Russell Crowe‘s filmography may look a little odd to the average cinephile. From “L.A. Confidential” to “Thor: Love and Thunder,” from winning an Oscar for “Gladiator” to starring in not one but two exorcism films – Crowe seems to have done it all, from high to lowbrow.
And according to the star, that’s the whole point of having a lasting career: To pick and choose what one wants to do regardless of how prestige (or not) the project may be.
“I’ve been unreasonably happy for most of my life. I know that bothers some people, but that’s just not my problem. I pursue creatively and artistically what I want to do, and I have done that for probably about 35 years, you know? I do it unapologetically,” Crowe told GQ UK. “And my choices are always freaking people out.”
He used 2011 film “The Man With the Iron Fists” as an example of what would appear to be an odd choice. RZA from the Wu-Tang Clan directed the feature that was filmed in China.
“People were like, ‘What the hell are you doing that for?’ And I was like, ‘Well, I really believe in Bobby Diggs, RZA, I definitely know that he’s got a director’s brain and that he understands film, and when else am I ever going to get to play a character like this?’” Crowe said. “‘[A character] who’s, like, blowing bubbles in a bath because he’s pulling anal beads out of [someone] in Shanghai, in whatever the year was supposed to be? Peter Weir didn’t ask me to do that.’”
Crowe pointed to one of his acting idols, Marlon Brando, as a guiding light for embracing the “batshit” roles sometimes.
“That’s the fun of it. You’ve got to find fresh ground. You have to,” Crowe said. “I can’t keep playing Bud White [from ‘LA Confidential’] over and over again, or Maximus [from ‘Gladiator’] over and over again. It has no appeal to me whatsoever. I’ll do whatever’s next.”
Crowe reminded fans of his varied career across decades onscreen. Basically, he’s not just that “Gladiator” guy.
“Every now and then…you have that very unkind journalist who will say, ‘So you’ve basically got a one-movie career.’ And it’s just not true,” Crowe said. “‘L.A. Confidential’ is something that I talk about with people all the time. There’s a large amount of people who consider that to be virtually a perfect feature film. ‘The Insider’ is another one that comes up. ‘A Beautiful Mind,’ obviously. ‘Master and Commander’ has such a huge audience now. Women love that movie. They love that movie! And I couldn’t figure out why all these chicks were talking to me about ‘Master and Commander.’ But there’s an aspect to the masculinity in that movie that’s about honor, it’s about fidelity, it’s about, you know, fulfilling your role. There’s a masculinity that’s not toxic.”
Crowe teased his next project, saying, “Now it happens to be in Budapest, playing Hermann Göring. I’m getting to break down one of history’s most enigmatic and famous names and actually try to put some humanity into what feels completely inhuman. I get to go to work every day, I’m looking around the room – there’s Rami Malek, Michael Shannon, Richard E Grant. I’m in a room full of gunfighters and I’m having a fucking ball.”
