Interview: Giovanni Ribisi

In director Karen Moncrieff’s sophomore feature film The Dead Girl, Giovanni Ribisi (Lost in Translation, The Virgin Suicides, Heaven) looks nearly unrecognizable as Rudy, a rough-looking grocery store employee (and walking encyclopedia of serial killer trivia), who sets his sights on Arden (Toni Collette), an introvert dealing with an abusive, invalid mother and unwanted localized celebrity after discovering the horribly mutilated body of a young woman. Fans of the actor will do a double take – Ribisi is buried under a tattoos (fake) and a lot of extra muscle (real – a demonstration of Ribisi’s dedication to even a small role, and his confidence in the film).

I had the chance to participate in a roundtable interview with Ribisi while he was in the New York promoting the release of The Dead Girl.

Giovanni Ribisi

Question: We were talking before about the matter of cutting the corneas and developing them like a photograph. Did this idea ever occur to you before?
Giovanni Ribisi: I’ve tried that actually [laughs]. It never occurred… but actually it’s interesting sometimes you see a performance and you think it’s literally, ‘Oh it’s great!’ because there’s like that one thing, but ultimately of course it’s the amalgamation of everything, and the whole. But that was one of the things I thought, ‘That, that’s interesting an poetic,’ and something that [promptly] engaged me.

Q: That really kind of put your character in a special place.
GR: [laughing] Yeah, it did, I know. For me I was like inspired by it, other people were disgusted and freaked out, or [eeked] out by it.

Q: This is a bit of a different role for you, we’ve never really seen you as this type of character. What about it appealed to you? He’s kind of rough, but there’s a gentle sould underneath.
GR: Well that was the thing, I think it was the whole thing, the script and the sort of poetic existential nature of this one event where there’s five different viewpoints on it. It was that, and it was also this guy who was sort of… I don’t know, it was a challenge and I knew it was something different. It’s hard to explain. I just had this affinity for it. And then also of course it was working with somebody who’s like acting royalty, Toni Collette.

Q: What was she like to work with?
GR: She was great, because it was a situation where it’s four days on a movie and you’re like… risqué and you have to like do the whole thing, and you’re like, ‘Hi I’m Giovanni,’ and she’s like, ‘Hi I’m Toni,’ alright let’s get naked. But she was totally open and just available for that and it was great. I was actually the squeamish one, and Karen was like, ‘No, I want you to…’ and these words I can’t really say right now, but…

Q: I think that really worked for you though.
GR: Yeah, I think so, possibly because that was the thing. I think that the guy as well. This is I think one of the main things for me as well, it wasn’t a movie about good versus evil as much as it was about human beings. And it sort of touches on the concept of ethics. Where ethics is not that, it’s not morality, it’s about survival, and it’s about ethics being a personal thing. And I think ultimately on the surface this guy would be chastised and he’d be an outsider and not the most… not someone you’d want your daughter to hang out with. But for her, he’s perfect. And he’s like this liberating element in her life, you know?

Q: So did they live happily ever after?
GR: Oh I think it was the total… the grassy knoll with the road and the sun and them walking hand and hand [laughing] into the sunset.

Q: Do you think he knows when he meets her and when he sees her on TV that he’s going to be this liberating experience for her?
GR: Yeah, definitely. And we had conversations about that. And, at the same time, there were also conversations about sort of pulling the wool over peoples’ heads and going, ‘Yeah, this could be the guy.’ So there’s those extreme sort of pulls with the character.

Q: But in a way it would have been too obvious.
GR: Right, exactly. Yeah. I just think it was just the thing of just working with Toni. And I love those things where you spend two months preparing for them, and then it’s like three days of work.

Q: You seem to have done some working out in preparation for those three days.
GR: Hello! [laughs] Yeah. Well, I have this sort of thing, this rule where right when you know you’re doing something, or even before depending on whatever, you start working on it. And we had a lot of time. The movie was actually going to be made a year before. But then Karen was pregnant and there was the whole thing with that, and so it got postponed. And generally I try and exercise and keep myself in sort of a neutral way physically, so I can go in either direction, whether it’s putting on weight, loosing weight, musculature, whatever it is that you imagine. But it sort of keeps you in a neutral way. But yeah. That was it.

