Sam Rockwell had a fail-safe audition trick that booked him roles throughout his early career — and it only took a little bit of lying to seal the deal.
Olivia Wilde detailed the bit of Rockwell trivia while recalling her time working as an assistant to casting director Mali Finn between ages 16 and 18.
“I really got to see how the sausage was made,” Wilde told “Smartless” podcast hosts Will Arnett, Jason Bateman and Sean Hayes of her time in the audition room. Apparently, Rockwell’s audition for “The Green Mile” was the most astounding Finn had ever seen. (The “Three Billboard Outside Ebbing, Missouri” Oscar winner eventually booked the antagonist role of “Wild Bill” Wharton in Frank Darabont’s 1999 Stephen King adaptation.)
“While I was working there, there was the legend of the Sam Rockwell audition,” Wilde began. “She would tell us, ‘The best audition I’ve ever seen was Sam Rockwell auditioning for “The Green Mile.”‘
As the story went: “He came in, and it was the last day of the director’s sessions, the last possible day you could audition, and he had been given the wrong scenes,” Wilde said. “And this man, Sam Rockwell, he didn’t even pause, he said, ‘Well, give me the correct scenes and I’ll go learn them really quickly.’ And they said, ‘That’s impossible Sam. It’s 10 pages of dialogue you can’t possibly, no one could do it.’ And he was like, ‘Just give me a chance, I don’t want to miss this opportunity.’
“So they gave him the right scenes, he goes into the hallway, they only have five minutes to give him to learn the lines. He comes back in, and he nails it. And they were floored, and he got the role.”
The lesson that real actors work fearlessly and fast was one Wilde carried with her for years into her own acting career. She finally had the opportunity to tell Rockwell how he inspired her while they were working together on 2011’s “Cowboys & Aliens.”
“Years later, I’m working with Sam and I’m sitting next to him in the makeup chair and I was like, ‘Sam it’s so nice to meet you, what an honor. I have to tell you I always heard this story when I was an assistant and it just really inspired me,’” Wilde recalled. “And he goes, ‘Ha! Oh yeah, that was, like, a thing I used to do. That worked every time.’”
It turns out, Rockwell had been given the correct sides all along, he just lied about receiving the wrong ones so that it seemed especially impressive when he walked back into the room 10 minutes later having the “new” ones memorized.
The “Smartless” hosts were shocked by the strategic deception, but admitted it was “brilliant.” Bateman, who’s directing Rockwell in the upcoming Netflix feature “The Cackling of the Dodos,” laughed. “He’s a real crafty bugger. I’m gonna keep my knees bent,” he said.
“I was like, ‘Are you f–king kidding me!?’” Wilde said of the revelation. “I revered his ability to flash memorize. He knew — he had the correct sides, it was a whole performance. And it’s so genius because it lowers their expectations. Then if you even say half the things right they’re like, ‘Goddam, this man learned this in five minutes.’”
Wilde concluded: “He deserves an Oscar.”
Listen to Wilde’s full “Smartless” interview, timed to the release of her third directorial feature “The Invite” and her performance in Gregg Araki’s “I Want Your Sex,” below.
