Steve Buscemi’s Secret to Stealing a Scene

Our product picks are editor-tested, expert-approved. We may earn a commission through links on our site. Why Trust Us?MH Illustration/Jason Speakman/Getty Images/Searchlight PicturesI’M LOOKING RIGHT into Steve Buscemi’s eyes, which on this early October morning happen to sit behind a pair of black-framed glasses, stylishly matching the collared shirt and jacket he’s wearing. Looking into Buscemi’s eyes is kinda like looking at the sun—even when he isn’t quite as animated as some of the characters he plays, his demeanor comes across warm and thoughtful. The 68-year-old is a New York native, and it’s easy to picture an alternate world where he’s the neighbor who always greets you in the hallway—instead of a face you’ve seen in a number of classic movies and shows that probably approaches triple digits.Much like the sun, sometimes Buscemi’s eyes—and the rest of him—are at their strongest when doled out in limited quantities, adding an indescribable excellence to a movie or show in need of some extra oomph.His latest role comes in Wild Horse Nine, a darkly comedic thriller from writer/director Martin McDonagh, the Oscar-winning Irish filmmaker behind movies like In Bruges and The Banshees of Inisherin. The film follows a pair of longtime friends and CIA officers, Chris (John Malkovich) and Lee (Sam Rockwell), in 1973 as they visit Easter Island in Chile, just ahead of the infamous coup d’état. Chris, who is terminally ill, is essentially being put out to pasture by the agency, and wants to take a visit from their station in Santiago, and Lee joins him. Buscemi plays a supporting role, popping up throughout its runtime as MJ, the spectacularly dressed and morally dubious boss to our lead duo.SearchlightBuscemi has played lead roles before, including, most notably, in HBO’s hit series Boardwalk Empire, for which he won a Golden Globe and was nominated for two Emmys. But it’s those supporting roles—in everything from blockbusters like Con Air to classics like Reservoir Dogs and The Big Lebowski to cameos in Adam Sandler movies—that have made him iconic, and it’s those kinds of movies where people see him put some of his best work on display. How, then, does he so regularly make a character like MJ feel lived-in and three-dimensional in a movie that mostly follows Chris and Lee?“I don’t really worry about what their story is,” he explains with a laugh. “You know? My job is to come in and pretend like it’s my movie!”He explains that he read Frank Capra’s autobiography, The Name Above the Title, where the It’s a Wonderful Life director makes it clear that he considers every character in one of his films to be worthy of their own standalone narrative. “The thing I care about most is the part I’m playing… it doesn’t matter how big it is,” he says. “But are they important to the story? It doesn’t matter how much screen time he has.”It’s a busy season for Buscemi, who’s not only in Wild Horse Nine, but also plays a key supporting role alongside his old friend (and fellow Coen brothers collaborator) John Turturro in The Only Living Pickpocket in New York. As the former film hits theaters and with the latter already out, Buscemi spoke to Men’s Health about locking in on his roles, close friendships, and memories with the cast of The Big Lebowski.MEN’S HEALTH: What draws you to a project? STEVE BUSCEMI: I mean, I like compelling characters. I like ensemble films and ensemble casts. I like good writing and good directing, and with Martin you get that in one package. Knowing it was a Martin McDonagh script, already I’m saying yes before I even read the script, practically. I’m reading it going, [Laughs] I hope I love this as much as I think I’m going to love it. And I did.MH: Is there any learning curve when you’re working with someone new, who has such a specific vision of what he wants? SB: There was a bit of nervousness, only because I wanted to do a good job. I wanted to do my best. I did have the advantage of getting to hang out with him in Venice when Banshees of Inisherin was there, four years ago. And we really got on really well. We laughed a lot together, and so that put me at ease, knowing that he was a gentle soul, and seemed like he was going to be very open and collaborative. But I was still just nervous because, you know, the material is just so high up there, and knowing it was going to be John, and Sam… you never want to be the weak link [Laughs]. I just wanted to do my best.SearchlightMH: Speaking of John and Sam, you guys have this very lived-in dynamic—did you have to work ahead of time to achieve that? SB: I’ve known Sam for like 35 years. I don’t always get to see him, but whenever I do, we just kind of fall back to that easiness of, we just really like each other and want to know what we’re up to. We have a lot of mutual friends, and people we’ve worked with. I don’t know John as well, but I have worked with him, and naturally, the scene we did in the office, that’s the only scene I have with John, we filmed that later. So, I got to hang out with him quite a bit when we were in Rapa Nui, on Easter Island. We were all staying at the same resort, so it was very easy to run into each other. And everything about our relationship—not that I have such a big relationship with John—but I’ve known him for a long time, I really respect him, I admire him, and I think I would be very intimidated if I were to direct him. So imagining that I would be his boss [laughs], it’s like, you want his respect, but if he doesn’t give it to you, how crushing that would be? I think that really served my character well.MH: Is there any sort of mental hurdle to that? Like, locking in and being like ‘I am John Malkovich’s boss.” SB: You just dive in. The material is so good, and John is so nice. He’s not an actor that will play games with you on set, or try and intimidate you. He’s just so open and easy to work with. I love that, because then you can really feel like ‘Oh, if I go at him hard, it’s OK.’ Or if he goes at me hard, it’s fine. We’re not going to take it personally.MH: Does shooting on location in Chile come with a different experience? SB: In Santiago, we were shooting in the square where the coup happened. So, that was very powerful just to imagine that this is where those real events happened. Then shooting on Easter Island, Rapa Nui… that’s a magical place. The horses really do run wild, and the dogs run wild, and there’s chickens and cows, and the Moai are incredible, and the history there. Like I said, we were all staying in the same resort, so it was just all about the work. There weren’t any real distractions. Everywhere you look informed the work that we were doing.MH: Did you do any kind of research ahead of time? SB: I asked Martin, “What should I be reading?” and he suggested this one book on the CIA that was very… I don’t know, it got very in the weeds, and the main gist of it—I couldn’t even finish it because it was just so disheartening to know what the CIA had been up to. But there’s a lot of big egos, and maybe that was the main thing I took away from it. I think MJ is very ambitious, and I love the outfits that he wore. That was one thing that really informed me—like, OK, this guy thinks a lot of himself. That’s good. I think I had first envisioned him as more of a bureaucrat in simple suits. So, I like that about the character, and I liked that he had that other dimension to him, where he had that coping mechanism. That, to me, made him very human.SearchlightMH: Is it fun to bounce back and forth between genres? SB: As an actor, I’ve always wanted to sort of be able to do it all, and not be confined to any one genre. When I first started out, I did a lot of independent films, which I loved. It was in the late ’80s and ’90s, and I think that was a time when independent film was really coming into its own. But I never wanted to just be known as, like, “the independent film guy.” I wanted to do other things. I wanted to work in studio movies, comedies, TV—and I feel very lucky that I’ve been able to explore and get work in all these different types of films, and I don’t feel constricted to be any one way or to do any one thing.MH: Does that inform how you approach and play your latest roles? SB: I don’t know that it informs how I would do it, but I think, certainly, maybe the work that Martin has seen me do in the past, like with the Coen brothers, or Quentin, or Boardwalk, made him think I was right for this character. Whatever the reason he thought of me, I’m happy [laughs].MH: Was there any kind of bump in the road along the way on Wild Horse Nine? SB: Not really a bump in the road, but just wanting to do my best. I have a monologue at the end, where I’m telling Sam’s character the way things are going to go, and the way things are, and I knew that was an important part of the story, and part of MJ’s character. And you just want to get it right. These days, I have to spend more time on the script, and learning the lines, and getting it right, than when I was younger, when I used to just be able to pick things up very quickly. It takes more work now, but it’s OK [laughs]. MH: At the end of the day, Wild Horse Nine is a story of close friendship between these two guys who would do anything for each other. Is there anyone in the industry who’s like that for you? SB: I have a very old friend, Mark Boone Junior, and we used to write and perform our own theater pieces, and I feel like it was with him that I learned a lot about being an actor. I also learned how to write, because he and I used to write our own shows, and also, by default, we would direct ourselves. So, that was the beginning of me directing. I feel like I owe a lot to him, and that time in my life. We live on different coasts and we don’t see each other a lot, but whenever we do, we just always fall back into that ease of friendship. He’s somebody I would do anything for, or anything that he asked of me.MH: I have to end with a question about The Big Lebowski, which is my favorite movie of all time. Because not only have I just seen you in Wild Horse Nine, but I just saw John Goodman in Digger, and you’re also in Only Living Pickpocket in New York with John Turturro. What kind of relationship do you all have these days? SB: I was very happy to work with John Turturro on Pickpocket, because I hadn’t worked with him in years and years. We know each other—I don’t live in Brooklyn anymore, but we used to live in the same neighborhood. I see him around town, or at screenings, or festivals. And so it was so satisfying and gratifying to be able to do a movie with him in New York. Goodman, I haven’t seen in a while, but a few years ago, I don’t know what anniversary it was of The Big Lebowski, but me, John, and Jeff Bridges sat down for an interview, and then we had dinner afterwards, and it was just… I don’t even think we hung out that much during the making of the movie. But that dinner, that night, we just had the best time. And we were looking at each other, going, ‘Why didn’t we do this while we were making the movie?’ [Laughs] But that’s the nature of it—you know, we were filming in L.A., and when you’re filming in your home town, I mean, I don’t live there, but it’s such a spread out town. You do the work, and then you go off and do other things. That’s what I loved about shooting in Rapa Nui—we were just all there, and so we not only had the great memory of making the movie, but also hanging out together and having dinners, and seeing each other at breakfast.This interview has been edited for length and clarity.Buy Tickets HereEvan is the culture editor for Men's Health, with bylines in The New York Times, MTV News, Brooklyn Magazine, and VICE. He loves weird movies, watches too much TV, and listens to music more often than he doesn't.