Kiefer Sutherland Breaks Down His Most Iconic Characters | GQ

i've noticed this in america more than anywhere else i've traveled americans believe when they watch a movie that they're watching the people they're watching and they believe that they are those characters you know i've run into people who won't shake my hand because of a character that i played [Music] stand by me and stand by me uh i got to play ace merrill all of the characters were so beautifully defined and and rob reiner as a director did this amazing thing with the boys because they were kind of ranging in ages between kind of 11 and 13. they would play theater games in the morning and then they would shoot only in the afternoon to cut your shooting schedule in half is unheard of but he got them to such a relaxed place that that the bonds that they started to develop as friends and as actors was really quite extraordinary and so my character's sole responsibility was to be a threat to these four kids that you would fall in love with and and i went for it you're dead you're gonna have to kill me ace no problem i was i was 17 years old it was the first job i was ever hired actually only job i was ever hired for in the office at the audition and i will thank rob reiner to the death for that uh it was one of the most extraordinary feelings you know but again the character was just so well written there was there was no trying to navigate what he was he was just you know i don't know if you're allowed to say but he was an uh and and as an actor uh you need to lean into that we're gonna get you for this maybe you will and maybe you won't oh we will i made great friends casey schmosko who's in in that gang is still a dear friend of mine and john cusack worked on the early parts of that film he and i became friends corey feldman and i would end up going to work on lost boys together river phoenix we had a shared interest in the guitar we did that and in fact i think one of the first songs i taught him was was stand by me and that was back when the film was called the body i don't know if rob heard that and heard river playing it or how that ended up becoming uh the title of the film but it was the first song that i had kind of played with river the lost boys when i was doing lost boys i got to play david he was a much more well-rounded bad guy than ace merrell was in stand by me ace merrell was almost a cartoon character whereas david you know becomes friends with the lead actor you know jason patrick david as a character is is at least on paper supposed to be kind of cool and sexy and and has a girlfriend and star [Music] i can't beat your bike you don't have to beat me michael you just have to try and keep up developing that character was a very funny kind of moment because so much of it was created from a physical point the look had to be right the clothes had to be right the hairstyle had to be right and joel schumacher as a director was very in touch with rock and roll and music and wanted that to be an aspect of this film wanted it to have that kind of look so i think all of us on some level started to try and live out kind of whatever rock and roll fantasy we might have joel schumacher wanted me to have white hair and and i had very long hair at the time and he wanted me to keep it and i just looked like a bad wrestler i looked like a it was awful and i thought billy idol was really cool and i thought he looked really cool and i still think he looks really cool his hair was all spiky and kind of punk up front and so i got that haircut but i left enough at the back so i could tell joel schumacher i left it long and i think kind of accidentally might have at least been part of a movement that created maybe one of the worst hairstyles of all time the mullet are those maggots maggots michael you're eating maggots how do they taste and i think joel was disappointed that i had cut my hair but we did five films together so i think he forgave me 24. when we were doing 24 i had shot the pilot and then i went away to do two other films i wasn't sitting around waiting to see if it was gonna get picked up if i gave you a phone number could you hack in and get all the internet passwords connected to it sure if you ever want and if i didn't have a warrant it's important it's pretty important and the truth is it was just different enough that i thought it doesn't really have a chance the whole idea of everything being filmed in real time it never been done before we didn't know if it was going to work and i would rather stick a darning needle in my eye than have to work out some of the logistics that howard gordon and joel cerneau and and bob cochran did but the truth is i really liked the character there was something so nice about not being the bad guy there was something so nice about this is the guy you want to win having said that it was painfully obvious to me out of the gate that he never would he was never going to win the odds were too big and he was just one person and so what i found really interesting in the process of developing that character over the first season was that there are people in our world who do jobs that they're never going to succeed at and yet we would not be here if it weren't for them i fell in love with that guy it was just like you know i can't say that i i'm that guy but i absolutely admired the character you know i think all of us felt very strongly that that terrible day of 9 11 when our show started to kind of emulate one of the great tragedies in american history i mean i remember going through weeks of not wanting to do it anymore and i think everybody on the show felt the same way it was like i don't want to i don't i don't want anything coming close to representing this awful thing that i just watched happen having said that the country felt very differently even if it was just a television show and a guy fighting back that's what they wanted and that's what we did get these men to back off and holster their weapons back off stand down i often think about how lucky i am to have had that opportunity i got to work