I was in an acting class taught by Eric Morris, and Jack Nicholson was in the class. He wrote the script for 'Head', so all of us in the class got little tiny parts in the movie.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I know many great actors who have small heads.
It was also wonderful to have the prospect of playing with Jack Nicholson. It was a terrific part, a terrific script, with Alexander Payne and Jack Nicholson. You can't get any better than that!
You were taught how to do the things you needed to do. Dance, speech, fencing. They groomed people. If you were in a film, and the script wasn't working for you, they brought in screenwriters and fixed the scripts.
Jack Nicholson is a textbook actor who's very intuitive. He is absolutely brilliant at going as far as you can go, always pushing to the edge, but still making it seem real.
Even as an actor, I think like a storyteller. My parents raised us to look at the script.
I was cast in a film toward the end of high school. Even then, I wasn't sure.
The thing I noticed about Jack was when we did a reading of the script, just to warm up.
I was so flattered to be asked to be in the movies - the idea of being paid to act was heady stuff.
I was the guy who had been bouncing around the film industry for years, and I'd been lucky if five or 10 people would see my movies, so Captain Jack did a big flip for my career.
When a subject pops into a director's head, you either fit in there somewhere, or you don't. An actor is only who he is. Especially as you get older, there's not as much of a range of potentially feasible parts.