Wes Bentley Gets Ugly

In the much lauded film American Beauty, handsome young actor Wes Bentley played the cute boy next door; a sensitive, misunderstood videographer peeping at the girl across the driveway. In the actioner Ghost Rider, Wes donned a cool black coat and shocked as a demonic dude after Nic Cage's flaming skull character. Now, you can catch the dark-haired hottie as the guy you would most hate to be stuck with in a deserted parking garage in the thriller P2.

We sat down with Wes in Beverly Hills to find out what it was like to film underground for several months of night shoots and how he developed his stalker character and bonded with the victim actress in the film, pretty Rachel Nichols. After a long day of stalking her, he took her out for a beer! Picture Wes with full beard and all casual in jeans, black tee and backwards black baseball cap.

TeenHollywood: Okay, your guy in this movie is pretty cute...for a while. When you first walked over to Rachel in the garage, hey I would have gone out with you [he grins]. Did you develop your own backstory for your character? He seems normal but he's so not!

Wes: I didn't do anything extensive. Usually, when I'm there doing it, that stuff is in my head. I don't do any writing about it or anything like that. The way I approach a character is I kind of open myself up and let myself go; all my issues, all the things I deal with and kind of rent out my body to the character. You don't think about what makes you this way or that way. In a way, that's judging. You can't judge a character. You can't say he's good or bad. You have to let it be the way it is. Otherwise, you do a caricature I think.

TeenHollywood: So, you didn't have any ideas about who he is?

Wes: Well, he has his background. I can feel it and have a sense of it. Sometimes I thought he was a foster child, at times I felt like he had a too overbearing mother. I didn't really know. I think he might have been such a compulsive liar that he didn't know any more. Every psychological problem there is, he definitely had [he laughs]. That includes pathological liar, sociopath. When we were doing it, I could name 'um all. Again, those are things you can't think about when you're acting.

TeenHollywood: What was it about the script and character in P2 that grabbed you?

Wes: Because it's so original and because it avoided cliche. In this genre it's so easy to go cliche and that's lazy. It seemed perfect for me because they'd allow me to play. So a lot of it's writing, a lot of it's me going further with it or Thomas being allowed to be more that way. It really fit and Franck [Khalfoun, the director] did a great job creating an environment. It was a tough shoot though. We were all very type A personalities and all had great visions. They clashed but at the same time it creates something beautiful. Big bang.

TeenHollywood: Did you do any rehearsing before you started?

Wes: We really only rehearsed that dinner scene because it's so integral to the movie. Without that scene, there's no relationship between us. You would just have my obsession over her which is cliche. But with that scene comes the intricacies and nuanced things that make you nervous about him or make you want to support her.

TeenHollywood: I guess Thomas liked Elvis. Was that you in the photo as Elvis?

Wes: That's me, yeah. They brought in a suit and during rehearsal period, I got into the wig too and the glasses. I was born an hour away from Memphis so maybe that had something to do with it. I didn't practice any. I'm not really an Elvis fan either.

TeenHollywood: What's your favorite film in the thriller genre?

Wes: Mothman Prophecies, because I like the book so much. First with the movie, if you don't know the book, it can seem not right but there's a lot of things that Mark [Pellington, the director] did that are truly great because the book is a document. It's not a story. He was able to make the document exist within a movie and I was really impressed by that. Not only that, I was thoroughly creeped out by it. I'm more creeped out by the things we can't see than the gore.

TeenHollywood: Did the sound play an important role in this movie?

Wes: Yeah, and I'm big on sound. If I went to a movie theater, especially as a kid, if the sound was bad, I had to leave. I hated that. I love great sound. It's very important to me. The sound of a character's voice is very important. It's their theme song, beyond what the writers' write, the theme song is his voice.

TeenHollywood: Is shooting guerilla-style energizing? Because you only had 25 days to make this film.

Wes: Absolutely. I definitely think so. The longer you have, the more lethargic you can get about it or are lazy because you think it's just there waiting for you, the more money you have. When you have 25 days, you're afraid that you might not have tomorrow to prove this. The important things about the character have to come to light quickly. I have to know him quicker. I have to sleep in him just so that he doesn't go away kind of thing. I like six day weeks rather than five because you don't have those two days to let it go.

TeenHollywood: You really put poor Rachel, your costar through some tough stuff. Was it hard to watch that?

