Jonathan Tucker for French Fries S/S 2021 THE HUMAN DNA issue
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Having recently starred in the Elizabeth Banks helmed CHARLIE’s ANGELS reboot with Kristen Stewart, and also in Showtime’s Matt Damon/Ben Affleck-produced drama, CITY ON A HILL, Jonathan Tucker spoke with us from Vancouver, where he is currently shooting DEBRIS.
“We’re all reunited in humanity when something like this occurs”, Tucker opens up about the NBC sci-fi drama he is starring with Riann Steele. The series offers a physics-shifter vivid panorama, and how two different mindsets must work together to investigate when wreckage from a destroyed alien spacecraft has mysterious effects on humankind.
Jonathan truly believes in spontaneity, and as we discussed how important a strict discipline such as ballet was for him, he tells us the value of expressing yourself and taking risks for a dynamic performance and a successful storytelling.
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Let’s start talking about Debris, the sci-fi drama that is going to be out on the first of March and you’re currently shooting
Yes, we’re shooting it here in Vancouver.
You and your partner played by Riann Steele are challenged to save humankind. Do you think we are endangered as a species?
I think we’re in a more precarious time than people believed. We just had snow fall in San Antonio, Texas this morning. I think people are starting to understand that we are having our own impact on the Earth. That’s something about our own making as human beings, and with the economic and the environmental consequences of dealing with that from a political standpoint. What is fun about Debris, is the idea that there’s other life out there in the universe. We’re living in interesting times to be shooting this show, because there’s been real evidence of potential intelligent life outside of Earth. There was a great article in the past weeks in the New Yorker that summarized an object moving through our galaxy that they can’t explain. And only last year the US government released footage from their UFO files. What the show does with this information that comes to us...it really asks questions about ourselves, our fate, our relationship, our position in the galaxies; and that’s a question we’ve been asking ourselves since the very beginning, but now with the whole new element...
And the fact that you are, I suppose... you do saved humankind in Debris. The relationship between you and your partner is very important. You’re coming from very different places. I think this is going to be kind of the new structure, it’s not going to matter. We’re going to, maybe, save one another by being together
One of the questions that the show evokes is that it doesn’t really matter which country you’re from, or what language you speak, or what religious background you have, we’re all united in humanity when something like this occurs. That’s a very good thing. The relationship between my character and Riann’s character is a lot of fun, because they don’t have romantic interest in one another, and that partnership is really about the respect that they have for their different approaches of problem solving; he is much more of an executive facts type of guy, whereby she provides much more of an emotional and empathetic response with a big science background. We both had to learn to find a value in each other’s approach in order to succeed.
You often play the villain in the movies, I think that’s very interesting, like Hodak in Charlie’s Angels and Alex in the series Monsterland. How was that? Were you scared to play certain parts, and people would mistake you for the characters you were playing?
Getting to play the antagonist in our story, I get a lot more room for character choice within the system of Hollywood and I’ve always been aware that everybody has unique stories to tell, nobody’s boring. And to that, if you can bring to life those characters on screen, it’s personally gratifying. What ends up happening a lot is that editors in studios shy away from the nuances of humanity, but they tend to be a little more liberal than the bad guys, so it can be a lot of fun to play those characters.
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Are you more of a Meisner or a Method actor?
I'm definitely Meisner based. That was my base as a child actor. I think it's a great approach; particularly when you’re starting out, because it puts so much weight on listening and reacting. Being spontaneous. You can only be spontaneous if you’re listening. There’s a great Meisner game, I think it’s called the repeating game, and it seems so dumb to most people, even to most actors until they finally understand. The world is constantly changing. We’re constantly changing, the vibrations and the volume of oxygen in a room, in the world is influx, and if you’re not acknowledging that, you can’t be spontaneous. All the pre-production work in the world can’t prepare you for the day where the weather is different or somebody bumps into you as they walk down the street, you know, a background artist, or a bus goes by and blows its horns; you can never be prepared for those things, specifically. But you can be prepared if you’re in the moment and you’re listening with your heart and your ears, eyes and all the senses that you have. When you understand what the Meisner is, then it gets exciting to kind of move and flesh out the process and I’m very interested in this kind of subconscious work and this sort of Jungian Mining. The idea of trying to understand what your fatal flaw is, the personal need or drive, the public persona, the idea that we’re all healing wounds and addressing personal problems that we have as actors that are also problems that characters have. Then, what ends up happening is that you have this whole life and toolbox and ideas and traumas and joys and all these elements and when you arrive on the day you allow them to find themselves on screen and in a scene; in a moment and that creates a very dynamic performance. But almost more importantly to me it’s a dynamic experience, it’s a gratifying experience, it’s an exciting experience, but it’s as exciting as being on a high dive in that you’re also a little nervous, so you get comfortable with being uncomfortable. When I've spoken to other professionals in other backgrounds, like special forces in the army services or elite athletes like tennis players or hockey players, basketball players, these sorts of people say the exact same thing. You prepare up to a certain point, you get all your tools, you have an idea of how you want something to go, but you really have to be open to the world as it is around you and as it changes.
How is your relationship with your characters, would you say you love or hate them?
I think you’re trying to understand them, and I believe there’s good and evil in the world, but I don’t see that so much in my characters as much as it’s about trying to understand and build them.
You also attended the Boston Ballet and played in The Nutcracker for five years. Are you glad that you formed yourself in such a strict discipline? Do you prefer the stage to film?
