| Paul Dano Delivers The Burgers And Goods |
| Written by Danny Peary | ||||
| Wednesday, 13 December 2006 10:21 | ||||
 Nobody will be going to see "Fast Food Nation," --Richard Linklater’s ambitious narrative adaptation of Eric Schlosser’s bestseller--to be cheered up. But they’ll find joy watching the super cast Linklater assembled for even the smallest roles. Bobby Cannavale, Bruce Willis (a terrific cameo), Esai Morales, Greg Kinnear, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Kris Kristofferson, Patricia Arquette, Ethan Hawke, Wilmer Valderrama, and even singer Avril Lavigne are among those who mostly play individuals connected with the fast-food industry, as management or exploited workers. Not lost among that array of talent is Paul Dano, who has made so many appearances of late in movies (“Little Miss Sunshine”) and television (“The Sopranos”) that no longer does anyone have to look up his characters in the end credits to find his name. Dano’s small role in "Fast Food Nation" surely will solidify his reputation for giving dead-on performances as alienated youths. He plays Brian, who makes hamburgers at Mickey’s, complains about it, and probably does nothing else in his life. As the popular joke goes, he is one fry short of a Happy Meal. foxsearchlight.com/fastfoodnation
Q: Was getting the chance to work with him the main reason you wanted to do the film? 
Paul Dano
Ashley Johnson and Paul Dano in "Fast Food Nation"
Director Richard Linklater displays promo merchandise from the film
Only some of the all-star cast (L to R): Wilmer Valderrama, Catalina Sandina Moreno, Greg Kinnear, Ethan Hake, and Ashley Johnson
Wilmer Valderrama and Catalina Sandina Moreno star in "Fast Food Nation"
PD: Not since I read the book. On the East Coast I liked Wendy’s best and when I was on the West Coast I’d go to In-N-Out Burger. I also like taking road trips and the places you find when you pull off the highway serve fast food. I wanted to be able to eat that so I purposely didn’t read the book when it came out. I knew what would happen. But when I found out I was going to be in the movie, I read the book. I haven’t eaten fast food since then. The book is really intense. Q: What did you think was the most shocking aspect of the book? PD: I think the treatment of employees is what affected me most. Most of us already had some knowledge that animals aren’t treated well in this type of situation. So the bad treatment of workers in fast-food restaurants is what surprised me. That’s what I liked seeing in the script by Richard and Eric. Even good people are part of the system and are helpless. The low-paid workers are going to starve if they don’t have a job so you can’t hold it against them for working in such places, but they are subjected to terrible things. Q: Did you ever work at a fast food restaurant? PD: No, but if the acting career doesn’t work out, I’ll see. To prepare for this movie, I actually tried to get a job at three McDonald’s close to where I live downtown. That was last Fall, and I thought I’d work a few days and then quit before filming, just to get a feel for what it’s like. I even filled out applications for two of them. But I got rejected by all of them. I was kinda hurt. I had to tell myself that maybe it was because I didn’t put down enough available hours. Q: In your research, did you talk to people who work at fast-food restaurants? PD: I talked to a few, including friends who work at fast-food restaurants. But honestly, you don’t have to talk to anyone. You can just sit down for a little while and watch the workers and you’ll get a pretty decent idea from their faces whether they like where they work and enjoy what they have to do. Also the book gives you, by far, the biggest insight into some of these people. Q: In the movie, Brian drops a glob of spit onto a freshly-made burger and later drops a patty on the floor and picks it up and places it back on the grill. Do your friends confirm what we see in the film about what disgruntled fast-food restaurant workers do to the food? PD: Maybe it’s just kids my age who don’t like their jobs, but, from what I’ve heard from them, the scary thing is that it doesn’t have to be a fast-food restaurant. Those things go on in all restaurants. Workers do some sick stuff that I don’t think we should talk about because you won’t feel like eating later.
