Jake Gyllenhaal Part 2: When the right role comes along 'I go after it like a wolf!'

After a break for jogging and while Jake Gyllenhaal irons his shirt, collects his dry cleaned suit and ponders over which shoes to wear for tomorrow's Golden Globes, here is the second part of the sensational and lengthy interview conducted with Scott Feinberg. In this part Jake covers the 'teenage in transition' roles, the big movies of the mid 2000s, living privately in the public eye and his pride in Love and Other Drugs. As before, there are times when words are unclear and/or muffled and I've done my best and so, as previously said, any mistakes are mine and not Jake's. Over to Jake:


Teenager in Transition

'I just remember being pretty confused! There was a lot coming at me and I didn't... and I think that was what Donnie Darko was born out of, Bubble Boy was born out of that - the question of confusion of adolesence and growing up and being out there on my own for the first time. And even the movie Highway that I did with Jared Leto which never came out at the the theatres. The Good Girl really. All of these characters came out of, I think, a sense - I think I have always tried to just,... but I guess I just learned from the lesson of the moment... where I was in that moment I think, that I kept on questioning...'


I care very deeply about what I do and I think that leaves me very vulnerable in a lot of ways

'It's funny but I've seen over the past five years the image of an actor really sort of change. What an actor does and what people expect from them. Being outside scrutiny, and the internet and all these things - you have to maintain integrity (laughs). There are a lot of different things that changed since 2005 to 2011, you know what I mean? In terms of what it is to be an actor and what young actors think it is to be an actor. There are people acting all the time, all over the place, themselves, really. For me, I think I saw, there was definitely a phase in there with Proof and Jarhead and Brokeback Mountain - those came at me in way that was just like kismet. There was just a real... being at work with those movies. And yes the beginning, trying to find a real ease in the acting process and I think that ease translates maybe into being an adult.'


'And then with Brokeback and what Brokeback became, that was... all of us in that process, that was overwhelming. I see that a lot with people involved in movies that are such... and become these huge things in culture and that happens, it does happen. I think there was a little bit of searching after that for me. I was like, Ok, there's Rendition and then there's... I did Zodiac, which was, looking back on it, particularly the honour to be working with David Fincher and Mark Ruffalo and Tony Edwards and Downey, and seeing where Downey was, that was a really special time. There was searching in that, for me that's what it feels like when I think of that.'


'And then even with Prince of Persia there was a search in there, figuring that out. And then I think when I did Love and Other Drugs there's a... to be there's a real clarity actually, just knowing the character, finding a character that, a real character that I fell in love with. And for the first time... there are a couple I'd say - Donnie Darko and Jarhead and Brokeback, even October Sky, there are a couple of characters in there that I felt sure about and when my instinct comes up like that I go after it like a wolf! I mean I really do! And I did with that. Imagine me with... that for me was Love and Other Drugs. That, that marks the beginning of something else for me and that's why I feel so proud of it and that's why the character and the role I feel... I feel at ease with it. Like when the movie came out, there's usually a lot of... I like to think that they're only there... I care very deeply about what I do and I think that leaves me very vulnerable in a lot of ways to some people's responses but with this one, with Love and Other Drugs, I was like I didn't really care... and that's the beginning of another phase for me, which is different than I've ever felt before.'


I'm just as guilty of being interested in the people that I admire

'I approach all this stuff with great trepidation because I always feel that I never know how my words will be interpreted which I think is the weird irony like I said of being an actor because ultimately the only thing I see that I want to see from actors is vulnerability and I want to see them open their hearts. And when somebody tries to do that in their work and other people know very little about what's actually going on and tend to paint a very, very simple picture. I'm not necessarily sure why that happens but I think it's just... we're all part and parcel of it, do you know what I mean? I'm just as guilty of being interested in the people that I admire or somehow I find as interesting as the next person. I do happen to be a part of that, of some people's interest.'


'But I think, to be really honest, which is hard to be, I think it is kind of really... I think for a while there I thought it sort of impacted my life in a way and then I realised like, you know,... I'm a very private person. I try - the irony about all of this is that I really try to be a very private person and I definitely am, in choosing what I want to do, giving up that privacy, which is already confusing (laughs). But I think that... I think what I've noticed is that it's so hard for anybody, whether they're under scrutiny by a photographer or by some tabloid, or whatever, any journalist, whatever you might do, it's hard for anybody to find themselves, really their true selves. It's just frustrating when people have intentions and the intentions are... They've made it so, so simple when it's a so complicated, fascinating, extraordinary thing. And that's what I see movies moving away from too - it's harder and harder to have people make movies about complicated, fascinating... because that's not what's being consumed as much but actually it feels like maybe there's talk about it this year, that maybe people are really wanting that. That they really do want that... I realise, as I said, that it can be seen like 'Why the hell are you in these things every week?', they might not like that.'


'There is something that I would love... I love that people understand that it's a funny thing, I think, in the end and you hear about celebrities getting upset at the photographers and I understand why! (Laughs) I don't know what it is but it's just a real... it's made it impossible for people to be totally honest because when you're honest it's manipulated.'


Love and Other Drugs

'When Annie came on the project, as what happens when anybody who's a great actor, they're looking for the reasons for why their character exists. That's the first real question you always have to ask and sometimes actors I think can fit themselves into something that's the way they've been given weight to, they can create weight themselves. Sometimes the weight's already there entirely written by the writer and they just show up and read their lines and somehow the story creates something even deeper than you could have imagined. But in the case of Annie and that role, it wasn't as much and I made a decision, which was great advice from a lot of different people who had read the story, that the strength of the script was always - and I believe the strength of the movie is too - is its love story and all the rest of it, not that all the rest of it can go away, but in a way it could.'


'And what I think mattered the most as an actor is going towards the thing that works. Its seen for any created thing, that anybody who has any great success in the movie business, moving towards the thing that works and that is the most honest. And when Annie came on, she was like 'what the hell is this girl doing here?' I don't understand. Is she just like a thing... to create sympathy?' And we worked on it to make it a real love story and we just started cutting things, that the story used to be a story about this guy who goes through a journey and then it became a love story.'


'And I think it really was born out of Ed, Annie and I all deciding that that was something... At any point along the way me, or Annie or Ed could have said 'I'm out of here. No, this isn't the story I wanted to tell.' I could have said I wanted to be that guy who learned something and Annie could have said this character isn't developed enough and if it's not about her I'm out of here, and Ed could say any number of different things. But I think we were all on the same page with it and Parkinson's is what she deals with and I think the movie deserved a trememdous amount of more weight than it had been given initially in the script. So we just went that way and I hope that answers your question.'


Thanks

'It means a lot that you like the movie. To me, Annie, Ed and I tried so... we tried so hard to make something special with this movie and the fact that people respond to it makes me... how much hard work was put into it and how much we care about these characters. It means a lot, thank you.'


Personally, I am delighted to hear Jake mention Zodiac. It sounds that now Jake looks back on that as an important part of his career. I'm thrilled with David Fincher's success with The Social Network, including victory at the Critics Choice Awards. And so good luck to Jake and Anne for tomorrow night's awards!

Includes pictures from IHJ.