OTHER TECH

How did a nice Midwestern guy like you end up playing an urban Jewish professor in The Squid and the Whale? Hmmm. The short answer is I guess I understood the part - I could see the comedy in it. When I expressed that to [writer/director] Noah [Baumbach], he said, "You're one of the first people to tell me they think it's funny. Everybody thinks it's such a tragedy, such a slow descent into marital hell and the destruction of a family." And I said, "Yeah, it is that except there is a lot of humor along the way." I think that became the reason I moved to the top of the list for the part.

It must have been gratifying for you to see an indie film like that get an Oscar nomination. It has been a wonderful ride for everyone involved. When we finished shooting, we were concerned that no one would see it, since we didn't have any distribution. So the fact that Noah ended up winning a nomination for his script is wonderful. I was worried the film was too smart for the room, but I'm glad to see a movie that can both disturb and challenge can get recognized.

Your career really took off with Woody Allen's The Purple Rose of Cairo. I was 30, and I got to work with Woody, one of the great American filmmakers. To get a chance to work with him and to get handed the script and realize you've got two leading roles in the same film - I remember thinking. "Everything I've ever learned, let me remember it now."

Was he a formative influence, working with him so early in your career? It was a huge opportunity, so every day of the four-month shoot I did my best work, regardless of simple the scene might be. And about halfway through shooting, Woody told me I was good. When the really great people like Woody, Clint [Eastwood] and Meryl [Streep] turn and tell you something like that, they're not really effusive. But when they say it, you remember it. And when he told me that, I instantly turned a corner because the critics didn't matter anymore. Actors read reviews because they need that validation, but suddenly I had all the validation I needed from Woody. When I moved back to Michigan and started my theater company, that film was such a turning point in my career that I decided to name the theater after it.

It seems like the Purple Rose Theatre Company is a labor of love. Yes, it is. I'm not paid there, and when I write a play for the Company, I donate the royalties back. And I have to raise a lot of money for it, but it's where I've been. Basketball players are called gym rats, hockey players are called rink rats - I'm a theater rat. I always have been.

Do you prefer the theater to working on a film? Well, if the American theater paid better [laughs] ... but ever since I saw Al Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon in college, I wanted to do film. I used the New York theater to get better as an actor, but it was a launching pad because working in movies was my goal.

You've got a movie coming out later this year about Truman Capote and In Cold Blood called Infamous. I've seen the finished film and it's phenomenal. Forget about me because I'm barely in it. It will be interesting to see what the critics do because they're very excited about Philip Seymour Hoffman's performance in Capote - as they should be.