Nicolas Cage Made Himself a Legend. Then He Had to Live With It.

If you couldn't tell, that is Taylor Swift, who hasn't saffered an interview like this in a long time.

I'm John Keramonica, one of the critics behind the New York Times' 30 greatest living American songwriters project. We interviewed some of the songwriters on our list, and these are not ordinary conversations. Watch all the video interviews for free, and check out the entire 30 greatest living American songwriters project at NYTimes.com/30Gradest or in the app. (music) From The New York Times, this is the interview. I'm David Marquezie.

I'm just gonna lay my cards out on the table.

“I think Nicholas Cage is a truly special artist, and the most original and unique actor since Marlon Brando.”

It's not just that he's capable of delivering beautifully naturalistic performances, like in leaving Las Vegas, for which you want a best actor Oscar.

Or that he's jumped between romantic comedies like Moonstruck, action movies like The Rock, and unclassifiable films like Adaptation. It's that he brings a postmodern, highly imaginative, and thrillingly risky approach to all of it. That style, which has led to his work frequently being meamed on social media, also pulls from other films, music, and painting. And I think it takes acting far beyond realism, or even frankly, traditional judgments of good or bad. The same devotion to originality shows up in his off-screen life, too.

Cage, whom I previously interviewed back in 2019, is a bona fide eccentric.

“His idiosyncratic interests, lavish spending habits, and all around free-spirited nature, are in their own way as legendary as his highly distinct performances.”

To what else can I say, other than that there's no one like him. The latest evidence is the new series Spider-N-Warr, which viewers can watch in either color or black and white.

The show is Cage's first big swing at television.

In it he plays Ben Riley, a hard-boiled private investigator in 1930s New York, who in a very cageian mash-up, also happens to be a web-slinging superhero. Here's my conversation with the Great Nicholas Cage. [Music] Nick, thank you for taking the time to speak with me. I appreciate it. Thanks David, thanks for having me back. I enjoyed our last conversation seven years ago in Nevada.

We'll pick up where we left off. Okay. I don't remember, but when I wanted to start, I just watched the speech you gave to graduates. At Cal State Fullerton. This is probably something like 25 years ago.

Going way back. And in that speech, you said, "Artists have the license to go straight up the devil's ass, smile at him, and survive." When have you done that? Uh... I felt like I did it on Battle Lieutenant with Werner Herzog. And Werner was an influence on that particular speech, because I remember he said,

“"If you don't have the money to make the movie, you have to steal the camera and you have to steal the film and make the movie.”

Do it any way you can. You've got to make the movie." And I think it was a saying something about passion, about the passion of facing the odds to get to the truth of what it is you hope to express as an artist. Sometimes you have to be willing to within reason, allow your instrument, your psyche, your imagination, to go to very uncomfortable and dark corners of your memory, or your thoughts in order to convey a truth in a scene that is perhaps disturbing, or dangerous in nature, so that doesn't feel funny.

I'm not saying go out and do something dangerous, but I'm saying sometimes you have to allow your psyche, if you will, to embrace that dark corner of your mind. That's partially what I was talking about, and that's speech about as you read, read, read, read, go up the devil's ass. It's not always a fun process to go there, to go back in that dark corner of your mind, or that memory. Or even look around you at current events and a newspaper to get to that place where you feel the emotion, and you feel the grief, or you feel the anger, so that you don't feel like you're faking it.

Have you ever done what you just described, sort of used the world outside, sort of looked at current events to motivate?

The garden green, yeah. And I was having trouble getting to that feeling of intense anger, and without mentioning names, I recalled a newspaper article, I read about a little boy who was at the zoo.

And he fell into a, well, a cage or an environment of wild painted dogs, the African painted dogs, and they ate the child alive.

“And I remember getting very upset about it, how could something like that happen?”

And so in that scene, I was upset that this child that I was sort of mentoring or guiding was the victim of domestic abuse, and his sister was potentially going to be abducted for other disturbing and horrible things, atrocities.

And so I, I went and looked at that current event at that time, and then it got me there, so that would be an example.

You know, it's interesting when actors talk about the psychological or emotional risks of performance, they often talk about it in the context of dark or emotions. Does it feel risky or difficult to get to the more positive emotions? So that's a really perfect question. And if I wake up in the morning to use a cliche on the wrong side of the bed, and I have to be funny, funny, funny and happy, happy and dance, dance, dance, and this isn't as bright and sparkling and poppy, that is more difficult.

That is much more challenging.

Well, how do you, how do you get there? You, you become specialists and compartmentalizing. Okay, that, I'm not going to think about what was said to me an hour ago. I am going to shut that off and to act from the spinal cord and be happy and turn it on, and that's not easy. You know, also in that Cal State Fullerton speech, something you said that that really stuck with me is you talked about a willingness to invite negative reaction to the work, a willingness to be despised or have someone not like the work.