Well, I love that you brought that up, because now I have two-year-old twins, I’m sure you’ll hear them screaming in the background. I have a daughter and a son, and nothing substantiates words more than how you raise your kids. It’s really important to me that my son, at least, tries ballet. I’m circling a father-son class. Maybe I’m getting my buddy into it, because the sense of discipline is tremendous. I think it breaks a lot of important barriers within yourself and within society, it gives you an understanding of your body and movement, which is ultimately less about you and more you in space. That awareness was an incredibly important discipline for me. It’s something I definitely want to be able to share with my son, more than my daughter. I mean, I’d love if my daughter wanted to, but it’s something really important for men to do. With Kingdom, I found ballet to be closer to Muay Thai kickboxing than any other sport I’ve played after ballet and all combat is movement and flow, but specifically Muay Thai. I have yet to be on stage as an actor despite putting the time in. I've gotten very close, but hasn’t gone my way yet. Getting on stage is definitely something I’m most excited about doing next.
Let’s talk about The Virgin Suicides, definitely one of my favourite movies. Where was it shot?
We shot in Toronto over the summer and spring of 1998 and I know that because I got my driver’s license. I turned 16 right at the end of that film. I was doing a movie that week for Showtime and we had the same production office. I think Sofia Coppola and I had the same representation and they said, well just read the script and head to the office downstairs to meet her. So, I went down there and we talked about the role, about the boys. She’s such a sensitive, thoughtful dynamic woman and director, and actually, it goes right back to the thought that she’s comfortable knowing, having grown up on film sets.
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Yes, she’s very spontaneous
It’s so important when we talk about spontaneous, because most people don’t appreciate spontaneity. Spontaneous isn't whimsical. There’s a difference between these words, I know you get it, but people think spontaneous and they think whimsical when it’s not that. Spontaneous is when they blocked out the windows and you’re shooting a scene...it’s an interior scene, and they’re trying to light it properly so they don’t want to use natural light, they’ll put up a whole bunch of screens, covering up the window and they’ll use light inside and it looks like it's natural light, but it’s not. Spontaneous is going pop, it would be really fun if this knife on the table could pick up some of the sunlight, so as you’re talking to me, I notice there’s sunlight, and go over and grab the knife and shine the light as you’re talking. That’s spontaneous. Whimsical is different, it just happens. Spontaneous is when you’re actively looking and aware in the moment, and that’s what she shoes, and what I’m trying to do.
How strange it is to be famous?
I don’t think I’m famous. Everything is relative. There’s always somebody more famous, less famous. There’s always somebody with more money and less money, more talent and less talent. You can’t be in the entertainment business for as long as I have, without recognizing there’s somebody above and below. Frankly what is compelling about your notoriety is that it might help you secure certain jobs that you want. I could tell all the stories. It’s when you get over that hump of jealousy, which you have to get over if you want a sustainable career. It’s simply about telling the stories and building those characters.
You worked with Ben Affleck and Matt Damon it City on a Hill, how was it like to work with them?
That was a show set in my hometown of Boston, and specifically a character who was from my neighborhood, so I felt a great responsibility to that role. That’s a bit of a scary thing too, because you have to go back and make sure you reflected authentically and you’re up against other elements that can potentially dilute or pollute your desire to be honest. You’re always making sure you get your performance, and I have to imagine that Ben and Matt felt that same sense of responsibility telling stories about Boston as well.
Do you like forming deep relationships on set? Do you find the more you're working with the same team, the better it gets?
You want that trust. It’s about a sense of trust more than anything else. I think the best process that can induce a dynamic performance and turn into successful storytelling is taking great risks and some of the choices that you end up making in front of the camera don’t end up working. The magic is trying things that might fail. That’s truly scary for some storytellers, and I have worked with some of those and sometimes it can be contentious, because they don’t want to understand. They’re operating from a place of fear, which manifests itself in ego, but they’re scared because they know they don’t have the confidence yet, to try things that might not work. But that’s why we get to have a rehearsal period for theatre, which I have yet to be part of, but I understand it, particularly from the work I’ve done in acting classes, which I continue to take. But that’s what you ended up having in a film set, because you’re going to come to an environment, work with actors you’ve never met before, you’re going to be handling props you’ve never seen, so by that very definition of rehearsing, you want to bring as much of a perspective as possible, and you need to, that’s your job. You have to be open to all of the other elements. “Oh, you can’t shoot at this location,” “it's raining,” or whatever it might be, you have to take risks, you have to be able and encouraged to try things. A whole take might totally fail, but maybe there’s one moment that's compelling, because ultimately you’re not even communicating as an actor or any member of the film set, with the other people around you. You’re really communicating to an editor, to a post-production facility, and trying to allow them to find your core value and go perform the story. Most people are operating from fear. I've been working with a handful of them, but the work soars when you have a set that’s encouraging of authenticity, of real characters, of risk taking. Life is really big sometimes, and people, as I said, are a lot less boring than they think they are. The moment you recognize that, your life can be more exciting. When you get to work with people you’ve worked with before, they understand that process, and it becomes much more fluid.
Last but not least, where do you eat your favourite french fries?
I’d been doing this television show Kingdom and people were asking about diet all the time, and the funny thing is that I have such an affinity for a few things: french fries, pizza, and ice cream. I love these things. When you eat them on a limited basis, you get very particular about them, and you fancy yourself an expert. I don’t love creamy potatoes. I like them very crispy and very dry. The Brits have a way of drying them out when they do their chips. There's a lot of ways of doing that, from refrigeration techniques to cool the moisture out, to let them dry overnight, to extract that moisture out of the actual french fry is key, so that’s what I’m on the hunt for.
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