Willem Dafoe has been cast in dark characters in "The Alley of Lost Souls" and "Spider-Man: No Way Home."
Willem Dafoe doesn't understand why people are so obsessed with his villains. When reviewing his long career, he does not find that there have been so many that he has played. You have to tell him that his ability to transform into someone scary with a look, in seconds, makes him the favorite villain of several generations. And he receives the praise with great humility.
We are never happy with what we have, we always want more, that would be the message of Guillermo del Toro's latest film, Nightmare Alley, about a circus of geeks and freaks from the Second World War, where Dafoe plays an unscrupulous businessman who turns homeless people into addicts and monsters for people's amusement.
“I don't want to say that villains are more fun to play, but they certainly have more dimensions. They are human beings with weaknesses; They don't necessarily want to always be bad. It is not my job to defend or justify them, but I need to understand them first,” explains the actor in a virtual press conference about the film, organized by the CCA.
His method seems to be to create a story for them. In this case, he imagines that Clem, his character in this surreal universe, sees the world divided between prey and predators.
And he assumes that he grew up during the Great Depression, that he is very pragmatic, that he may have been in prison and that, although he takes advantage of the weaknesses of some to chain them and take advantage of their misery, deep down he is also compassionate towards the rest of his colleagues in the circus.
The talented Willem Dafoe says that he is always interested in roles that challenge him and intrigue him. The one that Guillermo del Toro offered him to do in The Alley of Lost Souls (delicious translation of Nightmare Alley) is similar to the ones he imagined when he was a boy and went to those fairs.
“In my imagination I saw them as romantic, dangerous but charming. Playing dark people, who others see as villains, is very liberating. “He takes away your fears,” he summarizes.
His fans couldn't be happier that this year he has also returned as The Green Goblin, the supervillain, Spider-Man's archenemy, in a twist on Spider Man: No Way Home. If they could give him an Oscar for best supporting actor they would give it to him, they keep talking about him on social media.
Dafoe (66) has been nominated four times by the Academy but has not yet taken home the award. And he doesn't seem too worried about it either.
The curious thing about this return of his Marvel villain, who appeared in the saga for the first time in 2002, when Spider-Man was Tobey Maguire, is that returned from the beyond thanks to some spells from Doctor Strange, he now terrorizes the set, unintentionally, to the protagonist of this new stage, Tom Holland and his heroine Zendaya.
“Fear” is the word that the young actress uses to explain what Willem Dafoe inspired in her when she got into his bad character and gave them a sinister look.
He also imagines this comic book supervillain, whose alter ego is called Norman Osborn, dividing the world between losers and winners. “He believes that power is the only thing that matters, that is his compass. And that's how he handles people.”
This time, before agreeing to return to the Marvel cinematic universe, he asked to do his own scenes, without doubles; That was his only condition and it was obviously granted.
“I didn't like the idea of being a painted figurine. “I wanted to be in motion to be able to add qualities to the character.” He can be seen on YouTube balancing high on a board in front of a green screen. She admits that she finds it fun to do action scenes.
Before saying goodbye he clarifies that he is one of those who pretend to be someone else and that when the work is finished he moves on. “Avanti!” he exclaims. He doesn't look at his past performances. That is why, perhaps, he is surprised that some have remained so engraved in the collective unconscious.
