You find out an actor/actress you really enjoy in a movie or TV show have never bothered to watch the material they star in?
I’ve found that out a few times and it surprises me. My prime example is the cast of “Lost”. Both Michael Emerson (Ben) and Naveen Andrews (Sayid) stated that they had nevered watch an episode of Lost.
Wouldn’t they be curious? They star in a TV servies for multiple seasons, it has a rabid cult following and they can’t take the time to see what it’s all about?
Not really. When you are doing the acting, you can get so sick of the whole affair that the big picture bores you to tears. Or you just may not care in the first place. Does a plumber need to know about the architect’s concept when he installs the toilet?
I’m disappointed when I find out they didn’t like it. I liked the 13th Warrior a lot, but I found out Omar Sharif was dreadfully upset about being in it and hated it. I didn’t get why. It was a fun movie, and he made a paycheck, didn’t he?
Doctor Who: David Tennant, who played the tenth doctor, is the only actor to play the part who watched the show (both while growing up and while it aired). Many other actors who played major roles never watched the completed episodes. Same thing for Star Trek TOS.
Many hard-core fans are stunned to learn that, but I think that after an actor lives and breathes a script for weeks, they probably have formed such a good idea in their mind of what’s going on, they don’t need to watch the finished project. IMO, YMMV.
No. Not at all. Not in the least. I’m watching a movie, starring actors. Why do I care whether or not they’ve watched the movie. They know all about it. They lived and breathed it for probably a year. It’s work to them.
I don’t go back and read old reports or emails of mine and bask in my glorious writing proficiency from days of yore.
Daniel Radcliffe has been spending a lot of media time lately distancing himself from Harry Potter, saying things like he hasn’t watched the movies, he was drunk on set, sleeping with groupies etc. I can understand why he would want to move on and establish himself as an adult actor but I think he’s spoiling the “magic” for all the people who supported the series the last 10 years.
Michael Gambon has said he has never read the books and didn’t know who Dumbledore was. I think something like Harry Potter with such a huge following, it is disappointing to the fans that the people who appear in the films are not as invested in it as the fans are, that it was just a paying job.
I’d watch something I’d acted in. It must be a wonder to lead such a rich full busy life, that I couldn’t find at least an hour to check out the finished product I’d taken part in.
Not at all. In fact, I’d generally be kind of confused if they DID - don’t they have something else they’d rather watch than something they’d already lived?
(The confusion gets less the further from the time they made it they watched it. I generally find it’s better to check out my own artistic endeavours a little removed from when I made them, just so’s I can engage with them like the audience, not the creator who can only see what was intended, not what was actually created.)
I’d get a little annoyed if they actively ran it down, if it was something I liked. (On the other hand, Robert Pattinson dissing Twilight, or the like…that’s cool.) But simply not being interested in it as anything beyond a pay cheque? No problem.
This may not be a perfect analogy, but… a lot of my favorite records were made, in part, by session musicians who were well paid for their performances.
Session drummer Hal Blaine, for instance, played the drums for the Byrds and the Partridge Family, for Elvis and the Fifth Dimension, for Sinatra and the Monkees, among hundreds of others. Did he like all the songs he performed? I’m sure he didn’t. Playing the drums was a job for him, and once the job was over, did little girls care if he ever listened to “I Think I Love You” or “Woke Up in Love This Morning” again? As long as he gave the record a good beat they could dance too, the little girls should have been happy.
In the same way, acting is a JOB. A Shakespearean actor from England, may take a role as a villain in “Die Hard 5” because it pays well, even if the action genre doesn’t interest him in the least. As long as he gives a decent performance, why should audiences care if he himself liked the movie or even saw the movie himself?
Honestly, I think it’s weird not to be curious enough to check it out. I know from various interviews that they very often do not know exactly what the movie will bring. They know the parts they are in, and, even then, they don’t know what takes were kept or how much of their performance wound up on the cutting room floor. I constantly see people surprised at the finished product.
I’m not exactly disappointed, but I seriously don’t get it. If I had just finished a creative work, I would definitely want to go back and watch it completed at least once. That would be like writing a paper but then not looking at it again. Yeah, I get not being able to ever watch it recreationally due to the amount of work involved, but ya gotta check it out–otherwise it shows a lack of concern over your craft.
And, yes, if you’re only doing it for the paycheck, I’d rather you quit. There are no shortage of actors who do it because they love it, and if you don’t give a crap, they deserve a chance. Maybe if you’re actually living from paycheck to paycheck, I can excuse it, but how often is that the case amongst mainstream movie stars? Just because you mismanaged the 2 million you got for your last performance doesn’t make me think you really needed to do this schlocky thing you hate.
I was thinking the same thing. Really, to the extent that I care one way or the other, actors who don’t watch their own work rise a notch in my estimation. If nothing else, you know they’re not into it just out of a perverse need to see their own face blown up to three stories tall.
Pretty much what Leaffan said. I can also see how it could be a bit disconcerting if the actor’s personality is extremely different from the character. Imagine staring at someone who looks and sounds exactly like you but does things you’d never do.
Now if the actor was coming out and saying, “How can anyone watch this crap? I had to stop cashing my paycheck because I felt so dirty.” I might be put off.
I would be surprised if an actor regularly watched a TV show they starred in. I don’t spend my time away from working thinking about the company I work for.
Also, don’t forget that actors CONSTANTLY have strangers coming up to them expecting them, if not literally to be the character they play in whatever well-known film or TV show they’re in, at least to respond good-naturedly to being identified with that character, comply with requests to talk in that character’s voice or with his/her mannerisms, etc.
I can totally see why they wouldn’t want to spend any of their spare time watching themselves be that character.
Doesn’t disappoint me at all. I know that many actors don’t like to watch their own performances, and I can understand that perspective. Furthermore, many may be working on shows of a genre they don’t personally care to watch. So long as they don’t start calling the show crap or something, whatever, not everyone has to watch the same shows.
I’d imagine it’s pretty hard to imerse themselves into the imaginary setting/atmosphere of the movie after being on set. We see the bridge of a spacecraft and picture it as part of a larger ship floating in the middle of outer space. They see the bridge and see it as a crappily built set with cameramen and lighting techs just out of view inside some dusty studio warehouse with catered food on the otherside of the wall.