Aidan Quinn: The Mighty Quinn

"There were many horrors involved with it," he says. He crumples his empty Virginia Slims pack, adds it to the refuse on the tray, and takes a cigarette from me. "Hector, many, many times during that shoot, was not a sane person. He was insane. Ultimately, he and I respected each other, and he was not that cruel to me--because I don't allow it."

"What do you mean by cruel?"

"Well, when you're rehearsing a scene from seven o'clock in the morning until one o'clock in the afternoon in the jungle, in the heat, with full emotion, no camera, no viewfinder, just so he can get an idea of how he wants to shoot it, because he was so confused and so tormented--that, over a period of time, is tantamount to abuse. We had a good producer who made it worthwhile to be there, but he wasn't able to put any restrictions on Hector. So Hector could do whatever he wanted and keep us there as long as he wanted. Hector literally lost his mind a few times. I feel for him, in a way; I hope he's sorted out some of the demons that were comin' outta him. He's done some great work.

"There were a lot of cultural fights," he says. "We Americans were down there because we loved Peter Mathiessen's book, we loved the message. But between the North American idealism and the South American, um, total lack of idealism, there was a huge clash. A lot of us were adamant about not polluting the jungle, and the [South American] crew would indiscriminately kill any animal we came across.

"One day, the boom guy, Vito from Brooklyn, tried to stop the Brazilian crew from killing a tarantula. They were stompin' on it, and he was pullin' them off. And a fight almost broke out. I tried to intercede so the spider could escape. And Hector started yelling, 'You Americans make me sick: you killed two million people in Vietnam, but you don't want to kill a little spider.' He enjoyed inciting that kind of conflict." He puts out his cigarette and twists the end. "And, by the way, it was 58,000 people who died in Vietnam," he says.

"John Lithgow and Kathy [Bates] had their own problems with Hector, but they got along with him more often than I did. The thing about it is, I'm really an easy person to work with."

When he says this, it could be that my face experiences a brief, involuntary change of expression.

"When you print what I'm saying about these films," he says, "people are gonna think, 'Oh my God, this guy's difficult!' But if you ask the directors and the people I work with... I have a great time; I love the whole process. And I compromise, I'm not unyielding. There was a time, after I'd done Crusoe--which was another very, very difficult experience--when my wife said to me, 'You should think about doing something else.' I was miserable a lot of the time. Then, around the time that I was working with Barry Levinson, I decided to work with people I like and respect more often. With people who are sane. Do I want to go away for six months and work with a crazy person? No. Unless the crazy person is brilliant and worth it."

"Is Babenco crazy but worth it?"

"No," Quinn answers. A moment later, he recants, somewhat: "I love At Play in the Fields of the Lord. Babenco did a good job," he says with a shrug.

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