Interview: Tim Robbins Talks “The Lucky Ones” and The Loss of Hollywood’s Artistry

“It used to be every year a Hollywood studio would have three or four films that they were putting forth as their expression, their contribution towards the artistic end of cinema. They got out of that business about ten or fifteen years ago.”

Tim Robbins is a fantastic actor and director, outspoken in his beliefs while starring in some of the best films ever made. His latest film is The Lucky Ones [watch the trailer], a dramedy about three soldiers (Robbins, Michael Pena and Rachel McAdams) on leave from the Iraq War who are trying to figure out who they are during a cross-country road trip. Robbins plays Fred Cheever, a reservist who’s finally getting discharged only to discover the life he’s returning to is not the same life he’d left. He sat down recently at a roundtable interview and spoke about the film and his view on what’s wrong with Hollywood today.

Q: The Lucky Ones may succeed where a lot of Iraq movies haven’t because the soldiers are in a more relatable situation. What brought you to it?
Tim Robbins: For me, it was a script that I really loved and I really responded to because it has such a level of humanity in it. It was funny, it was moving. It was a story about three people who never in a million years should have been in the same car finding themselves in the same car. They find ways towards each other. They find ways of helping each other through the difficulties of coming home. I felt that was really the kind of movie we need right now. The one that can provide some healing and some insight into what it is to be a soldier and to come home. I had been receiving a lot of those Iraq scripts, and some very good ones that told the story of friendly fire incidents or corruption in the politics of what was going on. Even though the scripts were great, I just feel like I don’t want to participate in that right now. I think we already know that. We’re in pain about it. I don’t know if we want to see that story right now. Then this one came along and I said ‘oh my god this is something that will be helpful at this point.’ Particularly to veterans.

Q: One of the things setting this script apart are the moments of humor that you don’t know if you’re really supposed to laugh at. Did you have any of those moments while you were first reading the script?
TR: Oh, I knew I was supposed to laugh at it, and that’s the great thing for me about this project - it had the courage to do that. When you meet veterans, you kind of understand this quite quickly. The first thing out of their mouths isn’t the pain. The first thing out of their mouths is something that is working towards surviving the pain and moving on. So often times they’ll just want to talk about sports or movies. What I loved about the script was that all the other stuff was there constantly, but was never spoken. I find the more interesting writers are the ones that don’t write the obvious, that leave it as subtext. Knowing full well that it’s there it’s the elephant in the room but you don’t need to mention it. That was what resonated for me with this.

Q: How was it working with Rachel and Michael in that very tiny space?
TR: Great. I think we all realized early on that we have to find ways to be generous with each other. I’ve come to understand that chemistry is really just generosity. Particularly in this case, it was important because we knew we were gonna be stuck in a car for seven weeks. So we made efforts from the very start to have dinner together and get to know each other. We would go out and hear music.

Q: You’ve said that a lot of veterans would come up to you and tell you their stories at night and you felt you had a responsibility to listen to them.
TR: Well, no, I was honored. I was honored to listen to them, and I was honored that they would choose me to share their stories with. There were various stories. Some very painful. But that’s been happening for the last five years.

Q: Did they give you any sense of why they felt you were the kind of guy they could spill to?
TR: Yeah. My sense was that there’s a certain stoicness with returning veterans. One of them said to me they feel they can’t bring this information to their families, because they are trying to protect their loved ones from the details. Out of a sense of love and honor, they hold on to it. A couple of times this happened, I think it was the fact that they knew that I was opposed to the war. They knew I was kind of a safe person to talk to about this kind of stuff.

Q: How did some of the things you learned from talking to veterans influence the way you played this role?
TR: Well, a large part of it just validated the script. But that was before I read the script. I mean I had had conversations with veterans whose relationships had not been the same when they got back, and that was deeply troubling to them. I had had conversations with families of returning soldiers or active military. They were talking about the attempts to try to get their loved ones the proper protective body armor that were being blocked by people in the military and by the government. Different stories of compassion as well and of strength; of what it is to serve and the way you feel about the people you serve with, that that’s forever, that’s profound and deep and something that people that have not been in that circumstance can’t understand. One guy told me that there was this guy he served with that he didn’t agree with on a damn thing politically, but would want that person next to him in any battle because of who he was as a man and as a soldier. I think all of these conversations for the past 28 years since I did Top Gun have informed who this character is. I’ve come to know over the years a lot of people who have served.

