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Backstage - Anthony LaPaglia Interview
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA TAKES ON THE ULTIMATE VILLAIN ROLE AS LEX LUTHOR
IN ALL-STAR SUPERMAN
TENTH DC UNIVERSE ANIMATED ORIGINAL MOVIE
COMING FEB. 22
Award-winning actor Anthony
LaPaglia returns to his villainous roots as the voice of Lex Luthor in All-Star
Superman, the highly anticipated 10th entry in the ongoing series of DC
Universe Animated Original Movies coming February 22, 2011 from Warner Premiere,
DC Entertainment, Warner Bros. Animation and Warner Home Video.
LaPaglia
is known far and wide for his lead role on the CBS drama Without A Trace,
but his fame goes well beyond those 160 episodes over seven seasons on the
primetime series. LaPaglia’s career highlights include an Emmy Award as
Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series for his role as Simon on Frasier,
a Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series/Drama for
Without a Trace, and the 1998 Tony Award for Best Actor (Play) for the
revival of Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge. He has also been
honored with two AFI Awards as Best Lead Actor in the films Balibo (2009)
and Lantana (2001).
LaPaglia takes the villainous lead in an All-Star
Superman cast that includes James Denton (Desperate Housewives) as
Superman, Christina Hendricks (Mad Men) as Lois Lane, seven-time Emmy®
Award winner Ed Asner (Up) as Perry White, Golden Globe® winner Frances
Conroy (Six Feet Under) as Ma Kent, Matthew Gray Gubler (Criminal
Minds) as Jimmy Olsen and Linda Cardellini (ER) as Nasty.
In
All-Star Superman, the Man of Steel rescues an ill-fated mission to the
Sun (sabotaged by Lex Luthor) and, in the process, is oversaturated by radiation
– which accelerates his cell degeneration. Sensing even he will be unable to
cheat death, Superman ventures into new realms – finally revealing his secret to
Lois, confronting Lex Luthor’s perspective of humanity, and attempting to ensure
Earth’s safety before his own impending end with one final, selfless act.
All-Star Superman will be distributed by Warner Home Video as a Blu-Ray™
Combo Pack and 2-Disc Special Edition DVD, as well as single disc DVD. The film
will also be available On Demand and for Download.
LaPaglia’s career in
television and film has already spanned a quarter of a century, featuring roles
on TV series from Magnum P.I. and Trapper John, M.D. to Murder
One and CSI; films like So I Married An Axe Murderer and Woody
Allen’s Sweet and Lowdown; and voicing animated characters for Happy Feet
and Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole. He’s had the chance to
play a variety of real-life characters ranging from gangsters Frank Nitti and
Lucky Luciano to Cuban leader Fidel Castro and college basketball coach Jim
“Jimmy V” Valvano.
LaPaglia has belied his birth/upbringing in Australia
with a chameleon-like array of roles, frequently playing New York-style cops and
gangsters. However, away from the camera, he is quick to bask in his
non-American roots as co-owner of an Australian Soccer club (Sydney FC) and
playing goalie around the Southland, particularly for Hollywood United Football
Team. A quick conversation with the actor reveals his true passion is between
the posts.
Here’s a few questions the actor/goalie fielded in an
interview following his recording session as Lex Luthor for All-Star
Superman ...
QUESTION: What were the challenges of creating Lex
Luthor as an animated voice?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: You have to
understand the medium that you're in. As opposed to (on-camera) acting with
another individual where it requires listening in order for you to respond, here
you're having to create the question the other person would ask you in your head
and then respond to it. It's a much more difficult process because there's a
line between it being real and it being animated. There's a slightly different
tonal quality to the way you say things, or in the way you have to make it
bigger sometimes than you would naturally do in order to sell it. But not having
the visual in front of you – you're kind of shooting in the dark a lot.
QUESTION: Did you
enjoy this incarnation of Lex Luthor?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: Yeah, I did
actually. I found it surprising that Lex Luthor was getting a bit spiritual
(laugh). I guess it's kind of like a sign of the times where he's trying to get
in touch with the inner Lex. (laugh)
QUESTION: Can you talk about the
journey Lex goes through in All-Star Superman?
ANTHONY
LAPAGLIA: The journey Lex Luthor takes in this film – in the beginning it’s
what you'd expect: he's interested in power and world domination and Superman is
the bane of his existence. And then as it progresses, there’s a slight injection
of humanity, which is surprising to Lex Luthor that he's even experiencing
feelings that are remotely human. So it kind of gives him an unusual arc. He
definitely has more dimension to him in this film.
QUESTION: What do
you bring to Lex Luthor?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: As a kid, I loved comic
books. It's basically how I learned to read as a kid because my mother would buy
them for me to keep me quiet, I think. I remember one time particularly – I was
4 or 5 years old, and I was sick and I had to stay in bed for three weeks, and
so she would buy me comic books every second or third day. And I just created my
own world, sitting under the covers reading Superman, Batman, Silver Surfer, a
lot of the great comics.
