At the ripe old age of 19, actor Tye Sheridan, has done more and worked with some of the finest directors working today, including Terrence Malic (THE TREE OF LIFE), Jeff Nichols (MUD), and David Gordon Green (JOE). He’s also had key roles in great works like ENTERTAINMENT, THE STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT, and his latest work, writer-director Rodrigo García’s LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT, in which he plays a young man whose small family is visited by none other than Jesus (Ewan McGregor).
As if these accomplishments we’re enough, Sheridan has signed on to be in Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of Ernest Cline’s geektastic READY PLAYER ONE, and we’re about to see him on the big screen once again very soon as the teenage Scott Summers/Cyclops in X-MEN: APOCALYPSE. And if the latest release schedule is even remotely right, we may see Sheridan in one or two other films before year’s end, including THE YELLOW BIRDS (co-starring Alden Ehrenreich, Jennifer Aniston, and Jack Huston) and GRASS STAINS.
I had a chance to sit down with Sheridan in Chicago not long ago to talk about LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT and X-MEN. With that, please enjoy my chat with Tye Sheridan…
Capone: Hi, Tye. How are you?
Tye Sheridan: Hey, Steve. How you doing, man?
Capone: Good. I wouldn’t necessarily expect you to remember this, but when you were here in Chicago a couple of years ago with David Gordon Green I did the Q&A with you guys for JOE.
TS: Yeah, man. That was a good screening.
Capone: What I especially remember about it was out in the hallway, the movie theater had all these paintings of famous actors in character on the wall, and there was one of Ewan McGregor in a STAR WARS costume holding a lightsaber. And you said either you were about to shoot this film or had already shot it with him. And you admitted to me that you had never seen a STAR WARS film before. Does that sound right?
TS: [laughs] Yes, but I have now. The new one is incredible.
Capone: Have you seen them all now?
TS: I’m all caught up on the ones I need to catch up on, I think.
Capone: Very diplomatic. With LAST DAYS IN THE DESERT, this is not your first time making a film about fathers and sons. It goes to show the dynamic is age old—the issues about communication, wanting certain things for your kids, and wanting to please your parents. Nothing really changes. Why do you like these stories so much? Or has it just been dumb luck that you seem to have fallen into them so many times?
TS: It’s a little bit of both. These are the types of stories that I love to tell. I think these characters that I’ve play over the past few years in my career are often coming-of-age young men. I have a very easy time just relating to the characters, only because that’s what I’m going through in my own personal life, so there’s a parallel there. And especially with this film, it just made me reflect on my relationship with my father and what it was like growing up, and it made me recount some of my childhood memories. I immediately fell in love with the movie and I love this story and the fact that it’s told through the eyes of Jesus Christ, and he’s thinking about the relationship between he and his father, and I thought “Wow, the ultimate father and son story.”
Capone: Exactly. I love that he sees things in the relationship you have with Ciaran Hinds’s character in what he’s going through, to a different degree. He also acting as your family therapist a little bit, trying to open things up between you and your father. Did you like that about the screenplay?
TS: Yeah, I did. My character feels limited to outlets that he can really talk to. He can’t really talk to his mother, who’s really sick and he just doesn't go there. And with his father, obviously, he has opposing ideas and aspirations and desires in life, and I think he’s quite rebellious against his father. So it’s not until Ewan McGregor’s character comes into his life that he actually has a chance to finally ask someone for advice, basically, about life and about what it means to be a man. “Is this wrong thinking that I want to rebel against my father, that he wants me to stay here on the land and I don’t?” So, I love that aspect of the film.
Capone: You're shooting out in this beautiful but very isolated place for weeks on end. You hear all these stories about people going out to the California desert and finding themselves. Admittedly, sometimes they have drugs to help them do that.
TS: [laughs] I can’t say that there was no drugs on this set.
Capone: I wasn’t going to ask.
TS: But yeah, the isolation is nice, actually. At times, you obviously get bored. But it just creates such a nice environment to step into and tell this story in and to portray this character. It was so easy to feel immersed inside of this story.
Capone: I’ve talked to a few actors over the years who have played Jesus, and it’s sometimes a heavy thing for an actor to take on that role, for a lot of different reasons, but is it also heavy and is there a responsibility playing someone who’s playing opposite Jesus? Does that weigh on you to a certain degree?
TS: Yeah, but at the same time, it doesn't matter that he’s Jesus. I know you picked up on this, but it’s a father-and-son story at its core. So it’s not a Jesus movie or a biblical story or a movie about religion. It’s simply about that, just told through the eyes of Jesus.
Capone: Were you familiar with Rodrigo’s work before this? Because he makes a lot of very emotionally charged films, and this is certainly no different. How familiar were you with his work before this?
TS: Talking to him and reading the script, you get that. I think we relate so well to each other anyway, just on a personal level. Sharing stories about my father, and I think his relationship with his father is one of the biggest inspirations for this film, and I think that’s maybe why he wrote the film. I’m not sure. But it definitely was derived from a personal relationship, or just fathers and sons in general. Speaking to him about this, it just felt right from the very beginning. I remember I met him, and he told me about the movie and I’d maybe read the script or maybe I read it after, and he said, “You think you can do it?” And I just said, “Well, yeah. I love the story, but what’s my accent going to be like if I’m just outside of Jerusalem?” I was concerned I couldn’t do an accent. And he was like, “As long as you don't sound too Texan, I think you’re fine.” So we just made the movie [laughs].