with a cast and crew over nine seasons that i will consider family to the day i die even if i don't get to see them every day like we used to i have pictures of my daughter at the beginning of 24 and grade 6. i have pictures of my daughter at the end of 24 graduating from nyu it was a huge part of mine and my family's life and i miss it you know it was an incredible experience i have learned that you're just better off not to be definitive about your answer about whether you will do something or not do something i've loved playing that character uh i do believe the story is unresolved uh and if something were to be written that made sense to me and that i thought was going to contribute to the franchise then i would be behind it and even if my participation in that would be limited i thought the series that they went to go do i was i was very excited for all of them for that too and my involvement again uh will always be predicated on what i perceived to be the quality of the writing howard gordon who was the show runner for so many years is a fantastic writer and so if he is motivated to do something we'll see what happens [Music] a few good men so a few good men was an incredible play an incredible script lieutenant kendrick is the character that i played he was an interesting character because i think when when people have limited experience they tend to hold on to things very tightly and so the marine code of conduct and the bible are two things that you could hold on very tightly and follow to the letter of the law and still be incredibly wrong and that was what i used kind of as my defining moment for that character was that he had misinterpreted both the bible and the marine code of conduct in such a way that it led to someone's dying commander i believe in god and his son jesus christ because i do i can say this private santiago is dead and that is a tragedy but he is dead because he had no code he is dead because he had no honor [Music] and god was watching the story that i'll always remember from that film was you know two of the biggest actors in the world were in the same movie tom cruise and jack nicholson and and jack nicholson gives a performance that's that's iconic and extraordinary but any actor will tell you that jack nicholson can't give that performance if it wasn't for the performance that tom cruise was giving it works together and so the only time i ever saw actors on a day off come to work was the two of them squaring off for the you can't handle the truth scene you want answers i think i'm entitled you want answers i don't want the truth you can't handle the truth i remember coming in i had my cup of tea and a bagel and i sit down somewhere in the courtroom and i look over and i see you know bruce willis who's not even working on the movie he's sitting in the gallery people are coming from everywhere they start and the coverage is on jack nicholson and they do it from top to bottom the entire scene required a 1200 foot mag back in the days where we used film and it literally went from end to end and he knocked it out of the park not a slight hesitation not something like an uncomfortable moment or trying to kind of tip your toe into the scene and kind of see if the water's fine this guy went for it he took a full-on hank aaron baseball swing and he knocked it out of the park i'd never heard a set that quiet in my life all the oxygen has just been sucked out of the room and no one was moving rob reiner said okay well let's reload and and then really quickly we'll go again and jack smiled and put his head down and they did it again and the scene was scheduled for two or three days of filming and rob reiner said well it's never gonna get any better than that so we wrapped never seen it happen and i've also never seen a gallery of cast and crew uh give an ovation and it was to both of them and so i was always very proud to be a part of of that group of actors a time to kill in a time to kill it was a hard character to play it was again joel schumacher uh at this point we've done three films or four films together i got a friend who used to be active i could give him a call you do that winston you tell them boys we need some clan down here in camp you know i do remember i got married uh just after that film had been finished and forest whitaker was at my wedding uh and was friends with me and my wife he had seen that i was in uh a time to kill and he's like shook his head he's like man you got balls and i was like why you don't think people understand it and he's like nope and he was right resurrect our country from the fires of racial degradation and to make white people the sole masters of our nation's destiny and i've noticed this in america more than anywhere else i've traveled americans believe when they watch a movie that they're watching the people they're watching and they believe that they are those characters it hasn't worked out so well with some of the characters that i played you know i've run into people who won't shake my hand because of a character that i played i try to explain to them that that the overall telling of the story the whole story is what's important not just the one character they don't want to hear it i i don't apologize for the characters that i have played over the years because i feel very strongly about the reasons i chose to do them if you're going to try and make a movie about racism and how awful racism is then you're going to have to show it for what it is and my character the character i was asked to play was the character that was being used to show you how horrible how wrong how backward thinking racism is as an idea and and even more specifically the clan uh throughout the united states and i think that there's a huge responsibility in playing those characters and playing those characters correctly [Music] dark city dark city which was directed by alex poyus was one of my most favorite experiences that i've ever had as a person and as an actor i think alex poyce is a real visionary he wrote the cartoon version of dark city when he was 15 