Exclusive Portraits: Ron Perlman, Guillermo del Toro, Edward Burns at 2010 Chicago International Film Festival

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CHICAGO – One big star and two directors took their turns on the red carpet at the 2010 Chicago International Film Festival on October 15th. Ron Perlman, of the Hellboy movie series and “Sons of Anarchy,” joined directors Guillermo del Toro (”Pan’s Labyrinth”) and Edward Burns (”Nice Guy Johnny”).

The Chicago International Film Festival was honoring Guillermo del Toro through their Cinemas of the Americas Tribute, and del Toro was being supported by his old friend Ron Perlman. Edward Burns was premiering his latest film that he wrote and directed, “Nice Guy Johnny.”

HollywoodChicago.com was there, and got a few questions in, as well as Exclusive Portraits by photographer Joe Arce.

StarRon Perlman of “Hellboy” and “Sons of Anarchy”

Ever since Ron Perlman made his debut in “Quest for Fire” (1981), the character actor has been behind the mask in famous roles including the TV series “Beauty and the Beast” (1987) and the Hellboy film series, directed by his friend and colleague Guillermo del Toro.

Ron Perlman at the Chicago International Film Festival, October 15th, 2010
Ron Perlman at the Chicago International Film Festival, October 15th, 2010
Photo credit: Joe Arce of Starstruck Foto for HollywoodChicago.com

HollywoodChicago.com: How does it feel to get out of makeup for the TV series ‘Sons of Anarchy’ and does that change your approach as an actor?

Ron Perlman: The approach to acting is always the same, you try to figure who the guy is and then you try to transition your way into his way of thinking and moving through the world. The rest of it is just accoutrements, you don’t play the makeup, you play the guy. If you’re not wearing makeup, you just play the guy.

HC: When doing your costume parts, how do you stay aware of your presence in a scene and create balance between you and the actors in it, or do you think that is the director’s job?

RP: The answer is the same. Each character represents a different color on the big palette of what this ultimate painting is going to look like, who your guy is, and just try to be as honest and simple and real as you can possibly be. The outer trappings are incidental – costumes, period, makeup – all of that is rather insignificant at the end of the day.

HC: You’re father was instrumental in encouraging you as an actor, correct?

RP: My father gave me the ‘big blessing.’ He came and saw a few things that I had done in high school and college. For someone who had gone through the Depression and when at that time every parent was trying to teach their kids to become civil servants, he was very encouraging about my artistic path.

HC: What was behind your decision to eschew the New York City schools for your graduate acting work and go to the University of Minnesota?

RP: When I was going to undergraduate school in New York I accumulated almost $8000 in parking tickets. So I read a brochure for the University of Minnesota and I figured the cops wouldn’t find me there. I got a Masters Degree while I was on the lam.

Star Guillermo del Toro, Cinema of the Americas Honoree, Director of “Hellboy” and “Pan’s Labyrinth”

One of the hottest directors of the current era, del Toro puts his distinct mark as director on such diverse films as “Mimic,” “Hellboy” and Pan’s Labyrinth. He is currently working on a new version of Frankenstein.

Guillermo del Toro at the Chicago International Film Festival, October 15th, 2010
Guillermo del Toro at the Chicago International Film Festival, October 15th, 2010
Photo credit: Joe Arce of Starstruck Foto for HollywoodChicago.com

HC: How does your Catholic upbringing effect your sensibility as a creative person? What is it about that religion that still pervades your soul and expresses itself in your art?

Guillermo del Toro: I think once a Catholic, always a Catholic. You never escape. I still have Catholic guilt. It is in its basis a really powerful religion and a really strong set of beliefs. They permeate my work in many ways. I believe, for example, that pain can be a rite of passage into learning. I believe that the worse thing that can happen is the sin of banality and comfort. Those things are in my movies, but also my movies are quite the fruit of somebody who defines himself as an agnostic. I don’t try to define the cosmos, I know it’s unknowable, but I can understand my place in the world and my place in the universe through a mixture of Taoism, Catholicism, Zen or whatever I have at hand.