QUESTION: What is it about Lex Luthor that
most appeals to you?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: There's a kind of sarcastic
streak in Lex Luthor that comes from that extreme confidence in his ability to
do what he does. I like the attitude of him. I like that nothing really fazes
him, that he feels like he has complete control over everything, therefore, he
can be relaxed enough to be a smartass. A good Lex Luthor makes or breaks it for
me, I think.
QUESTION: As you’ve played so many villains, do you
prefer being the bad guy?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: I've always liked playing
the baddy. Some people have a problem with getting typecast. I'm quite happy
with being typecast. I don't care, as long as you're working. The truth is you
could play every bad guy in a one dimensional fashion, but it's like everything
else in life – everything's different and everyone's unique, so you have to find
the uniqueness in the character to bring it to life.
QUESTION: You've
obviously performed in every medium available, but voiceover is relatively new
for you. Does voiceover work offer you challenges or joys of acting that you
don't get elsewhere?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: I like the isolation part of
it. I like that there's a certain amount of freedom, and that you're not waiting
for somebody else to find their motivation. It's more challenging to come up
with a believable character doing animation work than it is (in live-action).
Acting is relatively easy because you have a personal one-on-one interaction
with someone, therefore whatever you're doing is a lot smoother. This requires a
bit more patience and you have to suspend the fact that you're in a sound stage
and really commit to the material.
QUESTION: You had a moment where
you weren’t understanding Andrea Romano’s direction on a particular emotion, and
Bruce Timm was able to draw Lex Luthor with an expression that depicted that
emotion. Have you ever gotten direction via artwork before?
ANTHONY
LAPAGLIA: That made me laugh. We were trying to get that particular passage
done right and I didn't quite know how to get it. It’s not an uncommon issue
where you have three or four people that have three or four different takes on
what it should be – it gets a little confusing sometimes if you're doing it and
you're taking in all the different stuff. You want to deliver what they want but
sometimes you're not sure how to quite get there. And I thought that was
ingenious, actually, showing me the picture through the glass of the expression
on Lex Luthor's face. It made perfect sense – Bruce is an animator. That’s what
he does – so he was able to show me visually what he was looking for in my
voice. I could actually see Lex’s mental state of anguish. It actually made me
think of doing it a different way and that ended up working.
QUESTION: You've earned a Tony Award, an Emmy Award and a Golden Globe --
does one of those honors mean more to you than the others?
ANTHONY
LAPAGLIA: To be honest, after a certain period of time they're just kind of
like objects in your closet. I think that, of all of them, the one that kind of
means (more) was the Tony Award because doing theatre is way, way, harder than
doing anything you'll ever do on film or television. It's about real discipline.
You have to go in and do eight shows a week whether you feel like it or not and,
in the case where I won the Tony, it was in one of those shows where you could
never phone it in. It just didn't work if you phoned it in. So, come hell or
high water, I did it for a year – which is a long time to do eight shows a week.
I think I missed about five in a year. Also, I think (the Tony Award) meant
probably the most because it's where I started. It’s kind of what I admire the
most. Theatre is what I find the most challenging. So I would say that the Tony
kind of meant more. But the others are nice, too, you know (laughs).
QUESTION: How much
does a background in the theatre help in the voiceover booth?
ANTHONY
LAPAGLIA: The theatrical background helps you in doing (voiceover) because
you've already been through a hundred different acting classes where you've had
to sit on a black box and pretend that you were a lemon or an imaginary cup of
coffee or whatever. There's always a part of that program that requires you to
strip yourself bare and be an idiot. And if you're not prepared to do that, then
you have no place being there.
QUESTION: You had quite a lengthy list
of unglamorous jobs before becoming an actor. Pro soccer player, teacher, shoe
salesman, furniture restorer, sprinkler installer. And now you’re an
award-winning star voicing a super villain for an animated film. How does it all
tie together?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: Well, that's glorification. I used to
dig the trenches for the guy who actually installed the sprinklers. I just did
the digging (laughs). I had no idea that I would be doing what I'm doing now
when I was a kid. When I was a kid you could've said that I was going to be an
astronaut and that would have been more realistic than doing this. So I think it
ties together in that I don't really have any expectations or feelings of how
things should go anymore. They go how they go and you’ve just got to roll with
it. And I think it's your ability to roll with it that keeps you in the game.
It's also your ability to recognize when it's changing and how you need to
change with it if you want to. And I’ll tell you that from the minute I decided
what I wanted to do, it's all been gravy from there. It's what I want to do.
Whether I'm successful or not at it, it's what I chose to do. It wasn't what
somebody told me to do, so everything that comes out of it is just a bonus.
QUESTION: OK. But if you could do it all over again, what would you
choose – acting or soccer?
ANTHONY LAPAGLIA: That’s a tough one. What
level of football? (laugh) Well, if I could play in Italy for a five-year
career, I'd swap it. Absolutely. People don't realize how huge football players
are in other parts of the world – compared to them, actors and musicians are
nothing. They're doormats. You walk through Rome with Francesco Totti and I
don't care who you are – nobody’s going to notice you because Francesco Totti is
God. It's hard for people to conceive in this country just how important the
game of football is culturally in Europe and South America, and even Asia. It's
religion; it's life; it's everything.
[ Back to Backstage ]
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