Aidan Quinn: The Mighty Quinn

So, of course, Quinn wouldn't do it. "Next, we have Desperately Seeking Susan," I say. "You have the distinction of being in Madonna's only good movie."

"Right," he says. "I thought she was great. Terrific." He stubs out his cigarette, twists the paper end closed, and places the butt next to the other ones he's collecting on the plastic cafe tray.

"Is it true you didn't get along with Susan Seidelman?"

"Susan and I had some disagreements, certainly," he says. "Yeah. Again, about the same kind of issues. The thing with Susan was about changing things in the script, and finally we came to an agreement: I would do a scene her way, and she would let me do it my way. She used most of mine. There was a lot of strife on that set, a lot of shenanigans. Most of the cast and crew thought that movie was gonna be a turkey, and when they saw it they were pleasantly surprised. Usually it's the other way around."

Stakeout?

"I had a good supporting role, playing a psycho killer. I think a big-name actor dropped out at the last minute."

Who?

"I think it was Val Kilmer, I'm not sure. Again, it was one of those things where I said, 'Yeah, but let's work on the script.' And [director] John Badham and Richard Dreyfuss and Emilio Estevez were very amenable to me coming aboard. So we worked on the script."

"I didn't see The Lemon Sisters" I tell him.

"It's not a good movie," he says. "But it was a fun part. Carol Kane is a friend of mine and she kept begging me to do it. So, I basically did it as a favor to her."

"The Handmaid's Tale," I say. "Saw it, liked it. It was fun."

"Fun?" he asks.

"Entertaining. No?"

"Well, I was, you know, I'm very critical." He lights another Virginia Slims cigarette with a match. "I was disappointed in the movie," he says. "But certainly it was a very worthy project. I worked with great people; I had a great time with Natasha [Richardson]. And I got to meet Robert Duvall and have some scenes with him." He leans forward. "I went on to co-star with him. I think he's one of the best, he really is. You can never catch that guy acting."

"I can never catch you acting either," I tell him. "It's always as if the camera has snuck up on you."

"Yeah, I like that style," he says. "I would, however, not like to be married to that style all the time. I would love, more than anything, to do an out-and-out farce with huge physical energy. Just because you're from the minimalist school, it doesn't mean you can't go big. I enjoy humor, and it's something I've gotten very little chance to explore. I don't get offered those parts. And if I don't get offered a part, I don't get a part. Ever."

Just at this moment, we're interrupted by a clutch of New York youths, shrieking on the path outside the cafe. "Someone got shit on," Quinn says, looking over my shoulder.

"Thank God no one was hurt."

What an odd reaction to birdshit, I think, in a city better known for its gunplay.

"I was once shit on by a mother starling," he explains, "as I was observing how cute she and her three little ones were. I was saying to, like, 12 people, 'Ohhh, look...' and she shit right in my eye! It really stung, like acid. I was staggering around and falling down and the people were splitting their sides laughing. See, I enjoy those types of scenes. Slapstick happens in life."

Like that experience in a gay bar in Chicago?

"Well," he says, amused, "I was in a gay punk bar that was owned by two gay friends of mine. This was when I lived in Chicago. It was the best dance bar for alternative new-wave music in the early '80s. There was this incredible-looking black woman sitting at the bar. I was playing pool, and she kept ogling me. And I kept ogling her. It was 50-cents-a-shot schnapps night, and I was gettin' better 'n' better on the pool table. And she was enjoyin' me more 'n' more, and startin' to say things to me that were really funny. Well, it didn't take long till we were in the men's bathroom. And we were... kissing. And we were goin' at it." He's warming into the story. "And I was kissing her, and all of a sudden I ran my hand down her neck and looked at her Adam's apple--and it was big. And I looked at her shoulders, and they were big. And then I looked at her hands..."

"And they were big?"

He nods. "And I went, 'Oh my God! You're a man!' " he says, laughing. "And I went tearing outta there. And the whole bar knew what was happening the whole night. They were hysterical. I mean, I actually got to the point where I was kissing him. It wasn't like, you know, that movie, but it could've been very close."

"We're up to Avalon now," I say, "but I think I skipped over The Mission."

"Yeah, I made that film so I could work with Robert De Niro," he says.

"You died right in the beginning of that. You looked so authentic in The Mission, the way you carried yourself, the way the clothes seemed to belong to you."

"I like period films," Quinn says. "I did a lot of work on posture. I loved putting on those clothes and getting to play around. I still have that vest and I wear it occasionally, to premieres and stuff. People think I'm a hippie."

"That's all you got?"

"Yeah, the rest was rented; they wouldn't give it to me. I only had a small part."

Okay, Avalon.

"That was a great experience," Quinn says, and I expect him to add a but..., a hello-sweetheart-get-me-a-rewrite brouhaha. Instead, he tells me, "It was a kind of charmed film, where you really had the feeling that as much fun as we were having making it, it was gonna turn out commensurately that well. And it did. Loved working with Barry Levinson, the cast got along, we hung together. I liked being in Baltimore."

"You liked being in Baltimore? Do you usually hang out with the cast? Are you sociable?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sociable, if there's time for it. When you're doing a lead role on location and you're in every scene, you work six days and then you sleep.'"

"At Play in the Fields of the Lord was some location, right?"

"That was an unbelievably difficult and... challenging experience," he says. "I don't regret it. But I don't know if I'd go back into it willingly again. It wasn't the jungle--I loved the jungle. We were three months over schedule, and it was a true Heart of Darkness experience in terms of what was happening on the set every day. And what was happening to the movie. And what was happening to the director. And what was happening to the relations between people."

"I've heard it was a real horror for you," I say. "And that there were problems with director Hector Babenco."

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