years old i did that movie at a time when maybe i wasn't the hottest ticket on the street right my career was kind of in a questionable state at best and i met with him in a hotel and i remember acting out the part for him in the lobby you know he just wanted to have a drink with me but i wasn't going to let it go i was i was walking out of there with that job and because i really really wanted it all i wanted to do in creating the voice was just the stutter of someone who was so scared that that that they couldn't get everything out because they were scared that they'd been terribly beaten and terribly abused and then somehow still have a spark a wit uh and trying to convey that in a hotel bar is not maybe the easiest thing to do or maybe the brightest call but i think what he got from it was that i would do anything this one is still long what is it the recollections of a great lover a catalog of conquests i loved that character i mean one of the worst hairstyles of all time and i wore that hairstyle for four months with pride you know for the right to do that part [Music] designated survivor in designated survivor i play tom kirkman i have to say that that character is probably closer to me as a person than any other character that i've played and it's by design i think as we get older we become hopefully more comfortable in our skin tom kirkman as the president was was never pretending that he knew everything or that he was the smartest he was thrust in a position out of terrible tragedy and all he says is i'm gonna do my best i love that about that character just look we're all trying to navigate this thing called life and it's not easy for anyone i don't care what you have and what you think i felt that there was a humanity in tom kirkman that understood that about all people you really think i should step down [Music] i do you may be right the look of everything is going to have an impact it's going to always be much easier to work in a beautiful set that represents the oval office in the white house than it is to do it with green screen and sit in an odd fake chair and all of that stuff so so your surroundings have a very profound impact but at the root of all of it is the writing it's going to be the story lines and the words that rule the day [Music] the first lady well i don't play a lady the first lady is is actually one of my favorite projects that i've ever been a part of it chronicles the lives of three first ladies viola davis plays michelle obama michelle pfeiffer plays betty ford and jillian anderson plays eleanor roosevelt and i play franklin roosevelt to her eleanor and it's told from the perspective of these three women it's not told from the men's point of view so this is about how they changed the office of the first lady in their time and how they affected their presidential husbands is it true that i am not to have a proper job in your administration please stop listening to louie well give me something else to hear fine i am not entirely comfortable nobody else is getting two appointments i'm not asking for two appointments i'll think about it i would be asked when doing designated survivor who is my favorite american president and and i would say fdr and fdr primarily because he was dealing with a great depression he was dealing with the dust bowl then dealt with world war ii he had very difficult decisions to make during his presidency and this is where i think eleanor roosevelt was so influential that she was his moral compass doesn't mean he always followed it but she certainly made his life complicated when he didn't and i think that's a good partnership playing fdr was the first time i had been asked to play a real character a person that existed for me i started with the voice and the voice was the most important his radio address you know on december 7th 1941 is is something that every child has heard in school he was a president that spanned uh four terms he died early in his fourth term so then the physicality of when he was a younger man to when he was an older man and he changed dynamically because of polio all challenges but all really exciting i mean this is the kind of thing certainly any actor that i know that i am friends with that knows i got to play that character is jealous the contractor chris pine and ben foster both did arguably my favorite film of the decade which was hell or high water i think they're the closest duo that i've seen that kind of reminds me of robert redford and paul newman just the way they act together the way they interact together is really special my character uh wants a b c and d and he'll do e and f to get it we gave them our minds our bodies and our spirit and they chewed us up and spit us out left us with fear rage uncertainty disillusionment a sense of abandonment betrayal and finally self-loathing and guilt as if somehow everything that happened to us was our own goddamn fault it's a very sad story where an an older person manipulates a younger person to get what they want that's what the audience person is going to have to challenge themselves with when they watch that movie i don't know anyone who thinks getting old is great but there are some serious benefits and one of them is that i believe now i have a sense of security in my thought process and how i approach storytelling in a way that i absolutely did not have when i was a younger person i actually go to work with all of the excitement a young person might have but without all of the fear

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Keywords: 24, a few good men, celebrity, gq, gq iconic, gq iconic characters, gq kiefer, gq kiefer sutherland, gq magazine, iconic, iconic characters, keifer, kiefer, kiefer gq, kiefer sutherland, kiefer sutherland 2022, kiefer sutherland 24, kiefer sutherland characters, kiefer sutherland gq, kiefer sutherland interview, kiefer sutherland movie, kiefer sutherland movies, kiefer sutherland roles, stand by me, sutherland, the contractor

Id: AUYGhROLiuM

Length: 20min 37sec (1237 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 13 2022