Paul Dano
Ashley Johnson in "Fast Food Nation"
Eric Schlosser, Author of "Fast Food Nation," he also wrote the screenplay
Greg Kinnear and Kris Kristofferson
Greg Kinnear in "Fast Food Nation" PD: I didn’t feel the need to do it. Brian is just a small piece of an ensemble and I didn’t want to overdo anything. But I guess there were moments in the restaurant when things weren’t planned. I was really making those burgers, throwing frozen patties on the grill. It wasn’t in the script for me to drop a patty under the grill. I was supposed to spit on Greg’s hamburger earlier, but dropping meat and putting it back on the grill wasn’t supposed to happen—I just did it. Q: “Fast Food Nation” is a depressing film, but was it fun to make? PD: Yeah, yeah. It was a lot of fun. Rick was great and my scenes were with Ashley, who is a really cool girl. It was good people. Brian was in a state of languor; feeling less than anyone else, but it certainly wasn’t a depressing experience for me to play him. Q: Some of the films you’ve been in—“L.I.E.,” “Little Miss Sunshine,” and “Fast Food Nation”—don’t give us a glowing view of the suburbs. Did you grow up in the suburbs? PD: I lived in Manhattan till about the third grade and then we moved to Connecticut, into suburbia. There were things I absolutely loathed about it, but I had a great time in high school and wouldn’t give up that experience overall. Suburbs do suck but there is something good about that “suckiness.” You learn from it. When you’re in high school, you just want to get out fast, but a few years later you can look back and see that it wasn’t such a bad place. Growing up there is what made me who I am. Q: What’s the worst job you had back then? PD: The worst, most unpleasant job I had was wrapping gifts. My little sister worked at a bookstore and she got me a wrapping job for a few weeks. And everyone in town that I knew seemed to be coming there to buy presents and wrapping their gifts was a humiliating experience. Q: You’ve played “bad-ass” teens in movies, so is that because you were a bad-ass then? PD: I’ve never considered myself a bad-ass! But every teenager knows what it’s like to be angry, and not be angry about something specific, just things in general. Most kids know what it’s like to be alienated and want the easy way out. Brian isn’t very smart, but he knows he wants to escape. Dwayne in “Little Miss Sunshine” is a very smart guy but he too is looking to escape. Q: Did you do any preparation to play a boy who refuses to speak in "Little Miss Sunshine?" PD: I tried a couple of days of not talking in my house with parents. The first day at dinner was the worst. It was totally infuriating not being able to defend myself when they’d say something that took me 20 years back—I felt I had to say something to them but all I could do was twitch. So it started out being very difficult. But then it became kind of liberating, a thing of power in fact because I wouldn’t give them anything to fuel the fire. So that was interesting. Then we did some rehearsals where we’d stay in character, driving around doing family activities and improvising—which I really like to do. During the first day of filming, I was not talking. I had planned on not talking for about thirty days, but Toni Collette said, “Paul, we’re going to have some fun, too!” And that made sense, so I started talking to everyone and I’m glad I did because I built some great relationships. Q: Are you surprised at the movie’s tremendous success? PD: Absolutely. After I read that script for “Little Miss Sunshine” years ago. I wanted to be part of it and was glad that happened even though it took years to be filmed. We all got along working together and as people, and we had a really excellent time making the movie, but nobody knew if anyone was going to go see it. Then it got a good response at Sundance and we thought there was a chance it could be a modest success. I didn’t want to expect too much. I had no idea that so many people would see and like it as much as they do. Q: You have two films out now, and word is you have several more on the way. You are incredibly busy. PD: This summer I filmed “There Will Be Blood” with Paul Thomas Anderson. And there’s an independent film called “Weapons” by Adam Bhala Lough, that I hope will be playing at festivals. Also, I finished my part for Spike Jonze’s “Where the Wild Things Are,” but he’s still working on it. I play one of the Wild Things, and we work-shopped the script like a play almost, breaking up scenes and improvising to develop their histories. Meanwhile they filmed us with a lot of cameras—there was a ton of footage—and have based the movements and dynamics for the puppets off of that. They’ll ultimately just use my voice but it was a real acting experience, unlike something done in a voice studio situation. So those are the films that I have coming out next year. I have been very busy, but it’s been great. foxsearchlight.com/fastfoodnation |
