Biographie

Did not make his first screen appearance until he was thirty-six years old.

Said he was afraid of taking the role in Beauté américaine (1999); his wife convinced him to take the role of the repressed soldier.

Son, Jesse Cooper (with Leone), born 1987, died January 2005 from causes related to cerebral palsy.

Studied ballet at Stephens College in Columbia.

Turned down the role of Jim Gordon in Batman: Le commencement (2005).

(On landing his role in Matewan) That was my first feature film, but it came in kind of an interesting way. My wife [Marianne] was also an actor. When we were living in New York, she answered a backstage ad for an NYU student's film, and that turned out to be Nancy Savoca. So Marianne did Nancy's half-hour junior black-and-white piece. Then she and Nancy and Rich, Nancy's husband-we all four became real good friends from that experience. Then Nancy worked on Brother From Another Planet when John [Sayles] was shooting that. And she was aware that John beforehand had lost financing. He wanted to do Matewan, but lost the financing, so he went on to do Brother From Another Planet. So Nancy gave John my name, and said, "When the time comes for Matewan, take a look at this guy." So that's kind of how that came about. It was an audition in midtown. I went up and read a couple of scenes. And then some months passed. I went to London to do a West End production with Harold Pinter-it was a Tennessee Williams play, Sweet Bird Of Youth, directed by Harold Pinter and starring Lauren Bacall. So in the seven months that I was over in England, news came. I got a callback to read some more scenes. So we did the Sunday matinée, and I had to get on a plane, fly to the States, do the audition, get back on the plane, fly back for Tuesday night's performance. I had virtually noooo sleep. I was really on a high just in anticipation of the audition. And then during that Tuesday-night performance, I came really, really close to fainting onstage because I was so tuckered.

(On Money Train) We had just moved to Kingston, I think in '94. I think I had gone into New York and auditioned for one or two characters in that script, and we bought this little house here that we still live in. And financially, we had no business buying this house. We were scared to death. So it was an opportunity to make some money and do another film role, and it's something I thought would be very challenging. It turned out to be... Certainly not a pleasant character. Sometimes you go into those dark areas, and that's what you're called to do. It was a pretty wicked, awful character, considering what he did. I just really can't say that was an enjoyable role. It was more of an opportunity, and kind of survival. Something for a number of reasons that I just had to do.

(On Adaptation) The audition I did was very, very unusual, in that when I read the script, I just saw so many possibilities and ways to play a scene. If you're not familiar with the audition process-you're lucky if you get a second reading of the character. I went to the audition and pleaded with Spike to please allow me to show him four or five interpretations of a scene. And he let me do that. We did four, possibly five scenes where I showed him different ways I thought this could be played. Then once I was cast, and we were shooting the film, when the finished product came out, that's how Spike directed me. He would say in a particular scene, "Okay, here you are picking up Susan Orlean at her hotel, and you're going into the Everglades or whatever. Okay, on first meeting her, you could be terribly intimidated. Here you are, this Florida redneck cracker meeting this intellectual New York journalist, and you're completely intimidated. Okay, now play it like you're the smartest guy in the world, and she's lucky to have this time to spend with you. So you're very confident." So on and so forth. So we'd play all those different variations, and then when it came to editing the film, it was up to Spike to choose what take he wanted. And that became a real surprise to me at the premiere when I saw the film, because I didn't know what take he was going to use.

(On landing Lonesome Dove) It's a mystery-I know they auditioned a lot of folks in L.A., and if I remember correctly, they had a handful of actors they were going to read in New York. And why or how I got the opportunity to audition for Lonesome Dove, I have no idea. But I knew that character of July Johnson was just-seemed to fit me like a glove. And I worked my tail off on that audition. And also, somehow, somewhere getting the news that the director felt pretty sure he had cast the role of July Johnson, that just spurred me on to try and give the best audition I could ever give at that time. And I guess it worked out.

(On his role in The Town) It's like one scene. But a great scene, I think. This is a great adaptation from a Chuck Hogan book called Prince Of Thieves. I play Ben Affleck's father, who is doing five life terms for a Brinks heist that I committed and killed a couple of the guards. But this story is generational. It's thieves who pass down their triumphs and mistakes to the next generation, so that they don't make the same mistake that the previous-like I had made. So Ben is visiting me in Walpole Prison. We spent just a great day with this prison visit scene. And Ben was kind enough to assemble 13 minutes of film that involved every reference to my character before my scene, so I could see how other people saw him before I played him.