You said something along the lines of, when somebody has a negative reaction like that, they're not BSing. Like it's a genuine reaction and that's something that you're striving for.

“And I think about that a lot actually. Like if you're only doing something that people like all the time or only have positive reactions to, it's possible you're not taking them on an exciting of enough ride.”

But it does take some courage to be willing to be despised or laughed at or misunderstood. But I wanted to know for you, if you have a memory of when you realized that you were willing to elicit that kind of reaction, or maybe even were drawn to that kind of reaction. I think it was on Peggy Sue got married, which everyone knows was a movie that I did not really want to partake in. And I found a way, and the powers that be said, okay, to play the part in a way that I thought would be interesting to me, which was to use this voice that was not considered very attractive.

And to change my appearance in such a way where it almost became like a cartoon or like a dream cartoon. I knew full well that that was not going to go over very well, but at the same time it's what kept me interested. It's what I knew that I was taking an enormous risk. But it was so exciting every day I went to work and I was just saying in my mind, I'm going to do this. I'm going to stick to it. I'm going to stick to it.

“And everyone else around me is like stop, stop, stop. And I just kept going. And I'm very happy with that performance for me. And I think in time, it's matured in a way that's actually quite wonderful.”

And I'm glad I did it. But in the process it was, I knew I was going to invite a lot of negative commentary. But then after Peggy Siugat Mary, you did, you did other performances where you were taking things to places that were probably likely going to be misunderstood. Was that a result of liking what you had done on Peggy Siugat Mary? It was like, you did, yeah. It was a personal choice of mine that I was carving something that I wanted to bring to life and have it shine in that way.

So I was actively looking for at times the grotesque, like a bacon painting, vampires kiss, even raising Arizona. I was challenging Joel and Ethan, because I was sticking to my plan that he was going to, he chiming, Donna was going to have this kind of Woody Woodpecker, Looney Tunes style, which they originally liked, but there were days where they were frustrated. And we're like, why did I wanted, you know, I could have cast this person, I could have cast that person.

“And then I finally just said, well, why did you hire me?”

And that's top that conversation. And the results on that I think are terrific. I think that that was a great union.

Joel, Ethan and myself and Holly, I think we got somewhere together that was remarkably funny, but at the time it was right on the edge. And then vampires kiss, of course, I mean, I was really struggling on that one, because I had a very specific vision of what I wanted. I wanted to bring a max-track lifestyle back into the sort of 80s, yuppy, this is before American Psycho, attitude of like the literary agent who's going to the best restaurants and he's going on dates. And then slowly devolving into a vampire and thinking he is a vampire.

And that I wanted to bring out the shrek-like behavior, and I did the horrible thing that I don't need to go back to, with the, you know, the ingestion of that thing.

And cockroach. Yeah. Well, that all that was me trying to make a big noise to say, we're going to do this. We're going to do something different. But though some of those performances that you just mentioned, bring to mind a question I had that's going to be a little in the weeds for most people other than you me and Nicholas Cage fans, but I'm going to do it anyway.

“I think one of the innovative things that you brought to acting was almost a kind of sort of like a postmodern, almost meta-textual element to it.”

Where you would take elements from genres that were outside of film and performance and sort of outside of the character you were trying to play and import them into what you were doing. So I'll give examples. I remember when I spoke to you last time, I asked you about the scream that you gave in a movie called "Rage" and you explained that you were trying to emulate some sort of stockhows in Sonic effect with that.

Or in face-off, there's a moment where your character sort of goes up behind a schoolgirl and in your face raises up and your giving a Francis Bacon style look to the camera.

Or in Mandy, there's a scene I think your character is in a car and you look quickly at the camera and the camera zooms into a close up like a Bruce Lee movie. And there's any number of other examples like the Woody Woodpecker Raising Arizona.

“I could keep going, but are there similar examples of you doing that kind of technique that you haven't seen remarked on?”

Like when have you done that and people have not noticed? Well, I don't know if they've known the specifics that went into the choices in terms of what you're calling "Metatexual" I would call the "The Artsynthesis" concept that I was dabbling in, where I could pull from other art forms and have them inform my performance. And I like to take from places whether it's in film performance, like you mentioned Bruce Lee, or whether it's in graphic art or any other art stockhows. And we were talking about poongke and steam on, I think.

In this case, I did it again, I felt that while at heart performance was we're holling in. Not Stanislavsky, we're holling in that Warhol would take these icons and do these marvelous collages with them. I thought well why not do that with film performance and David Lynch being David Lynch, the great American surrealist, was really up for that. Which brings me to Spider-In-Warr. So I can get there now or I can circle back.

