Now that's the Russell I know and love
Jan. 8th, 2004 12:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperWatched the 1/4 episode of Inside the Actor's Studio with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mamishka tonight, the one with Russell Crowe as the guest. The host was a pretentious sort of git as always--but we watch this show because of the occasional actor we're interested in, not because of the host. ;)
So it was fun seeing Russell on there. The biggest thing that struck both me and Meems was how shy he seemed; he kept looking down at his feet and sitting sort of awkwardly in his chair as he answered the various questions put to him by the host... though every so often, as he got into telling a story and looking out to the audience, he would smile and lighten up and start displaying those flashes of quirky humor that any TOFOG fan who's seen him on stage telling the stories behind his songs knows and loves. I almost expected him to start scuffing his feet along the floor; he very much had that sort of aura of "little boy being given an exam".
High points of the episode were:
1) The story of how the phrase "Strength and honor" got into Gladiator. Apparently it was a mutation of the motto of one of the three high schools that Russell attended ("truth and honor"). His imitation of Ridley Scott chomping on a cigar made the story giggleworthy. ;)
2) Russell letting out an abrupt giggle and startling Mimi with it, because he has this way of almost tittering when he laughs, this high-pitched sort of giggle that you totally don't expect coming out of a big brawny butch actor like Russell Crowe. (It's one of the things that charms the hell out of me about him.)
3) Russell also saying how tall he is: "5 foot 11 and a half and a bit".boudiccathered who is an even bigger Russellgeek than I am when it comes to trivia about him claims he's twitchy about describing his height out of lingering pique over being given shit about his height in the press. This also personally amuses me, though, because I would never have pegged Russell to be only 5'11".
4) A TOFOG clip out of the Texas DVD: specifically, out of a performance of the song "Afraid", which was amusing to me just because that song has been songvirusing me ALL DAMNED DAY. :D Plus, it led into an amusing tie-in to...
5) The inevitable "what's your favorite swear word?" question that the host asks everybody. And he asked Russell this with the lead-in, "I've been waiting for nine years to ask you this question..." Russell got this amused look on his face and proceeded to explain that the word alone isn't enough; you need to deliver it with passion. And then he made me cheer by answering, quote, "Fuck me swinging!", unquote. Which has always stuck in my head because he says that in the intro to the song in the very clip they played earlier in the episode. ^_^
6) Russell telling the students that he had never had any formal training in acting, and that by the time he'd saved up enough money to go to acting school he didn't need to anymore, because he was already an experienced actor. (Mimi suspects this had something to do with why he came across as shy during the whole episode... because he was surrounded by people who were formally studying, or in the case of Lipton, teaching the craft of acting.)
7) One of the students confessed that he'd snuck onto the set of Gladiator when he was 17! Hee! He admitted to being really nervous and scared about it, and Russell gave him this droll look and said, "That's because you were doing something illegal!" He also asked him, though, if he'd taken an arrow. Hehehehehe.
8) Russell looks GOOD! Back to the brown-haired, short-haired, bearded look that I remember on him from Portland in 2001. Which is a weird mental switch for me now that I've gotten used to seeing him blond in Master and Commander. Mrrrrrrrr. *swoon* *THUD!*
9) (edited in the next morning) Old pictures shown of Russell doing the Rocky Horror Show! I still snicker mightily at the mental image of him playing Eddie, and he also apparently did Dr. Scott, too. I have heard tell he even took a turn at playing Frank N. Furter, but that didn't get mentioned in the episode. ;)
10) Russell saying that his favorite word was "pusillanimous", which his mother frequently used on people who, he said, "didn't know what it meant".
11) And OH YES: his story of kissing the other male actor in The Sum of Us, where he was playing a gay guy. ;D That was HYSTERICAL. He described how the other guy came up to him and was all, "Um, uh, I, um, haven't ever kissed a bloke before, mate, do you think we need some rehearsal?" And Russell told him, "I'm about to do a movie with Sharon Stone. How do you think she'll react if I come up to her and ask her if we need some rehearsal? I've never kissed a bloke either, you lean in, I lean in, I think we'll remember what to do!" *LOL*
mamishka tonight, the one with Russell Crowe as the guest. The host was a pretentious sort of git as always--but we watch this show because of the occasional actor we're interested in, not because of the host. ;) So it was fun seeing Russell on there. The biggest thing that struck both me and Meems was how shy he seemed; he kept looking down at his feet and sitting sort of awkwardly in his chair as he answered the various questions put to him by the host... though every so often, as he got into telling a story and looking out to the audience, he would smile and lighten up and start displaying those flashes of quirky humor that any TOFOG fan who's seen him on stage telling the stories behind his songs knows and loves. I almost expected him to start scuffing his feet along the floor; he very much had that sort of aura of "little boy being given an exam".
