‘Monsters’ Star Javier Bardem On His Golden Globe Nomination, His Distaste For Violence & Why He Felt Depressed On ‘No Country For Old Men’
it was Javier Bardem’s wife, Penélope Cruz, who was the one to reveal to her husband that he earned his seventh Golden Globe nomination for playing Jose Menendez on Netflix’s Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story. The couple were with their children in Abu Dhabi, where Bardem is filming F1 opposite Brad Pitt, Kerry Condon and Tobias Menzies, when she revealed the good news.
“The family came here to pay a visit, and I asked my wife to check Google for the nominations,” Bardem tells Deadline. “And she said, ‘what do you mean?’ I said, ‘well the Golden Globe nominations are today.’ She said, why didn’t you tell me before?’ I said, why would I? Let’s see what happens. Then she looked at me and said, ‘you are nominated.’ It was nice and easy.”
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If Bardem wins the Globe, it will be his second win for playing a monster; the first time came after depicting the killer Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men, which also earned Bardem his first Academy Award.
Here, Bardem talks about the challenges of working with such dark and heavy material, whether he liked Jose, and what it was like to appear in his first limited series. “I was expecting it to be more frantic, more unstable, more artistically poor,” Bardem tells Deadline. “What I found was absolutely the opposite.”
DEADLINE Josh Brolin recently talked to Joe Rogan for his podcast and he brought up how you were depressed a lot on No Country because of your haircut, and more importantly, because you didn’t like the violence. Does that sentiment still hold?
BARDEM I’m not very much into violence myself, and I’m not a spectator of especially violent movies. I don’t like it. Funny enough, I’ve done some of those as well when I was younger. I also don’t feel comfortable watching very explicit sex scenes in any movie. I guess I’m getting older. I go, ‘listen, guys, unless it’s absolutely necessary for the story to be told and to advance the story, fine.’ But most of the time it’s just gratuitous. So yeah, I was kind of depressed in No Country for several reasons, for some personal reasons. It was a moment in my life where I was going through a crisis like many other moments. But I was taken to the middle of America to play this very dark role within an American cast and American crew for the first time in my life. So I felt kind of alone and absolutely detached from the whole surroundings. I guess some of that jumped into the character as well because he was somebody who was emotionally detached from others. He doesn’t care. Josh Brolin was my lifesaver. I mean, he was so nice and helpful and loving, and he really rescued me and showed me the light. We had a greatest time. I consider him to be a great human being and a good friend.
DEADLINE Monsters isn’t necessarily violent on that level, but it’s certainly dark. Did you ever have any periods where you felt that level of depression or sadness?
BARDEM No. When I did No Country, I was 37. I’m now 55. 18 years is a lot of time personally and professionally, and I was very aware of the sensitivity of the issue and the things that we were dealing with. I sat down with Ryan Murphy, who I adore and have tremendous respect for as an artist and as a man. We talked openly about my fears of playing such a man who could have done those things. I mean, I don’t know myself if those sexual allegations of abuse are real or not. We don’t know yet. But you have to play it from the sons’ perspective. And in that sense, yes, he would be responsible for committing those [crimes]. You have to play that. I wouldn’t say I was scared or insecure, but I very sensitive to jump into a role that had such resonance and for what it could bring to the conversation. Is it something that is going to help to openly discuss and give light to the sexual abuse victims, to give them the room they need? It has been proved, because the echo this show has brought to these two brothers and how they may have another chance to bring their case to a jury, hopefully with new evidence.
DEADLINE You obviously possess a specific set of tools to play a monster like Jose. Was one of those tools having to find a way to like him?
BARDEM I don’t need to like Jose at all to play him. I also played Pablo Escobar, and I don’t necessarily like him. But I guess our job is about trying to understand their faults, fears, pain, violence. We all are human beings. Jose was not born that way. He was educated. He was shaped by trauma. That’s the thing that is most exciting about my job. It’s not about saying the lines in front of the camera. It’s about giving yourself to this moment, in a time where we are always in a rush and trying to go to the next place as fast as we can. Give yourself the time to explore, to sit down, to reflect. It’s a gift. My judgment toward Jose? I don’t necessarily like the guy. I think he represents many of the things that I despise about men, about manhood. And I’m not talking about sexual abuse. I don’t even want to get in there. I’m talking about toxic masculinity, as we call it. But that doesn’t matter what I think of him. What they hired me for is to try to defend him as a character, as he will defend himself.
DEADLINE I read that because you were in Spain, you didn’t hear about the Menendez case back in 1989. So how did Ryan explain the story to you? Was he unequivocal in his belief that Jose did this to his sons?
BARDEM He very much explained it in the way that is shown on the show. Could it be? Or could it be not? We know things for certain. He was a bad father. He was emotionally and psychological abusive to his kids. He was putting tremendous pressure on them to be the people he wanted them to be. But when it comes to the sexual abuse, that has not been proven. It could be and it could be not. What Ryan brought to me is that, as an actor, I would have the challenge to play a character who could be responsible or innocent of such accusations, which is a great place to be. But at the same time, I have to give dimension to this human being so we can relate to him and understand where his pain is coming from, which is his own trauma, his own abuse as a child. I very much liked the fact that I was not playing someone who was one piece of a person. To play the ambiguity was the most challenging and fun part of being part of the show.
DEADLINE The reaction to Monsters has been huge, to say nothing about what it could mean to the brothers and their hope to get out of prison. Can you compare it to anything you’ve done before?
BARDEM No, never. Well, there might be one case, which is a movie that I did in 2004 with Alejandro Amenábar called The Sea Inside about euthanasia. That movie really brought a lot of echo into society to a point where some years ago, a law was approved in Spain. That was 17 years after the movie opened. But the discussion in society to the most highest political level in Spain started when that movie opened because of the case we were showing, which was a real case. It brought to the audience the right to have a dignified death. I would say that movie had this effect, but not as quick and as a strong and as universal as Monsters. The Menendez case is all over the world, all over the media. The whole attention that has been brought to the case is absolutely outstanding. And I think it’s a good thing. Why? Because it’s bringing a lots of discussion about sexual abuse, about machismo, male dominance.
DEADLINE This was your first limited series. What surprised you most about the process?
BARDEM I guess I was expecting it to be more frantic, more unstable, more artistically poor. What I found was absolutely the opposite. First of all, the Ryan Murphy and Netflix teams were top notch. Everything was right there for you to use it to your own benefit. Second, the fact that I was working with four different directors. I was like, how am I going to do that? I’m not used to doing that. But it was so smooth. It was so brilliant. They were all bringing their own thing, but they were absolutely linked to each other by the same desire to bring the same colors. They were not contradicting each other at all. Also, I never felt for a second that I have to be in a rush. It was opposite to what I was expecting. I found the joy in being part of that journey that takes you farther and deeper. And now I’m going to do Cape Fear because I found how joyful it be to be part of that journey.
DEADLINE When are you expected to start Cape Fear?
BARDEM I think it’s going to be in the first half of next year. I guess a little bit after spring.
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