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Jan Janssen

After celebrated performances in Star Wars, Girls and Marriage Story alongside fellow Hollywood star Scarlett Johansson, Emmy winner and Oscar nominee Adam Driver, who turns 37 on November 19, reflects on life as a US Marine and the unnaturalness of fame.
Shooting a movie has something in common with a military mission: you have to spend time with people you don’t know and there’s a forced kind of intimacy with that
Adam Driver
His role in Girls made him
“Within a short period of time, I was aware that people were very interested in the series. I was suddenly being recognised and having people come up to me on the street wanting to say hello or just talk about the show. I also noticed that a lot of my friends were treating me differently because they were very conscious of the success of Girls and how people were talking about it.
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“I’m very grateful for how it’s opened up new work for me and I’m trying to take advantage of every opportunity. I’m also very thankful to Lena Dunham who convinced me to take on the role when I wasn’t sure I was interested in doing TV. I’m glad she didn’t let me off the hook.”

Even though his career exploded after Star Wars, he will continue to do indie films
“I don’t have any plan other than to do interesting work. It doesn’t matter to me whether I work on big or small projects, and I always approach each film from the perspective of what the story has to offer. Sometimes a movie with a bigger budget will be telling a very intimate story or give you a chance to explore a character just as intensely as a low-budget film. I look at every project through the eyes of the character and what kind of meaning I can bring to the role.”
Being a US Marine has had an influence on his acting career
“Being a soldier influenced my approach to acting in terms of realising how the commitment of each member of a team is critical to the final result. After all, shooting a movie has something in common with a military mission: you have to spend time with people you don’t know and there’s a forced kind of intimacy with that.
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“There’s also another parallel in that on a film set, and in the military, you have a leader who stands above the others and directs. Everyone has a task and has to carry it out, otherwise you’re wasting time and energy and that can lead to the failure of the mission, which can be harmful or dangerous in the case of the military.
“I also think that my military training and the discipline that comes from it has been very helpful to me as an actor. It’s the way you learn to integrate yourself into a team and subordinate yourself to a bigger thing or goal. Nowhere more than in the military did I learn that joint effort is always more effective than going it alone. There’s a sense of community and shared purpose that is more important when it comes to making films than individual artistic self-fulfilment.”

He attended The Juilliard School after being discharged from the Marines
“It was a very different kind of world, but one thing I really benefited from was the sense of being very committed and fearless when it came to acting. I took it very seriously. I was able to use a lot of my experience observing people under stressful conditions and studying human behaviour during my military service, and I put that to effective use as an actor. It sharpens your senses and makes you very alert and aware of basic human emotions and how we relate to each other.”
He’s serious and determined on set
“I’m probably too involved with the work and I drive myself and sometimes the people around me crazy. I’m very hard on myself. I know I probably go too far sometimes, wanting to make every scene better and pushing myself and others further. I’m trying to be more relaxed and less intense because I know it’s just exhausting and that there are better ways to approach the work. It’s my military side overacting!”
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What interests him the most is the desire to work with great directors when it comes to choosing roles or projects
“The character is usually of secondary importance. I don’t care whether the story is very different from a previous film that I’ve done, or that the character is similar to previous ones that I’ve played. And if there is any pattern to my artistic choices, that’s come about unconsciously.
“Film is a director’s medium, so it’s only logical to want to shoot with the best directors. And that’s why it’s been very gratifying for me to work with incredible filmmakers like Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee, or Steven Soderbergh and Jim Jarmusch, whose work I’ve admired since I was growing up.”
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Fame hasn’t changed his way of working
“I don’t know if I’ll ever understand or be comfortable with fame because it’s – as you can imagine – an unnatural way of being in the world. It’s kind of antithetical to my job. My job as an actor is to live life and make mistakes and not worry so much about being analysed because you’re trying to get experience and internalise that experience, and maybe use it later, or maybe not.”
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Before Star Wars and Marriage Story, Adam Driver was a US Marine and his claim to Hollywood fame was through TV show Girls – interview

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Actor Adam Driver accepts the Best Actor Award for his performance in "Marriage Story," at the Independent Filmmaker Project's 29th Annual IFP Gotham Awards at Cipriani Wall Street, Monday, Dec. 2, 2019, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)

Scarlett Johansson, left, Azhy Robertson and Adam Driver in the movie "Marriage Story." (Wilson Webb/Netflix)

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Scarlett Johansson’s co-star and the Academy Award nominee talks about why he loved working with Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee, and why he’s thankful to Lena Dunham


‘I don’t know if I’ll ever understand or be comfortable with fame’: the Star Wars and Marriage Story star was a US Marine before his acting career, and often draws on his military past when filming


Before Star Wars and Marriage Story, Adam Driver was a US Marine and his claim to Hollywood fame was through TV show Girls – interview

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Scarlett Johansson’s co-star and the Academy Award nominee talks about why he loved working with Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee, and why he’s thankful to Lena Dunham

Scarlett Johansson’s co-star and the Academy Award nominee talks about why he loved working with Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee, and why he’s thankful to Lena Dunham