The actor: Stephen Root, the ubiquitous character actor who's made a living stealing scenes as Milton in Office Space, Jimmy James in NewsRadio, Gordon in Dodgeball, the blind radio-station proprietor in O Brother Where Art Thou?, and others, not to mention his role as the voice of Bill Dauterive on King Of The Hill. Being omnipresent, he has a slew of projects out or in the works, from No Country For Old Men to Leatherheads, George Clooney's upcoming comedy about the early days of football.
Office Space (1999)—"Milton Waddams"
Stephen Root: Mike [Judge, director] was originally going to do it. He had done a two-minute pencil sketch of it, which he showed me, two minutes before we had to read it for the network. Because, I was reading for the Bobs and the psychologist, and then Mike said, "Read this. I was going to do this." Oh, thanks for the prep, Mike. So he said he had a pencil sketch he would show me. I gave him a little more of a lisp, and did whatever I do. That was fun, because you could throw in some stuff. It was a pretty tightly scripted movie, but we all had some decent adlibs in that movie.
The A.V. Club: At what point did you realize the film was catching on?
SR: Actually, not until a couple of years after it came out. It didn't do anything in the theater; we knew that we had made a nice little B-comedy that no one would ever see. But I didn't know that it would resonate so much with the underbelly of America. Mike did, but it was a shock that the DVD sales went through the roof.
No Country For Old Men (2007)—"Man Who Hires Wells"
SR: I don't even think [my character] had a name in the script. It was just "man." It's analogous to one of the first movies that I did, Crocodile Dundee II, where I was "Man In Toilet."
AVC: Yeah, IMDB just says "DEA Agent (Toilet)."
SR: There is a scene where he pulls a knife on me and threatens my manhood.
AVC: Obviously, you've worked with the Coen brothers a few times. What was this one like compared to the others?
SR: I would say with this, that Ethan directed a little more than Joel. During O Brother, Joel directed, mostly, and then during Ladykillers they were both there, but Ethan did a lot more in this one, which was interesting. I guess Ethan's feeling like he wants more input, which is great.
AVC: How long were you shooting?
SR: Oh, not long—three or four days. It really took a couple of days just to get the mask for shooting in the face. So I had to do a whole special-effects mask, which was a very big deal. That took more time than anything else. It's the same with Woody [Harrelson]—only took a day.
AVC: You've had a few roles with a lot of make-up.
SR: Well, actually I didn't do any make up for O Brother. I did a little hair for Ladykillers. But this is the first time I've been squibbed or shot in a little while.
AVC: Is that nerve-racking?
SR: It's a little nerve-racking, because once they do the blood, you have to keep going with the scene. So if they need to do anything again, you have to clean up and start from scratch. It can take hours. You've got to really prepare to do it correctly. I think we did okay. We were on schedule.
Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004)—"Gordon"
SR: Dodgeball was an homage to Rick Moranis, basically. I basically said "If we're going to do this, then Rick Moranis should have this role." He's one of my favorite character guys.
AVC: That looked like it was a pretty relaxed shooting atmosphere.
SR: Well, it was a lot of hard work. It was like pitching 100 baseballs every day. We were all iced up by the end of the day. It's hard to throw overhand so many times. Vince started throwing with his left hand one day, because he was just done. It was a very physical shoot. It was fun, but it wasn't without its aches and pains.
King Of The Hill (1997-)—"Bill Dauterive"
SR: Bill is a sweet, sweet man, but a pathetic loser… As much of a sad sack as he is, he is still an army guy. He still has to have had some kind of military discipline at one point.
AVC: How did you come up with the voice for Bill?SR: I have done a lot of Southern theater; I came out of the University Of Florida. I did do a lot of Southern plays in New York, and regional stuff on the East Coast, so I had done Driving Miss Daisy and all of these things. So it was kind of an amalgamation of those things. I actually auditioned for Dale first. It didn't feel right to me, so I said, "Let me try this guy." That felt a lot more comfortable.
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