Did it go for it? Well, so do Shomp Shuffle, started this idea, I think, in pop art of taking a utilitarian tool and isolating it and we could regard it as fine art.

And broke it down all the way to the little printing press dots that you see from the printing press and he threw it into a still life.

And it became a kind of serotonalism but it was a Lichtenstein taking a reverence and reverence in a comic graphic and making it fine art and almost being a reverent about fine art while doing it.

“So what what am I doing with noir Spider-In-Warr is I'm taking the reverence I have for the actors that I cherish like Bogart or Kanger and where do you Robinson or Peter Lowery from those old movies?”

And I'm taking the mass utility of the television or the tube, if you will, and I'm trying to mash that that reverence I have up with a pop icon, a marble icon.

In Spider-Man if you will and make a collision in such a way that I'm taking television, which is a mass tool that every the many people in vibe on and and just.

And I'm saying look at this so that maybe the hope is that a young person in their teens would go oh wow what is that that's that's black and white not too familiar with black and white like in Washington club I can also watch in black and white what is black and what oh my gosh there's this immense. Volume a beautiful art that all these early actors were and let me check that out let's go look at that and owned by the way he's Spider-Man so it's like this boom this this crazy lictonstein collision so that is meta textual or my arts hit this is concept again now.

The fact that El Amy Pascal at Sony, Jen, Solki at Amazon or on New Zealand and Stephen Lightford.

Let me I'm still amazed by the when you're in meetings about doing a project like spider noir.

Do you do you explain the lictonstein stuff or no I don't keep that under my face. I didn't I didn't break out the lictonstein in those meetings I can do it with you because we can talk to same language sometimes but. For example with Jen, Solki at Amazon and went over to her house and we all sat there all the powers that be were there and I just said you know it doesn't matter if the 13 year old doesn't know who Humphrey Bogart is the point is it works it works I know it works.

“And I remember thinking a calling Jen saying you don't have to only do it in black and white you can also do it in color.”

And then they can hopscotch back and check it out in black and white and then low and behold maybe they'll want to see the big sleep or. And then I think you know I had zero interest in watching the color version. Thank you. Why I think folks like us real film enthusiasts will go with the black and white but I'm hoping that the 13 year olds of 15 year old whomever will see the color go let me try the black and what were the and I think they will. I mean there's a real. Are we doing spoilers in this interview.

Well it's fine with me you're you're the one who has to decide I mean I I really wanted to see. And to see a version of a spider man that was grappling with the arachnid DNA that was flowing through his bloodstream and having to retrain himself as to how to be human. I have a couple more questions about acting but before I do there's something I was curious about related to spiders.

“I know you've had a lot of exotic pets. Have you had a spider?”

Oh sure sure. I've had spiders a tarantula's well I even learned a little bit about the the the movement of spiders and I put that in the in the script. Spiders don't have muscles their appendages are like straws they shoot fluid so they're the fluid is making their appendages move which is fascinating to me it's like a party whistle all that went into the script. There is a spider that I found fascinating which is listed as one of the more intelligent animals and it's called a porous spider. And this spider is so intelligent it literally knows what bug likes what which tune on his web so he knows what to play to get the fly and he knows what to play to get the grasshopper and that's really something that exists.

This is slightly related there was a reddit asked me anything he did a couple years back and someone asked you about I think I don't even remember what the question was but the subject of praying mantises came up and you said something like don't get me started on praying mantises.

Why not? Well I think it was the same movie we had talked about years ago with that great line I never had a career only work the hammer horror film.

“A million miles to earth or something. What not millions miles to earth. Quader mass in the pit. Yeah, that's it. Whoa you have a good memory. Holy moly you remember that yeah well that's something you mentioned in passing seven years ago.”

The aliens in that look like praying mantises and it flipped me out I was very impressionable as a child which brings me to another reason why I'm glad that I managed to finally do a season of television. Because I think even before I discovered James Dean and Brando I was I was what I was all about my television the zenith oval television in my living room and I wanted to get inside that TV because the people it those little people in that TV were far more interesting to me than the people in my living room.

I think that was my earliest memory of wanting to be an actor. It was people like Bill Bixby and Pierre Faulk and rock Hudson and McMillan and wife and Dennis we were in the cloud. And I love and anything by rod certainly and so the television and it's amazing it's only happened now was largely responsible for me wanting to become an actor at the earliest age like three four five six the TV was the savior of my childhood. I mean I don't want to go into too much detail but it was not the calmest domestic environment and the I could go and escape in the TV by watching shows or I could go in the backyard amazing how much time I spent in the backyard without anybody checking on me.

