What happens when your standardly handsome, not-particularly-memorable movie star–the type that comes a dime a dozen in the plastic bubble of the entertainment industry–turns out to be self-aware?
Chris Evans, star of superhero film franchises like “Captain America” and the fragrance campaign for Gucci Guilty, has built a career on his all-American good looks and “comic book physique“. As a result, the decade or so he’s spent acting has felt anxiety-inducing and soul-crushing. Describing his failure to cultivate meaningful or varied roles, he told one interviewer, “I’ve made about 20 movies and I’m probably proud of three”.
While promoting “The Fantastic Four” in 2007, Evans described his fatigue with the press circuit:
I think the main reason I struggle so much in press is because I’m usually promoting a piece of shit. It’s really difficult to find a flowery way to tell people to go see this movie, that your face is all over, that your name is all over, that you’re endorsing. And then you begin to feel like a liar, like you’re transparent. You feel undeserving.
At a press conference for the sequel in Europe, he had a silent “meltdown” and instinctively left a room full of reporters before anyone had asked him about his role. Signing onto the “Captain America” series prompted him to go to therapy to fully reckon with the possibility he’d be attached for years to yet another job he loathed: “‘[…] if the movie’s bad, that’s one set of problems. If the movie’s great, here come the sequels, here come the fuckin…’ he said, catching himself […]. ‘This is why I hate myself in interviews. All of a sudden, you stop and you’re like, ‘Chris, how dare you?’ I don’t live in Darfur. I have both legs. […].’ ”
“The Avengers” series has finally led him to declare he will “take a break” from acting once his contractual obligations are up so he can focus on directing. He’s already in the post-production stage of an indie romcom, “1:30 Train“.
Despite the sense of indignation he has when reviewing his own body of work, there are no reports of bratty behavior on set. In interviews, he’s “unassuming” and breezily friendly. (If coming off down to Earth is actually an act, at least he has that part of playing a movie star down.) Evans speaks admiringly of his colleagues; he’s pointedly chummy and close to his “Avengers” costars. He admits that the success he’s garnered through big popcorn flicks will make it easier to transition from acting into other areas of film making. The only indicator of “spoiled movie star” behavior might be dissatisfaction with the roles he’s cast in and the phony grinning terms of stardom itself.
I’ve never found Evans compelling for good or ill, and previously might have easily dismissed him as overpaid and lucky he hasn’t fizzled out of any career in showbiz; but reading him speak openly about checking into therapy and “meltdowns”, not only did I sympathize with him, I had to consider the daunting prospect of being tied to a project I hated for five years (if not longer) or the potentially dehumanizing choreography of plugging my work over and over, fake-smiling through interviews, regaling the same anecdotes, navigating the line between self-flattery and false modesty about a part, using the same pitch ad nauseam on a multinational tour of self-perceived bullshit-peddling.
What’s a fratty-looking heartthrob to do when almost everyone can be typecast and pigeonholed into the same parts again and again, until the well simply dries up altogether, even of “bad” roles? Is Evans warranted in his grievance about the meta-performance of self-promotion and the struggle to balance commercial success with integrity, or just an ingrate biting the hand that feeds him, deluded about his own worth as an actor and potential director? Where’s the line between thoughtful candor and arrogance in an industry where 99.9% of those hoping to find work won’t get a two sentence speaking role, and the turnover for commodified pretty faces guarantees he can be replaced? Can Evans rebuild himself in the mold of Ben Affleck and change hats?
Does he deserve to?
Image: Wikimedia Commons / Gage Skidmore CC 2.0 Some rights reserved
