Willem Dafoe
Willem Dafoe
William J. "Willem" Dafoeis an American actor. A member of the experimental theater company The Wooster Group, he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Platoonand Shadow of the Vampire. His other film appearances include The Last Temptation of Christ, The English Patientand the Spider-Man trilogy. He has also had voice roles in Finding Nemoand Fantastic Mr. Fox...
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth22 July 1955
CityAppleton, WI
theatre ready
With theatre, you have to be ready for anything.
interesting people stories
I have some sort of affinity for compulsive behavior. The most interesting stories come up from the people on the outside.
moving play luxury
In films you do a scene, you play around with it and unless you're doing a lot of reshooting, which no one has the luxury to do, you deal with the problem for a day and then you move on. On some level, it never allows you to go very deep into what performing is about.
patterns taste advertising
I'm an optimist. I hope if a movie's good that it will be a success, but as we know, that's not always true, just because of popular taste, advertising, distribution patterns - there's lots of reasons.
stories pushing buttons
You can be intuitive when you've got a more expansive role. You can get into the poetry of telling the story rather than just pushing buttons.
opportunity interesting stuff
I love doing action and stuff; the problem is usually action movies are not that interesting. Also as I get older I feel like there's less opportunities for me.
exercise theatre vices
The bad things about theatre get balanced by the good things in film and vice versa. So to tell you the truth, I love it when I can go back and forth - it feeds different parts of you and exercises different muscles.
able film
I'll never be able to really see a film that I'm in.
crazy successful good-movie
Plenty of bad movies are very successful, and plenty of good movies are not. And distribution is so crazy, some films won't even get their day in court.
important-relationships important males
I've never had any close male friends. The most important relationships in my life have always been with women.
misunderstood sometimes wrong-time
In my experience, sometimes a movie just hits at the wrong time, gets the wrong press, or gets the wrong representation, and it gets misunderstood.
fun moving target
It's no fun for an actor to keep repeating what you did before. It's always changing. I'm changing. The target keeps moving. That's the beauty of it.
talking laughing guy
It makes me laugh when I hear a guy talking about being in touch with his feminine side. But I gravitate towards women; I identify with them. And I do cry very easily, more and more as I get older.
fun lying dirty
I wish to Christ I could make up a really great lie. Sometimes, after an interview, I say to myself, 'Man, you were so honest - can't you have some fun? Can't you do some really down and dirty lying?' But the puritan in me thinks that if I tell a lie, I'll be punished.