I started digging a hole I thought I was going to dig my way to China and I kept digging and digging and digging and digging and nobody found the hole and I had a shovel and I kept digging and I saw roots and I saw weird bugs and I kept digging and digging and I would cover the hole with a plank of plywood and there's someone on cover said do you see what Nikki's doing oh my god look at the size of this hole.

“Did what was the upshot did you get a trouble for the whole well the upshot was it rained and it was filled with water and I had like a pond of sorts.”

But yes I did get in trouble for the whole I got in trouble for the whole.

And I got in trouble for because evil can evil was big back then I got in trouble for jumping off ramps on my huffy bike going higher and higher and I remember at one point I was going to put on a show for the neighborhood and I would jump over beer kicks I don't know how I had beer kicks there were beer kicks and I'm go for one two three four on my ramp and then I had decided I was going to build. A hoop of fire I was going to build this round thing out of cardboard and down sit with kerosene light on fire I'm going to jump through a hoop of fire folks and that was when they took the bike away.

Yeah fair enough. Yeah. Wait let me return to acting for a sec. Sure.

Was that with that hoop of fire thing real by the way, which which weren't just improvising that.

No that's all actually. No that's how I'll true. Wow. These are all true stories. Yeah.

So there was an interview just a couple years ago where the somehow the subject of sort of retirement came up and you said you know you're no imminent plans but maybe you had some plans to dial back. But one thing that you said was that you felt like you had pushed screen performance as far as it could go. And I want to know where did you find the limits?

“Like where did you push it to and what were the ultimate boundaries for what you were able to do?”

But David I don't think it was so much that I pushed it to the limit. I think I couldn't come up. I wasn't able to come up with any more ideas as to what to do with it. I felt like I had realized for better or for worse for myself I had realized for better. What I wanted to achieve with film performance with things like vampires kiss and raising Arizona and adaptation.

I kept pushing the envelope in terms of different points of expression within film performance. And I felt that I had said what I wanted to say was cinema landing on dream scenario which I'm very proud of.

How am I going to stay interested? What am I going to do? What's going to challenge me? And I thought oh kids you're going to be stage or television because I haven't done really that in any meaningful way as far as I'm concerned. Some high school plays a bad television pilot that God didn't get picked up.

“And so I thought well let's how am I going to stay interested?”

Let's do something interesting on television. David Lynch had done twin peaks and he reinvented. He introduced he took the mass tool of television. The episodic tool of television and introduced surrealism to millions of people, which is immense. Again, hopscotch and metatectually art synthesis, Halston did it.

You know he was a genius designer and he decided you wanted to take the mass tool of JC Penny, it snubs in New York pooped on his head and it didn't pick up. Now everybody's doing it. He was ahead of his time. So now you see it everywhere.

You see harmonic change and many people get to enjoy designer style. This is brilliant. And so David did and I thought well what can I do?

“What can I do and change the form and stay interested?”

And with Spiderman War I'm hoping that I will have instilled an interest in younger generations to enjoy the black and white style. I design my performance to fit in the black and white format. That Howard Hawks way of talking, talking on your assignment. All that stuff was designed to fit in the black and white format.

I have to now to performance related questions that I've been curious about.

The first is there's a movie that came out just a couple years ago called Gunslingers, a Western.

And your character does a voice that I would describe as maybe like a modern blues man or something like that. So what happened there? Yeah, what was the voice? Well so what happened with that was it's common knowledge. We had a back to back strike in Hollywood.

“And I suddenly got a phone call like you need to do this right now or you know you're going belly up.”

And I said oh no really how much time one week and like what am I going to do? I want to do this other movie but they pushed and they're not sure they're going to go. How am I going to be able to afford to do the other movie, which is a movie called Madden. So the double strike hit and I got the phone call and I thought oh god please I don't want to do another commercial.

I had done commercials in Japan a million years ago and I got burned there because it was I thought it was you never say never.

But I thought it was a toy. This little Pachinko machine that my cousin had in his bedroom and we used to play it. I did not know and I asked is there anything wrong with this product in Japan I should know about? No it's a toy. I said okay and then I turned I did the commercial which was fun and goofy and slapstick and what have you. And I got to embrace my inner Jerry Lewis but it was basically Japanese gambling.

They don't do it for money and they do it for toys and then you could sell a toy with what have you. And that I really was I had umberage with that and so I thought I really don't trust this as a thing I should be doing commercials plus. You know I had a time I was going through this thing but like what would Jim Morrison do will he only live to 27 sadly and I don't know I'm 62. I'm now older than many terrible advice what would Jim Morrison do? Well my well you know he would not do a commercial but he didn't live that long so who knows what would have happened.

