WWTW Interview: Chris Cooper

Chris Cooper’s transition from stage actor to Oscar winner came courtesy of marital pragmatism.

Cooper was working in theater and didn’t have much interest in television or film. When he married his wife, Marianne Leone, his priorities shifted.

“We were living in a sixth-floor walkup on a shoestring. She pushed me toward film and I’ll be forever grateful for her,” says Cooper, who in person is as intense and focused as he appears on screen. Cooper’s latest film bottles that intensity in a diabolical direction.

In the period thriller “Married Life,” (out on DVD Sept. 2) he plays Harry, a married man having an affair with a lovely widow (Rachel McAdams). Harry can’t bear the thought of putting his wife (Patricia Clarkson) through a painful divorce. So he plans what he thinks is the most gentle solution. He’ll put her out of her misery – a permanent divorce, if you will.

“He was narcissistic enough to believe he was so important in his wife’s world that she couldn’t live without him,” says Cooper, who won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for 2003’s “Adaptation.” The actor drew upon his recollection of his grandparents’ generation to flavor Harry’s warped thinking.

“Divorce was out of the question … it was too much of an embarrassment. That’s the position he came from,” he says. Cooper says shooting “Married Life” was much less intense than with “Breach,” the unsung 2007 drama about disgraced FBI agent Robert Hanssen.

“I enjoyed the depths that I found myself going for for ‘Breach,’” he says. “Married Life” offered its own intense scenarios off-screen. Director Ira Sachs (“Forty Shades of Blue”) arranged for one-on-one dinners between his leads to build a sense of attachment for the film.

“Pierce and I shared a lot over dinner. Similar things happened to us in real life. It was just a nice, extra intimacy,” Cooper says. Brosnan lost his wife, Cassandra Harris, to ovarian cancer in 1991, while Cooper’s son, 17-year-old son, Jesse, died of complications from cerebral palsy in 2005. The dinners weren’t necessary for some parts of his performance.

“It wasn’t too hard to be totally captivated by Rachel McAdams,” he says dryly.

Cooper has worked in Hollywood long enough to realize not all directors treat actors the same way.

“There are a lot of directors who think shaking up a set can be advantageous, and perhaps in some respects dealing with some actors that may be true,” Cooper says.

It’s hard to imagine the approach being needed for Cooper, who in person is as dry and serious as some of his stern on-screen characters. Cooper discovered a fresh directorial style when he signed up to play an FBI agent in 2007‘s “The Kingdom.” It took the veteran actor off guard, at least at first.

“[Director] Peter Berg has a sort of energy and a way of shooting I’ve never dealt with before. It was a real wake-up call,” Cooper says. “I would say beforehand it would be really irritating, but it worked out OK. I’m open.”

Cooper prefers a different approach.

“The director casts you sort of assuming you can handle this role, and it’s more ‘hands off’ until you’re not on the same track,” he says. That’s how it goes with his frequent collaborator and friend John Sayles, with whom he‘s made “four films, including “Silver City” and “Matewan.” Their relationship extends off camera, but Cooper wouldn’t dream of leveraging their bond for the sake of a job.

“It would never reach the point where I would ask John, ‘is there a part for me [in your next movie]?’,” he says.

Working with an autonomous writer/director like Sayles does have its benefits. Cooper recalls the uncertainty surrounding 2000‘s “The Patriot,” the big-budget epic from director Roland Emmerich.

“’The Patriot’ was supposed to be completely, historically based until the powers that be made it more and more violent and turned it into a vigilante movie … to the point where we had to change the historical characters’ names,” he says.

Cooper’s “Married Life” adds yet another stern, severe character to his estimable resume. He wouldn’ t mind a lighter role sometime soon. That isn’t stopping him from tackling a proverbial labor of love – a feature written by his wife, Marianne Leone, about a woman trying to give her disabled daughters a public school education. Cooper met the woman whose story the film is based upon through their mutual pediatrician.

Family ties remain a constant through Cooper’s career.

“Theater is very hard on a family because of the day-to-day demands and what I demand of myself and the isolation I need,” he says of his decision long ago to switch to movie work. “I don’t think it’s fair to put that on a family

(Photo: Chris Cooper delivers another finely tuned performance in “Married Life.”)