Q: What would you like an audience to take from this film?
TR: First of all, I hope they see it. One of the things today for movies is that it’s so challenging is to compete in this marketplace. It really does take word of mouth, this kind of movie. So if you see this movie and you like it, tell forty people in an e-mail to go see this right away, because the shelf life in theaters of movies that try to step outside of the box of the blockbuster and try to tell human stories is very limited unless there’s a real response to it. So we’re hoping that people will help us out and come see the movie and tell their friends. Hopefully, they’ll take out some more compassion for the people that are living amongst them that have been through this kind of experience and have come home and need help. If nothing else, the understanding of what they’ve been though.

Q: You’re obviously a passionate story teller. You love movies. Can you remember something you saw when you were young that made you think I want to tell stories? Was there a movie that you saw that maybe had a big effect on you?
TR: I was so lucky to be coming of age in the seventies. I saw so many films that just knocked me out. One of the ones that made me want to make films as a director was Nashville. Harold and Maude. Hal Ashby’s movies. The Last Detail. Let’s see, I was twelve in 1970. So we’re talking about from twelve to sixteen, I would sneak into R rated movies, but the movies I was seeing were storied that were adult stories. Stories that didn’t condescend to the audience. That didn’t try to appeal to my lesser instincts. Treated me as an adult and told stories in an uncompromising way. That was due, in a large extent, to the amount of freedom that filmmakers had at that time. Then to study theatre after that, and read Eugene O’Neill and Arthur Miller and Sam Shepard and Bertolt Brecht and to see how all of that mattered. All of that kind of depth of writing and the complex moralities really informs great story. Then to become involved in the business and see the decline, to some extent, in the way storied are told. Seeing what makes money and how it became about big box office just in the course of my time, from the seventies to now. How it’s become a business of explosions and big special effects and -

Q: Lesser instincts.
TR: Yeah. Appealing to my lesser instincts. I can see how those work and I can see how those are fun, but Hollywood got out of the business of making serious films and that’s sad. It used to be every year a Hollywood studio would have three or four films that they were putting forth as their expression, their contribution towards the artistic end of cinema. They got out of that business about ten or fifteen years ago.

What I’m saying is when they put out The Godfather, you knew that The Godfather was coming out. The fact that it got great reviews and then had a really successful run in movie theatres and was considered a success, and the fact that it was also an amazing film that will stand the test of time - I don’t know if that’s possible today. I think it’s possible to make a film of the same quality, but whether it’s going to be worn as a thing of pride by a major studio and make sure that it gets out there like those films did - I don’t know if they’re capable of doing that anymore. When you have your serious films being done by bastard sons of the industry, the boutique divisions, you can have great films made there but it seems like Hollywood has forgotten how to release those films. A good example last year - There Will Be Blood. I thought that was an extraordinary film. A film that will be there for a long long time. A classic. It didn’t reach the audience it should have reached, because they forgot how to do that. They don’t know how to do it anymore. They know how to do their big blockbusters but they don’t put the full weight of the studio and the pride of cinema arts into releasing it.

Q: Do you have any advice for up-and-coming actors trying to get their start in the business today?
TR: If you’re just starting out and you don’t have any credits yet and your just coming out of college, I would say that if your gonna make this as a life choice, make it because you feel profoundly that if you do anything else you would be miserable. Don’t get into it because you want to be famous or rich. The odds aren’t good. Do it because you have to do it for your soul. Then if you are starting to enjoy some success and are starting to get some grounding in the business, I would encourage hobbies. Different interests that are outside of the day-to-day auditioning and acting. Everything from travel to reading about things you don’t know, to attending lectures, to educating yourself in some way. If involvement in a theater company is a possibility and something that you’re serious about, then do that. But other than that, the most dangerous thing is the self-involvement - the self-celebratory nature of show business that really doesn’t make you grow as an actor, it makes you grow as an ego. I think that’s a dangerous thing.

Q: Are you coming out with an album?
TR: I’m doing some music and I’m gonna be mixing the next couple weeks. I don’t know what I’m gonna do with it yet. We’ll see what I’ve got. I’m gonna play it for a couple of friends and see what they suggest. It’s a tough time for the music business right now and I’m trying to figure out from people who know better what the alternatives are. It’s already all about the internet right now, so I think there’s gotta be a way to find different distribution techniques. My instinct, of course, is to just put it out on vinyl and that’s it. Ha ha, if your cool enough to still have a record player you can listen.