To promote his new film Cop Car, a thinly plotted but hugely enjoyable genre flick that mixes suspense and high violence with a coming-of-age bent [review here], Kevin Bacon was in town, hitting the Seattle International Film Festival red carpet in style. After talking briefly about who he’d choose to bequeath the honor of Six Degrees of Bacon upon (other Kevin actors: Spacey, Klein, etc.) Kevin and I talked being Kevin Bacon, playing cops, not being pigeon-holed or type-cast, crafting a character from little dialogue, jumping back and forth from movies to television and not watching his old movies.

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As an actor, you’ve transformed from a celebrity into, at this point, an icon. Do you find it a challenge to escape the Kevin Bacon-ness of being Kevin Bacon?

Kevin Bacon: I think that I have this name, and certainly the game that sort of turned this name into something, but I feel like I’ve always been less interested in what people think about me as a person, and more interested in what they think about the work. Who I am personally, I don’t think is all that interesting to people. I’ve got sort of a boring life. I’ve been married for a long time, and I haven’t been to rehab. But I really prefer just to have the work speak for itself, and the thing I’ve tried to do and work so hard at is to be able to be in a situation where I can play different kinds of guys. And that is, to me, a giant accomplishment because in this business, people really want you to do the same thing. That’s just the reality. They’ll say, “I like him as—whatever—a funny guy, or a serious guy,” or whatever it is. And I’m able to bounce around; that’s something I’m very grateful for.

Speaking of bouncing off, you play a great villain—anything from a big blockbuster like X-Men, to something small from the eighties, like Whitewater Summer—you have this ability to be intimidating and belittling. How much fun do you have playing a bad guy?

KB: I have a great time, but it’s not because the guy is bad or good. I have a great time because the character’s interesting and complex, and that applies to a good guy, too. If a guy has something fun about him, for me to play something that I can sink my teeth into: that’s my happy place, that’s where I live. So bad, good, is not really so much the issue for me.

So in The Following, you play an officer of the law in some capacity and in Cop Car, you’re playing on the other side of that as a corrupt, evil police officer. What part of the law makes for fun territory to play on both sides?

KB: It’s funny you mention that, because for a guy my age, I think I’ve played relatively few cops. When you really think about it, I think I played a bad cop in Wild Things; and I think I played a state trooper in Mystic River, but it’s usually if you get to your fifties, you’ve played thirty cops. I think that, again, it’s that thing of reaching to do something that’s really different than you. I’m not a guy who would ever in my wildest dreams consider taking on a job where I’m gonna put myself in physical danger, where I’m gonna put myself in front of a bullet, and sacrifice my life for people. I’ve played a lot of marines, for instance. I could never be a marine; I could never make it through boot camp; I could never send myself over to defend our country. I just don’t have the stones for it. But it’s a great opportunity to explore what that personality might be.

Cop Car is a fairly outrageous film—a lot of twists and turns. Talk just briefly about what was one of the most outrageous experiences you had on the set.

KB: The thing that was the biggest challenge, and the thing that was the most fun for both myself and for the director, was to take the part where there’s not a lot said. He doesn’t have a lot of lines, and he doesn’t do any kind of talking about who he is, and why he’s done what he’s done—so we just tried to lay some hints in there for the audience, so they can absorb it and start to make their own decisions about why he has a bag of cash, or why there’s something going on in his trunk, or whatever it happens to be. That was the challenge, and I really loved that. I loved that opportunity.

You’ve done television; you’ve done big blockbuster movies; you’ve done smaller, independent films. Is there a particular platform you prefer, or do you like to jump from one to the other?

KB: I like to jump from one to the other. I like to jump around in genres, too. It’s exciting to do one thing, and then to shake it up. To go from something like X-Men: First Class to something like Cop Car, that’s a great plus.

You’re not here only celebrating the Seattle premiere of Cop Car, but also you did Footloose and Diner—I think you showed last night. What is that like for you, going back and watching those movies from thirty-odd years ago?

KB: I didn’t watch them.

Do you ever watch them?

KB: No.

Why is that? Is it weird?

KB: No, it’s not weird. I got other stuff I want to do. I’m sort of looking down the road. But it’s funny, there’s a clip reel they showed tonight. They grabbed scenes from a bunch of movies. There’s scenes I have no memory of shooting. There’s a scene of this clip reel of me and Julia Roberts from Flatliners, and I was going, I don’t have any memory of shooting this—which is OK, because I feel like I’m looking for the next thing.

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For more Silver Screen Riot interviews, check out more of our “Talking With…” series here.

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