Keepin’ it real
After almost 40 years in the business, Bateman feels he’s just getting started
Don’t confuse Jason Bateman with the mild-mannered Everyman he’s played in so many hit comedies.
Not that he’d mind. Bateman, 49, has indeed made audiences laugh in movies such as Horrible Bosses, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Hancock, Zootopia, Up in the Air, The Switch, Identity Thief and Office Christmas Party; on television, he’s the centre of Arrested Development, past and present.
But the lifelong actor is also a producer and director, and he’s currently starring in — and producing — Ozark, the hit Netflix violent drama about a guy who’s been laundering money for a drug cartel.
He’s also a producer on his new movie, Game Night.
Q A lot of the laughs in Game Night depend on delivery. The action gets grisly and violent and yet everyone is so understated and polite. Wait — are you all supposed to be Canadian?
A I hope what you’re picking up on is our intention to make it very relatable. You say “Canadian” and I think I know what you mean. They’re kind and human, and not afraid of their vulnerability. The concept always appealed to me, that a bunch of decent people get together to have a game night and get involved in something they’re obviously not expecting, and that they’re ill-equipped to respond to. So, if they were at all more snarky or edgy or broad, then perhaps you wouldn’t enjoy watching them navigate this, because they would seem more capable.
Q What’s the path from child actor to producer-director been like?
A My ideas about what I want to do when I grow up have changed as I grow up. I started off wanting to be a character actor, like Lon Chaney Jr. and then I wanted to be Robert De Niro or Al Pacino, then I wanted to be kind of a funny guy. Then I wanted to be somebody who was the centre of things, the Everyman, the leading man, so I can service the whole story. And then I wanted to direct these things I was doing, because it became clear to me that was the really challenging job on set … And then my life got into a place where I could actually handle that kind of responsibility, and fortunately, I was given the opportunity to do that.
Q How does one handle the whole celebrity whirlwind for almost 40 years?
A I feel fortunate that I haven’t really been swept up in any kind of celebrity attention.
It helps my personal life, my family life — my wife, my kids and I, we get to cruise around for the most part, undetected. Or if someone does come up to say something, it’s usually something kind of, casual, kind of peer-topeer and positive, and anybody who doesn’t like what I’m doing, I don’t hear from them. Which is kind of nice ... I think the media decides who they want to make a celebrity and who they don’t. And I don’t think I do anything in my life that warrants that kind of celebrity attention. I’ve been married for 16, 17 years now, I have two little girls, I’m up at six in the morning, and in bed by nine.