Jake: I’ve punished my body for roles but method acting is all in the mind
THE South Bank’s status as a cultural hub is getting a major boost, courtesy of a new world-class ballet school.
A site in the Paris Gardens building, between Tate Modern and the National Theatre, has been identified as the JAKE GYLLENHAAL says he tells actors who ask him how they should go “method” that it is all in the mind — despite drastically altering his own appearance for film parts.
The actor, 36, lost 30lb to play an obsessive journalist in 2014’s Nightcrawler before putting the weight back on — and an extra 15lb of muscle — for boxing movie Southpaw the next year.
But he said that when he is asked by fellow stars if they should change for a role, he responds in much the way Laurence Olivier did to method actor Dustin Hoffman — try acting.
“Some actors have asked me, ‘Hey, I know when you get into something you do a lot of prepara- home for the Central School of Ballet, which is moving from Clerkenwell. The school runs a touring company and offers degrees in choreography and dance. It has raised £3 million for the project and needs another £6 million. More than 1,200 people pass through its doors every week and it has started working with south London schools ahead of its relocation in time for the start of the academic year 2018/19.
Its patron, the Countess of Wessex, said the move was “momentous” for the school, founded 35 years ago “on the principle that talented young dancers should get the opportunity to pursue tion — I’m doing this role, do you think I should go and jump off a building?’,” Gyllenhaal said. “I’m like, ‘No! Use your imagination!’”
The star, who was born in California, told Esquire: “I’ve grown up thinking somewhere that if you’re really doing something great it has to be punishing in some sort of way.
“After a few years of really pushing in different areas, pushing my body physically, pushing my mind, going a little too far in spaces, I’ve realised that joy is a huge part of it.”
But the actual weight gain and loss, he said, was what people were really interested in. “People always say, ‘I’ve heard you’re very committed to your roles, you’ve lost weight’, which seems to be some, like, magical, extraordinary thing ... people just love talking about the physical part of it. ‘What did you do to get in shape for this thing? What did you eat?’”
In new sci-fi thriller Life, he plays an astronaut — and spent days on set attached to wires. He said: “It was very fun to do physically. In terms of the emotional world, in terms of conjuring dance as a career independent of financial circumstances or background”. She said it “will allow a greater engagement with young people who don’t get access to dance classes”.
The bespoke centre will let the school take more students and include accommodation, studios, a theatre and feelings up while floating on wires, it proved to be a little more difficult than I thought it was.”
Gyllenhaal spoke about a conversation he had with Barack Obama in the White House in which the then-president asked him to “bring some levity or joy” to difficult times in the US. However, he refused to add his name to public rancour against Donald Trump.
He said: “I’m a wealthy white male and right now what’s important is not what I think. But I will say I don’t like it when people say, ‘You shouldn’t hear what an actor has to say about something, let the politicians talk,’ because the irony is we have elected a celebrity as a president, so that doesn’t work any more.”
Read the full interview in Esquire’s April 2017 issue, on sale now. Also available as a digital edition. a health centre. Director Heidi Hall said it would “provide world-class facilities to match our students’ ambition”. She added: “We will have space to grow, to nurture creativity, to inspire partnerships and to encourage the local community to experience our passion for dance.”