Q: Was it your idea, was it Karen’s idea?
GR: I don’t know, it was like one of those things where you have like this arbitrary imagined concept of the guy, and then you’re like, ‘Okay, you have to fucking execute that. You have to do that.’ Is it possible? That sort of thing. So you just go.

Q: What was your workout regiment like?
GR: It was pretty intense. And it’s like this thing, like I still run a lot, and bike a lot, and I surf. So those three elements are just for being healthy, but then… and the diet and everything, yeah.

Q: How is Karen’s work process different from other directors?
GR: She is an actor herself, and she’s an extremely intelligent person, which is sort of needless to say, because of the script and how that’s evident there. And she’s sensitive in really this sort of maternal way to the whole process of acting. And it’s easy to criticize that, people don’t get it and ‘Oh the drama and acting, you don’t need to be acting,’ and the whole thing. But no, I think it’s a really sensitive thing, it’s you. You’re the person who’s going to be chastised, your being, your sort of psychology. And she really demanded a rehearsal process even when she had a baby that was… I think less than a year old… I don’t know how old her daughter is. But you know, the whole thing. And so that was the difference. I think it’s also her second film, and it’s not like working with somebody whose done sixteen films and they’re like, ‘Okay, whatever… What?’ [laughs] ‘Just come to work and be on time,’ you know, that kind of thing.

Q: Did her first film affect your decision at all?
GR: No, it was really just conversations, and the script.

Q: Had you seen it?
GR: No. But I also have, so many times, seen people that I…. Like Paul Thomas Anderson, who is I think, canonized, one of the best directors right now. And you look at their first movie, and it’s really not representative of their whole body of work. And the first film for me, I think, is always just a learning thing. More often than not you see people go from here to there from their first to second film.

Q: What was the rehearsal process like in the two months before the four days? Other than what you did physically, how did you prepare for the role?
GR: Just sort of reading over and over, and reading it and understanding… fitting the words in your mouth. There was a little bit of a dialect there, so working on that. And then just sort of trying to… ultimately I think it just comes down to having that confidence. That confidence of expression and communication. Robert Duvall said to me, you start at one point, you go all over the fucking world, bleeding on things, and then you’re like, ‘Oh, I’ve got it!’ and you realize you’re right back at the fist point where you started. But the difference is the confidence behind that first decision.

Q: What made you want to do this film?
GR: I think for me it’s that thing of… the concept of ethics, as far as…. I’m responsible for my acting, and hopefully what an actor does, in my opinion – there’s so many different concepts of why people act and what they want to do and why they want to express themselves and whatnot – but ultimately it’s I want to have an experience so that an audience member will hopefully have an experience. And it’s not pretentious, it’s very simple. As far as the story and the expression of the story, it’s exactly that, it’s something that denounces good versus evil and basically says, ‘This is human.’ In a way you could interpret the film as being [pisogynistic] where all the men are fucked up, demonized assholes and the women are these martyrs and all, but I don’t think so. I think it’s really embracing all of that, and saying this is just human beings, and this is life, and this is life as we know it, and fucking wake up to it, know what I’m saying? And ethics to me, in my philosophy that I study and all that, is a personal thing, it’s a thing that’s based on survival as opposed to good versus evil.

Q: What are you working on next?
GR: It kind of reversed itself because that was the last in a succession of four films that I did.

Q: What are the four?
GR: There’s The Dead Girl, there’s this one called The Gardener of Eden, there’s this one called The Dog Problem, and there’s one called The Perfect Stranger.

Q: So are you planning on writing and directing something of your own? It seems almost an inevitability.
GR: Yeah, I’m working on something right now, but it’s really a matter of consummating that and not…. That’s the most precious time, when the clock is not ticking, and it’s a shame that so many people just want to issue what could very well be a replacement for toilet paper! [laughs] No, I’m just kidding guys. That was a joke.

First Look Pictures release Karen Moncrieff's The Dead Girl exclusively on December 29th with a wide release coming on January 19th.