John Turturro has been an actor that always draws one’s attention. Whether it’s his more serious roles that he built his career on or his ability to mold into a loud and brash animated caricature in some of his more comedic roles as of late, he is constantly trying to experience something something new. He also writes and directs, and his latest project is Fading Gigolo, which is currently in limited release, where he stars as a friendly gigolo pimped out by his best friend played by Woody Allen.
The film is quietly humorous and something could be said about the way it parallels an actor’s wish fulfillment role as well. I recently had a chance to sit down with Turturro to talk about the film, what made him jump behind the camera, where cinema is now versus when he started, his desire to keep from being pegged as one type of actor, and much more. Enjoy our full conversation below.
The Film Stage: So, you’ve been in this industry for quite a while.
John Turturro: Have I?
Oh yes.
Naw.
Over 60 films now.
[Shakes head] I’ll deny it.
[Both laugh].
It’s a lot of time to see the film industry change. I imagine when you made Mac, your directorial debut, you had to cash in a lot of chips. Are you still having to cash in a lot of chips today or is it getting easier?
I think it’s harder than it was. But in this particular film, once I developed a script and Woody Allen gave me feedback. I developed it with him because I thought we’d be interesting together. I thought we’d make a good team. Once I got to know him and he said, “Okay, I want to do this,” it wasn’t easy but it wasn’t that hard because we had both of us together and then I got the rest of the cast. But yes, making a film like this, even though it looks so beautiful and everyone thinks, “Wow, you had all this time.” We had barely more than six weeks. On Mac, I had close to nine weeks to shoot it. Illuminata I had eight weeks. So it’s harder. I think the medium-sized films are harder to do. [It’s] easier to do these tiny movies or these giant movies. I don’t think that has necessarily served filmmaking, in general. So many budgets are so blown out of proportion. Of course when you’re reviewed or when an audience is watching, they just want to watch. They don’t care that you have…
Six weeks.
Yeah. This or that to do. But it’s much harder. You have to prepare. The script has to be really tight. The margin for error is really tiny.
I don’t know if I’m just more aware nowadays but it seems like so many actors today are stepping behind the camera.
Some people have done it once and never did it again. Some have done it twice. But early on, Charlie Chaplin did it. Buster Keaton did it. Woody’s done it. Tim Robbins has done it a few times. Kevin Costner has done it a couple of times.
What’s the difference?
The difference is I had a story to tell years ago and I couldn’t find the director I wanted to do it. Then I decided to do a short and see how I felt and people liked it. I got the money and I did it. After my first film I was offered to direct a lot of movies and I turned them all down. I didn’t know if I wanted to do something that I didn’t generate or that didn’t fascinate me or I didn’t love. So I’ve been selective of the movies I’ve made. Sometimes you have good fortune and sometimes you have a good distributor. Sometimes you lose a distributor because they get bought by somebody else. Sometimes you make a movie like Passione. People loved the movie but it was hard to get a distributor for a movie about neapolitan music. Yet people talk about it now. With this film, I have a really good distributor and I think I have a good film. I’m hoping I can get the biggest audience possible for it. That’s who I made it for. I made it for people. I didn’t make it for myself. I made it for people that would like to see something like what I would like to see. I made a movie that was like, “What would I like to see?” I’m seeing people respond to it in a way that I had hoped for.
You’ve been pegged as a comedic and very animated actor within the last few years.
Well, that’s only in the last few years. I’ve played so many roles. I played Primo Levi in The Truce, Sam Giancana in Sugartime, Box of Moonlight. You do a couple of broad things and that’s what people think. For years I never did comedies. Five Corners is the movie people saw me in then I got into the Coen brothers and Spike Lee films. I’ve worked with Billy Friedkin. I’m from the theater. I do all kinds of things. I do Anton Chekhov, Samuel Beckett, William Shakespeare, Henrik Ibsen, Bertolt Brecht, John Patrick Shanley. I’ve done all kinds of plays. So, people can say whatever they want and I’ll keep turning that on its head. That’s my job. My job is to not do the same thing. If you do the same thing, you’re only going to work for a couple of years. So I did these other things because the whole nature of those films are broad. I can’t do something as nuanced as that so you have to work within that genre.
Fading Gigolo is now in limited release and expanding.