But anyway long story short I didn't want to do it. And now I'm older than Beethoven was when he died and hungry boger and James is the end of all these guys in John Lennon and all these heroes of minor. I'm now 62 and I'm still here and I wanted to do this movie Madden. I didn't know I was going to be able to buy the time to get to Madden and I didn't want to do a commercial. So along comes gun slingers and I thought okay I'm a cameo in this movie.

Let's have some fun with it could the movie be good. I don't know the director seems like a nice guy but what can I bring that I'm going to find amusing and I remembered.

Going on dick cavit a million years ago with Miles Davis.

Yeah and Miles he was sort of like Nick. Yes sir. Where's your letter Jacket?

Yeah do you know nothing from Dennis?

Dennis? Half a man when you went there so far.

“Well I you know and then I was on the show doing this with my hair was sticking up like Woody Woodpecker again back to raising Arizona.”

And then I had this trumpet with me and I wanted Miles to teach me how to play the trumpet fell down behind me and he was like you be careful with that instrument. And so then I got the trumpet I couldn't get a sound out of it was so.

There's been a couple times when I really felt that horrible three times in my life I really felt that humiliating embarrassed feeling.

One was that when I couldn't get a sound out of trumpet with the maestro. One was when I had to sing love me tender to the president's wife at the Cannes Film Festival on a table because David Lynch demanded it. And one was when I couldn't get the tune right on a harmonica in a high school play. All three were disasters. But to answer your question I was channeling what I remembered that I loved about Miles's sound in his voice and I plus I wanted to wear a green bowler hat and I thought well if I can do a Miles Davis sound in a green bowler hat I'm happy so let's make the movie.

Just let's just make the stupid movie. I'm still trying to get over the fact you were asking yourself ever what would Jim Morrison do what did that what did that ever go wrong. Probably. Probably should I really have another whiskey what would Jim Morrison right nope. Yeah he would say yes.

Oh go ahead. No I'm a big fan of his poetry and his stage presence and his voice.

“I think his voice if you listen to it today sounds like it's so iconic it doesn't sound real.”

How can that come out of somebody really a human being that that. Come on come on now touch me baby can't you see that I am not afraid what was that promise that I mean he just it's so fall you know. My aunt my aunt knew him and and UCLA I think they would go tally a shire yeah they would go for car rides together and talk philosophy. He was a smart man apparently and thus concludes the Jim Morrison portion of this interview. So what can you tell me about playing John Madden I don't I actually was trying to think about it I don't think you've played with an iconic real life character before.

No I really didn't know who he was I don't have in my view anyway much in common with him. David O' Russell is someone that offered me a movie a million years ago I think it was I don't remember the name of the movie but anyway it was a good movie and he offered it and I said no and he's the only director that I ever said no to who actually came back and offered me another movie.

Most of them they get their feelings hurt or something and don't call you back it's happened a million times to me.

And it's happened with Christopher Nolan it's happened with Woody Allen it's happened with Paul Thomas Anderson they don't they don't call me back and I my schedule. What movie did Christopher Nolan and Paul Thomas Anderson movie was it was a very early movie he showed me a short film which was very go with so big or hall and we were going to do something hard. Yeah it didn't work out but anyway David did call me back and and I have I thought that that was really. He showed a lot of class that he would call me back and and buy me again and I didn't want to say no to him again because I do have great respect for his talent.

And I was a beautiful experience I enjoyed working with David I enjoyed working with Christian I enjoyed working with all the actors John Mulaney I mean and we really got in stuff with each other and so I'm glad I did it.

“It was big challenge it was a stretch I mean it's not I don't think of myself when I think of John Madden so I was okay how can I get way out of my comfort zone.”

Which I think we talked about that was what David Bowie said I mean I asked him I said how did you do it how do you keep reinventing yourself I just never got comfortable with anything I was doing and so that's stayed with me. I believe it's called dead fall yeah you your character looks to me like you're doing a riff on Andy Kaufman's alter ego Tony Clifton no and I've heard that before that's not true though I wasn't ripping Tony at all I was doing my own thing which is interesting.

They were all in like sabotosh sabotosh and they're all like he's bad wigs and they all and these terrible sunglasses they all looked like Eddie from dead fall was okay I think I know where that came from but no I was that was another movie I didn't want to make and I felt like I had to because it was my brother and I said okay I'll do it.

“What can I do that will make it interesting for me you know and what can I bring to this so I just went full.”

It really is just full. I didn't care if it made sense or it didn't I just wanted to do this like live wire performance in a bad wig and an upturn nose and nose kind of went out and then up like that and I'm just I'm very proud of that performance I do I do think it I think it in doors.

After the break Nick and I talk about his resistance to becoming a caricature of himself.

