The actor: Stage and screen star Peter Dinklage, best known as the lead in The Station Agent. He was recently seen as the villain in Underdog, he's playing Trumpkin in the upcoming Prince Caspian, and from now until December, he's appearing onstage in The New Group's Things We Want, the Off-Broadway directorial debut of Ethan Hawke.
The Station Agent (2003)—"Finbar McBride"
Peter Dinklage: It was written and directed by one of my good friends, Tom McCarthy. We'd been trying to get that movie made for a while. Which was really nice. Tom sort of wrote it for the three leads: Bobby Cannavale, Patricia Clarkson, and myself. So whenever we were available, we'd get together in somebody's living room and just read through the latest draft. Eventually it paid off—it took us a little while to get the money, so Tom was able to rework the script a number of times, based on our readings. And then when the money fell into place, it all happened sort of quickly. Suddenly we were at Sundance. [Laughs.]
The A.V. Club: How much input did you have into either the character or the story of the film?
PD: It's 100 percent Tom's script. The funny thing is, a lot of people thought it was my story, that it was biographical, or that I co-wrote it. I find that a little amusing—I think it has a lot to do with my size. I found it peculiar that people would immediately assume it was my story or that I co-wrote it, but it was neither. I never lived in an abandoned railroad station. I did a play with Tom years ago, four or five years before we shot the movie, and we just loved working together, and Tom thought it would be a good idea to make me that character, I guess.
AVC: A bunch of your roles directly address issues surrounding dwarfism. Do you get that a lot, the assumption that you're playing yourself, or speaking through your characters?
PD: I try not to make it too didactic. It is who I am and all of that, and there it is. But I'd rather not clock people over the head with it, because… Really, in my day-to-day life—maybe because I live in New York, where everybody has a peculiarity about them—it hasn't become a defining trait of my person, you know.
Mostly, people don't make that assumption. But for some reason, with that film in particular, they thought that. Maybe because it was my first leading role, I'm not sure. I guess it's basically a compliment in the end, because we all got pretty close to those characters—we'd been with them for a few years. But no, I think that was the only movie where that was an issue.
AVC: You pointed out that you wound up in this film because you were in a play with the director—do you find that film work and stage work often lead to each other, or is that rare?
PD: Well, that's why I live in New York. I'm doing Things We Want right now, and I love going back to theater. I think it really sort of grounds you, and keeps you alive. Keeps you active. I mean, It's a shame how a lot of actors use theater as a stepping stone to film and television work; I think it shouldn't be treated that way. Maybe it's narcissism or something. I think we should always go back to it. I try and do a play a year, and I think that's really helped me.
Living In Oblivion (1995)—"Tito"
PD: That was my first film. I was working an office job at the time, and I get a call from this guy named Tom, and I thought it was one of my friends playing a practical joke on me. Because I picked up the phone in my cubicle—it was a cubicle temp job—and this guy says "Hi, my name is Tom DiCillo, and I was wondering if you could come in and do a read for me for this movie I'm directing called Living In Oblivion." Oh no, at the time, it was called Scene Six Take Three, or some working title. And I was like [Heavy sarcasm.] "Yeah, sure, I'll be there tomorrow," then some expletive or something, and I hung up on him. About five minutes later, he calls back and he's like, "Um, no, it's really—hi, my name is Tom and, uh, I'm really making this movie." I felt really bad. So I was very close to hanging up on my first film job. But it was great. I came in and read for him, and he gave me the part right after I read. I couldn't have been luckier, that being my first film. I've always been a huge fan of independent films, and that was independent and then some, and with amazing actors. I had just started to really discover Steve Buscemi and his films, and Catherine Keener, so I was pretty excited to do that one. And it was great. It was a good time.
AVC: You play a very difficult, angry actor who refuses to cooperate with the director. Was that ever an issue, starting off a career where the only image people would have of you was as someone intimidating and hard to work with?
PD: I think that because it was a comedy, people understood. Have I ever been in the position that that character was in? Sure. Where it's just driven me crazy. But I sort of learned to not accept those roles, where I'm playing a sight gag and stuff. Maybe after I did that performance, people who thought about offering me those roles weren't going to any more, which is fine by me. But who knows? I can't speak for anybody else who was terrified by the blue tuxedoed dwarf. Hopefully it didn't scare anybody away too much.