Wes: It was psychologically hard for me to watch her be taken to such physical extremes. It was hard to watch because I cared about her. I saw her take some spills that could have broken things. That's not worth it. Luckily, we didn't go there and it's easy to look back and say, 'We won, so it's good.' But that was the hardest psychologically for me. I even came to set a few days I wasn't needed just so I could make sure she was all right. She's a very close friend.

TeenHollywood: Are you surprised that after your big break playing this sensitive guy next door in American Beauty, now you've gotten a lot of offers to be bad guys?

Wes: Well, a lot of people were creeped out by Ricky [his American Beauty character]. I think this [character in P2] is someone I wanted to know. I wanted to know about Thomas. I was interested in that. But, I'm not surprised I guess. I don't have an explanation for that. I guess that's acting. It's an array of things. I hope to forever, be diverse because I think that that is longevity.

TeenHollywood: What type of role is more fun to play; the normal guy who loses it or something more born evil like in Ghost Rider?

Wes: Acting always is fun [whoever you play]. You play make believe. I'm not a method actor. I don't take it home with me. It's there but it's like a kid playing make-believe. I've got a dream job in a sense so. Ghost Rider is fun because it's like stupid evil and the costumes were great [laughs]. And, to delve into unlimited evil is interesting. You don't really know where that is. But Thomas is limited. I really, really wanted to make sure he was human and I also wanted to make him likable, a likable guy that you shouldn't like because he does all these awful things. That's a person. That's a human being but it's fun to play bizarre, supernatural that doesn't exist or at least not for me.

TeenHollywood: You say you and Rachel were friends during this. Did you both go in and out of character and laugh between shots of you trying to kill her?

Wes: [laughs] Oh yeah. Absolutely. Between action and cut is my time. It's my time to play and everything else is downtime, and that's definitely for fun. She and I are very close and got close during the filming. Between times, especially since it was such a hard shoot and she had dealt with such grueling conditions. She needed that and I hoped to be that.

TeenHollywood: Rachel says she's afraid of dogs. What was the dog like on this film?

Wes: There were three of them actually. One of them was for running, one was for the mean barking stuff and one was for just the look of him. The running one was dumb and sweet. He was a really dumb Rotweiler. I love dogs so I loved them all. Even the one that barks, he was sweet. It was great for me but Rachel, unfortunately, was terrified of dogs so she'd take off but I liked playing with them and stuff.

TeenHollywood: What else did you do between shots?

Wes: I love talking to the crew. Actually, in a way it's work because, in a way they're my muse. I like to use everybody as a sounding board. They don't really know what I'm doing because I'm playing with it. Blackheart [his Ghost Rider character] especially was kind of someone I played with people, with the girls especially because they give you back more and the guys sort of like want to walk away. But everyone is my muse around me when I'm working and it's the same on set.

TeenHollywood: What were the greatest physical demands for you on this movie?

Wes: The nights. But it wasn't nearly as demanding on me as it was on Rachel. She had a f**kin' hard shoot. But, for me, just the fact that it was nights and to let someone that evil in you is a bit draining you know. Actually, I'm a night person so that's not terrible. It's the working at night. I like to play at night [laughs] so that's taking away from my night play.

TeenHollywood: Did they let you do any of your stunts on this film?

Wes: I did the tackling [Rachel] at the dinner table but there really weren't many stunts for me. I didn't have much to do. In Ghost Rider I had more to do and that was all me and in Game of Their Lives I was a soccer player and that was all me. If I get a chance to, I'll do it. I'm a physical, athletic person so I like to do that.

TeenHollywood: What are you doing next or what might be coming out that's finished already?

Wes: I did a film called The Last Word with Wynona Ryder. He's a guy who writes suicide notes for other people. That's his business [laughter]. It's dark humor and very draining because he's a very dark person. I was sort of the straight guy on the humor. Wynona Ryder, she did a great job with it. Another film is Weirdsville which is a dark comedy and it's kind of floating out there right now. I really love it so I'm pushing it as best I can. I think it's a great film. It's got cult capability and already has that in Canada. It's funny as hell. I just play a dumb drug addict but it's not about drugs though. The focus of the film is truly just a night of craziness, weirdsville.

TeenHollywood: Uh, In The Last Word, does he demand payment up front?

Wes: [laughs] No, actually he waits 'til the last moment. He does drafts with them and sits down with them, has meetings over it. Then they pay cash and that's when he knows they're going. He's emotionless about it I guess until he meets her.

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Lynn Barker is a Hollywood-based entertainment journalist and produced screenwriter.