Maybe there's an element of like gosh I really want to see Nick go off the rails and I'm not going to give them that every time and I hope they're not disappointed. I'm Dougher Cayman I'm an investigative reporter at the New York Times. When I say real estate I'm guessing you're thinking about things like the cost of rent what the market looks like whether or not mortgage rates are going to go up.

What I do is I look at what goes on beneath those numbers the people running the industry who for so many years had been relatively invisible.

And the more that I look into it, the more that I find there are people operating unethically and there are ethical behavior affects every single American. If we only focus on the numbers, it's like covering the results of an election and not looking at the politicians.

“To know why the system is the way it is, you have to understand the people making decisions behind it.”

Worktimes we don't ever tell a story at just the top level. We're always looking a little bit deeper to help readers better understand not just what something is but why it is and also who's causing it to be that way. You can subscribe to the New York Times at nytimes.com/subscribe. Earlier you said you pointed to a film you did a couple years ago called dream scenario as sort of being the culmination in some ways of of what you were doing and dream scenario for you who didn't see it. It was you played a college professor who starts showing up in people's dreams.

“But can you explain what was going on in that performance that makes you say makes you point to it as well kind of culmination?”

I was just standing with this sort of mean meanification. I coined the word meanification. I don't think it was ever used before. This meanification that I had lived through and needed to find a place to put it and that was the perfect vessel because the memes were not unlike the dreams. And so the dreamification of my character in dream scenario was similar to me to the meanification of Nicholas Cage. It's interesting that you bring up dream scenario as a way to address the meanification because I was wondering if that was part of the intention for doing that film.

And it was interesting because it also that movie came not too long after you did the unbearable weight of mass of talent in which you played a version of yourself. And the character Nicholas Cage and that film was also kind of contending with a public perception that he was uncomfortable with.

In my perception the sort of feverish meanification has basically disappeared since dream scenario and since the unbearable weight of mass of talent.

And I wondered if in taking on films that directly addressed that if you were trying to sort of puncture that so that the fever would break. I'm not not consciously know, but that's an interesting observation. Has it? I didn't know that. I don't know if it has. I think so. Well, that's interesting. What is a meme really? I mean, what is that? Is that a snapshot of something that happened culturally?

I mean, I I don't know. I think I'm flattered by it on some level. You know that it communicated and it was remembered that.

“That it got into a whole new technology that I wasn't even aware of when I made vampires because it didn't exist. You know, it's I guess how I'm choosing to look at it. I think positively it kept me in the conversation.”

I have a different slightly different theory for why you, someone dressed up in particular, gotten meamed. And I think it's also ultimately a flattering theory too, but I think one of the things that memes do is also I realize now as I'm talking, I sound like a jackass, pontificating about what memes do, but I'm just going to continue sounding like a jack. It sounds interesting, but I want to memes are sort of the the purist encapsulation of a particular feeling or sentiment that then is otherwise being expressed. So like the example of the vampires kissed you don't say meme that is capturing a feeling and an emotion that people have in the purist possible form.

“And that's why it gets passed around because people use it as a shorthand for a feeling that they're having. And seeing in that light, I think actually.”

Stuff getting meamed is a signal that you are doing in your instance, in your case, we're doing the job correctly, I would say. I think that there is a need for a vessel.

Vicariously for folks who are good citizens who are doing their best to be upstanding members of the community to live through.

“And get their yaas out, whether they're angry yaas or happy yaas or whatever it is, I think. And I don't know how conscious I was of it, but that.”

That has communicated through some of the meltdown performances in my work where people can tap into it and live through it without having to go and do it, whether it's domestic man in the pharmacy.

You know, I would like me to take down the stream and pass, blah, you know, or flipping out and vampires kiss or whatever it is. I think that that perhaps more than anything else is what has enabled me to endure people that I gravitated towards like James Dean when he did rebel without a cause. He was speaking to, I was 15 when I discovered that I knew what that felt like. And so I think as a person that enjoys being an audience member, I find these actors or personalities and cinema that have helped me find my own identity or understand what I was going through in my own life.

It happened, you know, with Bruce Lee, it happened with Troubleton, Serenite Fever, and it gave me a feeling of like, oh, I can I can do this. Yeah, did you ever tell John Travolta that? Sure. What happened was, what's funny? Almost aren't faiths. Right, right. What happened was literally I was going to Horace Man Elementary School and I used to go to the Tropical Aquarium store, even then I was interested in fish and I had these two buckets of tropical fish in my hands and I had the the the t-shirt with, you know, just no sleeves walking with the buckets.

And I thought I was Tony from Serenite Fever walking around. Yeah, Manera walking down the street and low and behold, I'm at the stoplight waiting to cross near the school and up glides, John Travolta and a blue Adidas tracksuit and a gold.

And then kind of wielded it into face off.