AVC: If you didn't seek out your first film role, how did you go from there to a film career? Did you get the bug, or did more things come to you as a result of that first film?
PD: No, it was slow going. Living In Oblivion I got right after I got out of college. And a lot of actors think their first big break—like, they'll get a movie or a TV show or something, and they're set for life. But you know, I did that movie, and then I went back to my day jobs and temping and doing shitty work to pay the rent. And other little projects came, but they don't pay a lot of money, you know? You can't really survive off of doing one of those every once in a while. No, it was slow going at first. It took a good five years to get going. Until, finally, I could say "I make my living as an actor." It's not what you'd expect.
Lassie (2005)—"Rowlie"
PD: Lassie was amazing. I didn't have any scenes with humans. There's a couple little bits, here or there, but mainly just me and my horse and a couple of dogs in the Isle of Man. [Director] Charles Sturridge, I grew close to. He's an incredible person. We ended up doing a production of Endgame two years after the film as part of a Samuel Beckett 100th birthday celebration. We still keep in touch. I really enjoyed that experience. He's an amazingly intelligent, creative person. I would love to work with him again.
AVC: W.C. Fields famously said you should never work with animals or children.
PD: It is hard working with animals, I've got to say. We did the same thing with Underdog. Your pockets are filled with bacon, there's meat dangling above your head so the dog looks like it's looking in your eyes, there are trainers standing by who have to shout commands before you say your lines. It's slow going. That's what they say: "Don't work with children or animals." I've done a couple of movies where I've done both, and, especially with the animals, it's slow going. But the end result has worked out somehow.
Nip/Tuck (2006)—"Marlowe Sawyer"
PD: I was unemployed, I had an apartment in L.A. that I was not utilizing that my wife and I had started renting just a few months before, so my manager called and said "Would you like to do this show called Nip/Tuck for two months, like eight episodes?" And I really wanted to go to L.A. I wasn't interested in doing television, because I'd done a series that got cancelled called Threshold, and I just wanted to get back to film and theater work. But I don't know. They caught me at a weak moment. [Laughs.] Not to say that doing TV is a weak moment, but the timing of it worked out. I had never actually seen the show before, because I didn't have cable or anything, but I liked the people involved, and I met with Ryan Murphy, the creative person behind that show, and he sort of inspired me to do it. Because he's a pretty smart individual. So I said yes. By the end of the meeting, I agreed, and I'm glad I did it.
AVC: Strictly from an acting standpoint, do you have a preference between film, stage, and TV?
PD: No. It all has to do with the material and who you're working with. I've learned the older I get—I'm closing in on 40 now, and one thing it's taught me is to really have no preconceived notions of what you're going into because your hopes are so high, because you think a project's going to be great. But it could be disastrous, and vice versa. So you've gotta keep the options a bit open. It really all comes down to who you work with. I like to mix it up, to go from one thing to the next. It's sort of the joy of being an actor. Being on television, playing the same character for many years, for me, I think that would get a little tedious. But if you have a great role—it just depends on the individual.
Tiptoes (2003)—"Maurice"
PD: That one's impossible to find. Shit, Gary Oldman is one of my all-time favorite actors, so when I heard he was in it, and I'd get to play his delinquent best friend, I immediately said yes. I thought it was a really interesting idea, about dwarfism and genetics and all that. Too bad it sort of fell apart. That's one of those things where it's out of the actors' hands. I had a great time making it. I got to work with Patricia Arquette again. She was there with me at the audition. I thought it was going to be great, and it was great. But then it sort of—I don't know what happened after we all left, but I heard various stories about the post-production business, and it's a real shame. That's one of the things about theater vs. film—with theater, actors have a little more control, and one of the disappointing things about films is that once you're done shooting, anything can happen, you know? They can make a tragedy into a comedy. And things can fall apart, like I guess this movie did. It's a shame. That movie could have been great, but something bad happened and c'est la vie.
AVC: Did you see the finished product?
PD: Yeah. I did.
AVC: Do you tend to watch your own films?
PD: I try to. I've been working quite a bit lately, so I had a couple movies out this summer, Death At A Funeral and Underdog, and I haven't seen them because I was in Prague and we didn't get any movies over there. And by the time I got back, they had already left the theaters. So I haven't seen those. I cringe when I see myself onscreen—sometimes I close my eyes—but I do watch my films out of sheer curiosity, to see how the director finished it up. I've seen most of 'em.
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