High points of the episode were:
1) The story of how the phrase "Strength and honor" got into Gladiator. Apparently it was a mutation of the motto of one of the three high schools that Russell attended ("truth and honor"). His imitation of Ridley Scott chomping on a cigar made the story giggleworthy. ;)
2) Russell letting out an abrupt giggle and startling Mimi with it, because he has this way of almost tittering when he laughs, this high-pitched sort of giggle that you totally don't expect coming out of a big brawny butch actor like Russell Crowe. (It's one of the things that charms the hell out of me about him.)
3) Russell also saying how tall he is: "5 foot 11 and a half and a bit".
boudiccathered who is an even bigger Russellgeek than I am when it comes to trivia about him claims he's twitchy about describing his height out of lingering pique over being given shit about his height in the press. This also personally amuses me, though, because I would never have pegged Russell to be only 5'11". 4) A TOFOG clip out of the Texas DVD: specifically, out of a performance of the song "Afraid", which was amusing to me just because that song has been songvirusing me ALL DAMNED DAY. :D Plus, it led into an amusing tie-in to...
5) The inevitable "what's your favorite swear word?" question that the host asks everybody. And he asked Russell this with the lead-in, "I've been waiting for nine years to ask you this question..." Russell got this amused look on his face and proceeded to explain that the word alone isn't enough; you need to deliver it with passion. And then he made me cheer by answering, quote, "Fuck me swinging!", unquote. Which has always stuck in my head because he says that in the intro to the song in the very clip they played earlier in the episode. ^_^
6) Russell telling the students that he had never had any formal training in acting, and that by the time he'd saved up enough money to go to acting school he didn't need to anymore, because he was already an experienced actor. (Mimi suspects this had something to do with why he came across as shy during the whole episode... because he was surrounded by people who were formally studying, or in the case of Lipton, teaching the craft of acting.)
7) One of the students confessed that he'd snuck onto the set of Gladiator when he was 17! Hee! He admitted to being really nervous and scared about it, and Russell gave him this droll look and said, "That's because you were doing something illegal!" He also asked him, though, if he'd taken an arrow. Hehehehehe.
8) Russell looks GOOD! Back to the brown-haired, short-haired, bearded look that I remember on him from Portland in 2001. Which is a weird mental switch for me now that I've gotten used to seeing him blond in Master and Commander. Mrrrrrrrr. *swoon* *THUD!*
9) (edited in the next morning) Old pictures shown of Russell doing the Rocky Horror Show! I still snicker mightily at the mental image of him playing Eddie, and he also apparently did Dr. Scott, too. I have heard tell he even took a turn at playing Frank N. Furter, but that didn't get mentioned in the episode. ;)
10) Russell saying that his favorite word was "pusillanimous", which his mother frequently used on people who, he said, "didn't know what it meant".
11) And OH YES: his story of kissing the other male actor in The Sum of Us, where he was playing a gay guy. ;D That was HYSTERICAL. He described how the other guy came up to him and was all, "Um, uh, I, um, haven't ever kissed a bloke before, mate, do you think we need some rehearsal?" And Russell told him, "I'm about to do a movie with Sharon Stone. How do you think she'll react if I come up to her and ask her if we need some rehearsal? I've never kissed a bloke either, you lean in, I lean in, I think we'll remember what to do!" *LOL*
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no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 12:07 am (UTC)All in all, though - interesting stuff there.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 07:16 am (UTC)His height came up most notably when Lipton was asking him about how he got involved with L.A. Confidential, and Russell described how he got into the character of Bud White, who is portrayed in the book as the biggest guy on the police force. So he rented a flat that was really small so that he could deliberately get a feel for how to go around feeling oversized and bigger than everything else.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 05:27 pm (UTC)Only in height, I'm sure.
Interesting bit about how he got ready for the role of White, though.
no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 08:14 pm (UTC)*SNORF!*
no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 08:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 08:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 09:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-01-08 10:00 pm (UTC)Because BOY HOWDY am I taping this. ^_^