Aaron Stanford
Aaron Stanford
Aaron Stanfordis an American actor best known for his roles as Pyro in X2 and X-Men: The Last Stand, and Doug in the 2006 remake of The Hills Have Eyes. From 2010 to 2013, he starred as Birkhoff in Nikita. He currently stars as James Cole on the television series 12 Monkeys, based on the 1995 film of the same name...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTV Actor
Date of Birth27 December 1976
CityWestford, MA
CountryUnited States of America
People have always liked to be frightened. People love to feel that jolt of adrenaline. People love roller coasters. People love skydiving. These things that really get your heart pumping, and horror films are sort of a safe way to get that rush I guess.
Actors, we like stories, we like storytelling, we love being a part of the story, and if you give us a story that's interesting then we'll want to do it.
But a lot of shows, they pose questions and they give you a puzzle where there's no solution.
I consider myself a blue-collar actor, just chugging away.
Of course, I'm not allowed to talk about the script, but I can say it is a really good story.
Wes Craven is obviously a horror film icon so I was definitely very interested in bringing something back to life that Wes had created.
You have to find it in the moment, and that's one of the challenges of being an actor - especially a film actor - is that you have to maintain these heightened emotions for long periods of time. There's no trick to it. You just have to do.
You know all those dangerous mutants you hear about in the news? I'm the worst one.
You always take a little bit back with you at the end of the day. I always put a little bit of myself into the characters, too. You find parallels, points of connection, things like that. But I'm not an actor who gets so incredibly haunted by my characters that I can't come back.
The best compliment was Ben Kingsley coming up to me, putting his hand on the back of my neck, and saying, "Good job, son.".
I've been recognized very seldom. I think I just look different in person than I do as the character.
I do know that I've read somewhere that it's been statistically proven that in times of war, horror films are much more popular. I don't know why that is. You'd think it'd be the opposite. You'd think people would want to escape from it.
It's nice to know when you're a part of a story, it's nice to know at least something about the beginning, middle, and end.
I try to pick characters that I find interesting and complex and that I feel I can bring something of myself to.