Capone: You’ve got a bunch of movies in the can already, you’ve got X-MEN: APOCALYPSE coming out, you’re doing a movie with Spielberg soon. You’re becoming somebody who is bordering on being very popular. What are the things that keep you grounded and stable?
TS: Yeah, I’m nowhere near that stature [laughs].
Capone: You’re closer than you think. Give it another month.
TS: Yeah, I’ll bet you on that one. But yeah, at the end of the day, it’s about the material, and it’s about my passion for each project and challenging myself and making sure that I’m working with people that I really love and trust and enjoy working with. As long as that’s happening, then life is good, and I stay sane. I’ve got a lot of great people around me, and I’m so grateful for my team, my family, and my friends.
It gets hectic, and you feel like you’re just so caught up in your work and you’re struggling to find yourself, you take a second to just breathe. I was just talking to someone about my childhood and how it was just so filled with peace, and now everything is so chaotic and crazy and, life moves at such a fast pace. But you just gotta remember to slow down. I was telling my dad this. We were having the same conversation like two weeks ago, and he says, “Man, I know you’re busy and I know that you love what you do, but just slow down, just breathe whenever you have the chance, just make time to slow down.”
Capone: That’s great advice. I know the last time we spoke is when you were here, but I actually was in Montreal last summer when you guys were shooting X-MEN. I wasn’t on the set. I saw you guys in the audience at THE BIG LEBOWSKI script reading [directed by Jason Reitman and featuring fellow X-MEN cast members Jennifer Lawrence, Olivia Munn, and Michael Fassbender as The Dude]. You were there, right?
TS: Yeah! How cool was that?! That was such an incredible experience by the way.
Capone: I know. Wasn’t it crazy?
TS: My little sister had never seen THE BIG LEBOWSKI. She was visiting me in Montreal. She was 15 at the time. So I’m like, “Maddy, we’re going to watch THE BIG LEBOWSKI, and then we’re going to this reading.” And the fact that Jason Reitman came out before and said, “Guys, let this experience be simply for yourselves. You don't have to document everything. I know we live in an era where we feel like we have to document everything on our cellphones, because our friends might not believe we’re there, but just enjoy it for yourself.” And him saying that was like the perfect set up for this reading. I just remember, it was such a special thing. What, were there 300 people in the audience?
Capone: It was a small place.
TS: Yeah, you and I experienced it.
Capone: Just real quick, let me ask you about a couple of things you’ve got coming up. We mentioned X-MEN a little. In the comic books, Scott Summers always been a very stoic guy who has these emotional moments. What did you see as the key to playing him as a young man?
TS: Yeah, I just took James Marsden’s blueprints, if you will. The character’s there. You know who he is and you know his backstory, but you’ve never seen his backstory really, so in this film, it’s very much an origin for a lot of characters—the Scott Summer’s character, Jean Grey, Jubilee, Nightcrawler, Angel, Storm. You get to see their origin. I think that’s what’s so special and unique about the film. We see the beginning of like where these characters came from and how they met each other. So that aspect of the film was very cool for me. I thought that was really special.
So in the film, you meet Scott before he even discovers his superpowers, so this arc basically takes you from… I don’t want to spoil too much. He discovers his mutant powers, then he feels like an outcast, and he feels like a weirdo, and it’s not until his brother Havok—and it’s also cool to see the brother dynamic between the two. You get to see Havok take him to the school for mutants, and he meets Professor X and he finally understands maybe there is a place where he fits in like all of these other kids and can be normal. He’s an alpha male; he’s like a leader. So to see him I guess scared and not sure, weary of his super powers and not sure when or how to use them, and to use them for good is a nice quality. It’s like a nice dimensional development, if you will.
Capone: I’ve known Ernie Cline [author of “Ready Player One”] is an old friend of mine from down in Austin.
TS: Oh, no way. Wait, are you from Austin?
Capone: No, but our website is based there, and a lot of our writers live there. I’m down there a few times a year. I was just down there last month for SXSW.
TS: Cool. I was there too.
Capone: How much does it blow your mind that you’re about to be in a Steven Spielberg film?
TS: Oh, man. It doesn't even seem like a reality.
Capone: Well, it’s not yet, but soon.
TS: Exactly [laughs]. People keep asking about it and I’m like, yeah, it’s cool. I think it’s in the bag. But I don’t want to get super hyped up. But it’s a great feeling. It’s a dream come true. I’m so honored and grateful. That’s so cool that Ernest Cline is a friend of yours. I’m just reading his book now, “Ready Player One.” He’s an incredible writer. So immersive, such a visionary.
Capone: Wait till you see his tricked-out DeLorean that looks like the BACK TO THE FUTURE car.
TS: No way!
Capone: That’s what he drives.
TS: That’s on the back of his book. That’s his?
Capone: That’s his car.
TS: No way! That’s cool.
Capone: Tye, it was great to talk to you again. Best of luck with this.
TS: Yes, sir. Thank you so much. Nice talking to you as well.
