Since his character has zero dialogue in the John Woo-directed film, the actor thought he would attempt method acting for the first time.
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Joel Kinnaman is sharing his failed attempt at method acting for his role in the upcoming action movie Silent Night.
During an appearance on The Tonight Show Wednesday, the For All Mankind actor told host Jimmy Fallon that since he has zero dialogue in the John Woo-directed film, he decided to “go full method on this one” for the first time.
Kinnaman recalled telling his fiancée Kelly Gale, “Listen, this is gonna be a tough one for our relationship. I’m not gonna talk for the whole shoot and not talk with you either. So we’re not gonna have any communication.”
relationship coach to find a way to navigate it all. When Fallon asked Kinnaman if the relationship coach thought it was a good idea, the actor responded laughing, “No.”
But he said his fiancée eventually came around and told him, “This is a sacrifice that I will do. And, you know, we will figure out a way to do this.”
After working out the logistics, Kinnaman said he was going to officially stop talking once he got to Mexico City to start filming. But it wasn’t long after the actor landed that he realized he “was feeling a little lonely” since he didn’t know anyone there and decided to call Gale.
Kinnaman noted that his fiancée was so confused on the phone call, telling him, “You’re supposed to be silent the whole two months.” But The Killing actor decided to wait a little longer before diving into the immersive acting approach, saying that he would stop talking on his first day on set.
“Then the first day of shooting starts, and I get in the car. Super quiet the whole car ride to set,” Kinnaman recalled. “And then, I get into the makeup trailer and everyone’s, like, hanging out and, like, talking, and I’m sitting there in the makeup trailer.”
He quickly realized that he wasn’t going to make it six weeks without any verbal communication and decided to give up on the method acting approach.
“I had a really, really intense silent car ride to set. The car ride was basically the whole thing, you know? So that kind of charged me up with enough silence that I needed for the rest of the shoot,” Kinnaman quipped.
Silent Night follows a grieving father, who is recovering from a wound that cost him his voice, as he enacts his long-awaited revenge on Christmas Eve after his young son gets killed in the crossfire between warring gangs.
The movie is set to be released in theaters Dec. 1
Woo sat down to RogerEbert.com about “Silent Night,” his return to Hollywood after all these years, his thoughts on current action cinema and his next project, his long-planned remake of his own classic “The Killer,” which is currently in production for Peacock.
What was it about the screenplay for “Silent Night” that got you excited to do it? Was it primarily the idea of doing a film that told its story without any dialogue?
I am always looking for something different. All I was getting offered was action, action, action, and I was getting tired. I wanted to make a change and so when I came back four years ago and got the screenplay for “Silent Night,” I was so excited about it. Even though it was an independent film, I really loved the script, and I thought the idea of doing something with no dialogue would be a great challenge for myself. It also gave me a chance to change my own style. My kind of movie would always have a lot of action and romance and fantasy but for this one, I wanted it to be more realistic so that the character would be more believable. By not having dialogue, it allowed me to use my gift for using visuals and sound to tell a story. I think it was a very good experiment for myself.
In a number of your films, you have included extended dialogue-free sequences of so-called “pure cinema,” but “Silent Night” extends that notion for the entire running time. Did the no-dialogue concept require you to approach the project in a different manner than you might have if it had been done in a more conventional manner?
The whole story was a human drama, so it led me to try to make the movie in a more dramatic manner than most action movies...
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