“I have a million more specific questions about acting in performance, but can I just do like a quick rapid fire, Nicholas Cage of lore series of questions and you tell me if they're true or not?”

OK, I'm in your hands. Let's have it for better words. No, it's all good. What would it, what would it, what would it be got?

I got a bunch. OK, so here's the first one. Vampires kiss in a there was a sex scene and you asked to have hot yogurt poured on your toes during the sex scene.

There was there was some yogurt. There wasn't hot yogurt and I think I was administering the yogurt to myself. But why? I don't really remember. Yeah. I don't know. It's better that you don't. Yeah, probably. OK, next one. There was an old playboy interview from maybe mid 80s, late 80s something like that and there's just an offhand reference to stealing an aquarium from the museum of modern art. Did that happen? Yeah, what wasn't an aquarium. It was in California and it was a it was in the trash. It was a a loose side box that covers art artifacts and I just took it and I used it as an enclosure for a king snake.

That's stealing technically. No, not really. No, it was in trash. Yeah, we're using trash picking.

All right, last one for last one for now. I might come back to some others, but so apparently at Graceland, there's a there's a private family only area.

“And I read that you were granted access to the private area and tried on some of the king's clothes and sat in the bathroom in the same position that Elvis was found in when he was found dead. Is that true?”

No, that's not true at all. What is true is, you know, my ex wife and I, at least in repression. When it was great, we were we were very close and we had a lot of laughs and there were a couple of nights at Graceland where She went wanted to go upstairs and so I did and I remember lying in Elvis's bed and and he had this, you know, those little fiber optics things that's been in change colors. Like a lovelin, not a lovelin, but not unlike a lovelin, but little fiber optics and it rotates and then they can change colors like green and blue and little little plastic like strings that like whiskers that stand out and they can change colors. There's usually sitting on top of a light box that changes colors as rotates and I remember staring at that.

And being very relaxed by it and calmed by it and I enjoyed thinking of him looking at that and how it might have must have relaxed him. So it was kind of a beautiful poignant little moment in my life. Okay, so acting is in a lot of ways is all about choices, right? The choices that the actor chooses to make within the performance and the choices the actor makes about what performance is to to do.

“I think you're known in some ways for making unconventional choices in performance or doing doing the unexpected thing or the surprising thing and you know.”

I want to know about the difference between making choices in art versus making choices in life and I assume that in art you're able to be very intentional and decisive about the choices you make. Are you able to to access that kind of control in life also or do choices in life present difficulties that choices in art don't present I think that's a pretty. I just do it question and within the question I think there's perhaps some observation I. It's no secret that I have over the years particularly early on perhaps had lack of impulse control and probably shouldn't have bought that car or shouldn't have bought that property or whatever it was.

But it's usually the the surprise element in evokes a laugh response so there's a lot that that part of my palette is always at work with the tragic part and sometimes at the same time.

But in my own personal life for example when you met me seven years ago. I was more interested in other habits than I am now I am extraordinarily boring right now I live a very monastic life I am not taking any risks whatsoever if I can avoid it I am really going to go the other way and I am all about. Raising my three and a half year old my taller to have a happy and healthy life that is my focus and that and when I work those that's it you know my two boys are grown up and.

You have vices I mean I drink entirely too much caffeine I'm drinking 200 milligram you know strawberry energy drinks six times a day and I'm not good with.

And the doom scrollings got a stop they're not good vices to have they're not good for your psyche but I'm not enjoying a martini which I did like my martinis and and I'm not. I mean I'm pretty monastic so to answer your question I'm not doing any unexpected things in life at the moment.

I have to say I was wondering about the question almost in more of a.

“Like a mechanical cognitive way because I think this is again I'm just pontificating in a way that I probably shouldn't do because it makes me sound like I have.”

No things that I don't know but I think one of the real secrets to life at least for me has been. Realizing like if you can just get in between the impulse and a thought you can really live a much a much healthier life you know you can if you can just consciously decide. Oh I I feel this but I don't have to act on the feeling I can take a step back and decide actually what I would want to do or what would be the prudent thing or the better thing to do in a given situation and I it seems like with acting.

“It gives us to be able to do that to say okay my character is thinking and feeling this what is the best way for me to respond to in order to deliver the performance I want.”

Are you able to have that kind of perspective on day to day life choices where you can step back in the moment and say how do I want to move forward right now. I am and is it the same kind of thought process no is it the same kind of have so tell me how to tell me about the difference from muscles one is a. I am trained through years of experience understanding of my instrument and what I can contribute on the set for a specific character and performance and with my co stars that will flow and collaborating such a way that we can.

I don't know how to work and hopefully entertain you the other is just sort of saying well you're doing this and I am not going to get angry because I'm not going to. Let you do that and and be patient and take it in and think about what I can do to diffuse but without engaging and that I find very easy I mean when I was 19 no.

