Bob Gunton – Interview

Staci Layne Wilson reporting

Character actor Bob Gunton has been in a million movies and TV shows. He's "that guy" you probably recognize, but couldn't name. Most recently, he had a recurring role on Desperate Housewives (as Noah Taylor) and in the upcoming Dead Silence, he plays a really creepy character…

…in this interview, which took place in Toronto Canada on the film set in August of 2005, Gunton really spilled his guts. Director James Wan requested that the interview not be run in its entirety - at least not now - but here is a non-spoilery portion of it.

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[Opening banter]

Bob Gunton: And you’re genre specialists?

Q: That’s right.

Well, I’m unaccustomed as I am. I’ve done one [horror genre] turkey that earned me a major tomato award. You know that rotten tomato? Man, I scored.

Q: What was it?

BG: I hesitate to even say it.

Q: Come on…

BG: It was something called Bats.

Q: Ohhhh. [Talking over each other.] They’re making a sequel to it.

BG: No.

Q: Yeah, they are.

BG: No.

Q: They just announced it.

BG: With Lou Diamond Phillips?

Q: No.

BG: Lou was great. But compared to this, that-- like, we were supposed to be swarming with bats. They, like, scotch taped the little bat dolls to the windows. And then they jiggled the windows to make it look like they were alive.

Q: So after that experience, what made you want to jump back into horror?

BG: Because this is a great script. And also James is a fantastic director. Before I signed on I saw Saw, and I’m not a big genre fan, although the classics, I’ve seen most of them, but when I saw Saw-- Have you seen Saw?

Q: Yes, of course.

BG: We should all see Saw. Sue saw Saw. [Laughter] When I saw it, well first, I had worked nearly all of the actors that he had hired for that movie. Cary Elwes I was in Glory with, Monica Potter I was in Patch Adams with, Danny Glover I was in something called Buffalo Soldiers with. So I knew all those people were wonderful, and if they had signed on to work with this guy, and I had no idea that he was this very, very young Asian Australian wunderkind. And when I met him I thought one of the producers brought his kid along for laughs. But then when we talked I saw this is a guy who really, really knows his stuff.

It’s humbling for a guy of my age sometimes to take direction from someone who is maybe a third of my age, but I had no problem with James at all. He’s extremely articulate and the script that he evolved with Leigh is very tantalizing, and also, to tell you the truth, one of the reasons I took the role, and I’m not going to divulge anything too much, or if I do, someone will hit me, right?

Technically, it was a tremendous challenge of playing this character, which, without going into detail, they could have cast an animatronic to do, for a number of reasons. And come to think of it, after I’ve seen what some of the special effects cost, they probably got me cheaper than an animatronic, so maybe that part of the mix. But I think they also wanted an actor who could do what this role requires. And what it requires is some real, just technical things, without the givens.

I come from theater, where theater is not bound by sort of linear, logical reality. It makes these huge leaps. I’ve done lots of plays where they’ll be a bare stage, and if the actor told you he was in the middle of a jungle, okay, you’re in the middle of a jungle. It’s just how temporary suspension of disbelief works. And James and I were talking last night and there’s somewhat of that in genre. You do suspend disbelief, most of us do, some critics will say, now why is the girl that doesn’t have any clothes on and she says, oh, I shouldn’t go into the house, and she goes into the house. So to some extent there’s a little suspension of disbelief.

But theater, you can do anything. I did a play once where I played 21 different characters and I never changed costume. I just, if I was playing a female, which I did, I’d put a flower behind my ear. And if I was-- It was all in the psychology. And the audience believed it. They loved it.

So I was looking for an experience like that in film, which I very rarely have. Most of the time I’d play authority figures or just the district attorney or the warden or these kind of people. Except in independent films. I get to play actual human beings in independent films. So I just thought it was a great, great challenge. And one that I might not be able to bring off. But at my age, don’t write this down, what the fuck?

Q: How much can you tell us about your character without giving it away?

[trimmed for spoilers! The entire interview will be run, after the film has come out]

[end]

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Staci Layne Wilson reporting