HC: You are slated for a remake of ‘Frankenstein.’ Going back to the original source novel, what do you admire about author Mary Shelley and her structure and approach to monstrous circumstances within the context of the time she wrote the book?

GdT: Well, when she wrote the book Frankenstein was an eminently modern novel. It was really dealing with every question that was in the zeitgeist of the time. It was talking about animal magnetism, the currents of electricity and it was her own version of ‘Paradise Lost’ in a way, her saying the Frankenstein monster becoming man fallen into earth, created by an uncaring father.

She was a very interesting, socially minded woman, and she truly was asking universal philosophical questions in the novel. The movie versions have strayed into different areas that were not as profound and effecting as the novel.

HC: What still inspires you when creating your works?

GdT: I try to find inspiration in books, paintings, illustrations and the one thing I try to avoid is just being inspired by other movies, because then you just are talking about movies in movies. I try to talk about movies that are culturally and spiritually a little more diverse. The movies that I do are in love with cinema, and I try to show that I am in love with cinema. I want them to be, in other ways, drinking from other sources.

HC: When it comes to subject matter in films, what do you think scares Americans the most?

GdT: A lot of things. Less than a decade ago I was preparing ‘Mimic’ and talking to someone at the studio level, and I wanted the lead actor to be Andre Braugher, an African American actor, to be the husband of Mira Sorvino. And they told me America is not prepared for that. That was ten years ago.

It’s changed a lot, but it needs to change more. I don’t think it’s Americans who are afraid, it is the studios who are overbearingly protective of anything that they think will ruffle feathers. Yet every time something like that breaks through, it is usually a successful movie.

Star Edward Burns, Writer and Director of “Nice Guy Johnny”

Edward Burns has been on the film scene since his unlikely debut film, “The Brothers McMullen” shocked the independent world in 1995. Shot on a shoestring budget estimated as low as $26,000, it went on to win the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival and became one of the most profitable films of all time. Burns also acts besides writing and directing, appearing in Nice Guy Johnny as Uncle Terry and was recently a featured player in the film “27 Dresses.”

Edward Burns at the Chicago International Film Festival, October 15th, 2010
Edward Burns at the Chicago International Film Festival, October 15th, 2010
Photo credit: Joe Arce of Starstruck Foto for HollywoodChicago.com

HC: What was your inspiration for the role you play as Uncle Terry in your new movie Nice Guy Johnny? Was it someone you knew in your youth or is he part of your Hollywood experience?

Edward Burns: He is probably a combination of a couple of guys I knew in my thirties. I guess what I was trying to do was to show that the Nice Guy Johnny character was nice to a fault. He is so self-sacrificing, and what I was trying to figure out who his mentor character would be, I wanted to create a guy who is the complete antithesis, a guy who is selfish, a liar and a cheat to a fault. I think Johnny, and all of us sometimes, need to be a little bit selfish when your dreams are on the line. That being said, I did know some guys who were complete animals. [laughs]

HC: When you made the famous ‘The Brothers McMullen’ on the legendary shoestring budget, did everyone have a feeling that magic was happening, or did it surprise you when you able to score the Sundance Grand Jury Prize, the distribution deal and ultimately, the film’s success?

EB: Every step along the way was a complete surprise, we never thought it was going to work. We were doing it for the love of it, and the originally the only goal was to get an agent. The actors were hoping to grab some scenes and use it as a reel. Everything that happened was a complete surprise.

The 46th Chicago International Film Festival is October 7th-21st, 2010. For more information and to purchase tickets, click on ChicagoFilmFestival.com

HollywoodChicago.com senior staff writer Patrick McDonald

By PATRICK McDONALD
Senior Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

© 2010 Patrick McDonald, HollywoodChicago.com

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