“I'm 62 sure I'm I know I think I know what to do and what not to do whether it's at home or in a restaurant or out in public whatever I I first thing I do is I don't go out if I don't think I can meet people well.”

The choice and when I do meet someone I know what it means to to meet someone that I admire and have them run your day by being unkind. My favorite pillars of the human spirit which I'm a big believer in are kindness compassion wisdom and love and you know I I want to embody those pillars when I meet people.

I I I I don't want to say it because I still love them and and I don't want to.

He's extremely famous I mean I don't want to upset him. Yeah and sort of a two-part question do you envision if not retiring at least sort of ramping down the amount of time you spend acting especially given that you have such a young child at home.

“Definitely yeah that's and then what would you do if you weren't acting so often because I know in the past you've said things like you know you need to act to live so how how would you feel that space again.”

But I'm all about my toddler I mean I that she takes 80% of my energy and I'm focused on that so I'm there's it's not about how how can I fill the time it's more about can I find the time that I can.

Maybe there to nurture her and and guide her and I'm lucky right now because she's young enough that as long as we.

Can travel together and I can come home to her that's good but yeah that is on my mind how I'm going to come compartmentalize my time. So the last question you know I know early in your career you were interested in the idea of developing a mythology around yourself kind of becoming. A larger than life character I think you're looking quizzical is that not. I'm thinking about it I'm thinking about what you're asking me and I'm putting I'm connecting the dots and.

Whether you realize it or not you've definitely have achieved that and and our to a lot of people a kind of larger than life character.

Or figure in the way that other kind of older Hollywood icons might be I think of somebody like you know like a dentist hopper or something or a brando sort of reputation precedes them in a way and they have a mythology around them and I want to know what's been.

“What was what was good about achieving that and and what was more challenging because you might be larger than life but I think well it's your life that that you're living that the other people are are viewing that's really.”

I'm. A profound I think question because I I'm still trying to find my answer to it and. It's pretty deep. Yes when I began I wanted to cultivate this mythology around myself. That was before we had this thing called the internet and I didn't know.

“That it would go that far that it would be that wide spread did I think could I didn't have the means to imagine that one day it would become this thing we call memes or.”

We're going to different cultures around the world or whatever it is that the internet deploys so I think it it went beyond what I initially was trying to cultivate a. A mystique and aura and in the inigmatic presence of mystery all that beautiful stuff that the black and white golden age as we call them boge arts and cagnie's. Betty Davis's had before. There was so much television and certainly before the internet. That's another way of putting it would be what was gained in achieving the goal of developing a personal mythology and what was lost.

Well, I think that there may have become. You know, it's like I grew up watching David carried in and Kung Fu and I saw him in a movie and he didn't do any Kung Fu and I was disappointed and so maybe there's an element of like gosh I really want to see Nick go off the rails and I'm not going to give them that every time and I hope they're not disappointed, you know. And what was the good thing about it about having achieved the goal that you well I was that out for yourself, but what in your early point, David, it wasn't the goal the goal was to create that mystery that inigmatic.

Or this is something else that I had no reference point that I would happen and so I'm still trying to so what can I say that what's the good thing. The good thing is it kept me in the zeitgeist or kept me in the conversation for better or for worse, but is it perfect for me no because that's not what the movies necessarily about that little to second moment. If you really want to see how the character got there you need to watch the whole thing it's not just little screenshots of little gyps and whatever they call them it's it's something building to that eruption if you will and so maybe it's lost you know because.

Yeah well you do have movies that thank you will go and sit down and watch so thank you so thank you for taking all the time to speak with me appreciate thanks for having me David it's always pleasure to have our conversations.

“That's Nicholas Cage. Spider-in-law will debut in the US on May 25 on mgm plus then globally on prime video on May 27th.”

To watch this interview and many others you can subscribe to our YouTube channel at youtube.com/atsymbol the interview podcast.

This conversation was produced by Wyatt Orm it was edited by Paola Newdorf mixing by a theme Shapiro original music by Dan Powell Row and Nemisto and Marianne Lzano photography by Devon Yalcon.

“The rest of the team is Priya Matthew Seth Kelly Joe Bill Munoz Eddie costus Amy Marino Marximo David Hur Kathleen O'Brien and Brooke Mentors.”

Our executive producer is Alice in Benedict.

Next week Lulu talks with the cognitive scientist Laurie Santos about the elusiveness of happiness and what we can do about it.

“I think we really just definitely think of happiness as about Mimi and so much of the science and so much of this classic wisdom tells us that's the way you get off track that's the way you pursue it in the wrong way.”

I'm David Marquesie and this is the interview from the New York Times.

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