In Digger, Alejandro González Iñárritu brings together an eclectic ensemble led by Tom Cruise, with the ridiculously prolific trio of John Goodman (Roseanne, The Big Lebowski), Michael Stuhlbarg (A Serious Man, Call Me by Your Name) and Jesse Plemons (Bugonia, Civil War) among the actors navigating the film’s darkly comic world of political power, environmental catastrophe and corporate excess.
While Goodman and Stuhlbarg essay the roles of the eccentric, almost-bordering-on-caricaturish President and Vice President respectively, Plemons is Kenny, a mysterious figure in the film whose purpose might be the most important of them all.
In conversation with The Hollywood Reporter India, the acclaimed actors discuss finding the humour in Iñárritu’s chaos, and the contradictions at the heart of their characters.
John, you've played politicians before, in The West Wing and Alpha House, for instance. They're mostly good guys, though, when compared to President Compson, who’s… well, not overtly pleasant. When you got the script for Digger, were there any fictional or non-fictional characters you used as a reference to play him?
John Goodman: Well, if something came up, I don't remember what it was directly. Probably in my subconscious more than anything else. But everything was on the page, so I didn't need a lot of help in that direction.
Working with Iñárritu… every day was a surprise. I wish I could explain it better, but it seemed like I learned something new every day about the whole process and about the script in particular. It was a nice unwrapping of many things.
Michael, you've spoken earlier about how your training at Juilliard, when you were a teenager coming up as an actor, helped you marry a sense of tragedy and humour on stage and in your performances… and also see the humour in everyday life. I couldn't help but think that ideology mirrors your role in Digger. He learns to laugh at the farce of it all.
Michael Stuhlbarg: It's funny, this character finds himself early on in the story trying to catch up with a group of individuals he most likely doesn't agree with, but he has been placed on the ticket with the President, in order to get them elected. So there is a great contradiction in his presence in the room and also his presence trying to catch up. I think he has some ambitions there.
So there is a kind of contradictory nature to what I think he'd like and what it is he has to deal with. And in some ways, that might mirror what you're speaking of… the sort of comic-tragic elements of what my experiences may have brought in other incarnations of plays or stories I've been able to tell.
Playing contradictions is a wonderful exercise as an actor and something I'm always looking to accentuate or explore. What might be funny downstage could be, you know, really, really dark upstage, or vice versa.
I love that about this project because it marries all of that together.
Jesse, I watched the film last weekend, and for some reason, Kenny in Digger reminded me a lot of your role as Teddy in Bugonia. I couldn't quite place why, so I went back and read a bunch of your interviews; there was a quote that stood out when you spoke about Teddy: “There's a lot that Teddy is not right about, but there's something in what he's feeling — that things are being controlled by forces that don't care about people — that's very much in the air right now.”
I thought that was perfect for what Digger is about as well.
Jesse Plemons: Hmm, Teddy and Kenny… I didn't think they were all that similar in many ways, but it did cross my mind in a sort of somewhat abstract way that the themes do kind of relate to one another.
And I do think there just is something in the air that people are picking up and wanting to discuss and explore, certainly with our current environmental struggles and realities.
But I guess there was a part of — oh God, now I can't... I was about to say something about Kenny, but that would reveal too much.
Yeah, there are certain small elements, but more so just kind of in the larger sense. That answered your question perfectly, right? (laughs)