girl...It's not an area I'm very mature in."
We're lingering over coffee. The restaurant is starting to clear out. Butler's next appointment is with the director Lasse Hallström (The Cider House Rules, Chocolat) to discuss a possible project. But with time to kill, that restlessness surfaces. Maybe he should come uptown with me, Butler wonders aloud. Or just knock around SoHo a bit.
I ask him how hard it was to quit drinking.
"Smoking took a lot longer," he says, and grins. The patch didn't work; nor did hypnosis. He even prayed to quit in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. "I'm thinking, if this guy can die for mankind, the least I can do is quit smoking," Butler says. "I really felt an epiphany was happening. I even thought I saw light around me. Four hours later, I bought a packet of Marlboro Reds." That big, infectious laugh emerges one more time. "Who am I kidding? I need a cigarette."