Little by little, he has acquired the reputation as a sure bet in cinema. By choosing wisely, Jake Gyllenhaal continues to take on more increasingly ambitious roles. He has earned several Oscar nominations for roles such as a cowboy discovering his homosexuality in Brokeback Mountain, a detective in Prisoners and most recently as a freelance crime journalist in Nightcrawler. Previously present in Cannes In Competition along with David Fincher for the film Zodiac (2007), the actor has returned this year as a member of the Feature Films Jury presided over by the Coen brothers.
How do you consider your role as a member of the Jury this year ? Do you appreciate a film with your head or with your heart?
From the very start, the Coen Brothers said to us that the most important thing is to be positive. If you allow yourself too much power, you start to judge. I think I am here to be guided rather than just express an opinion; I want to learn from people who are wiser than I am.
The first photo that the world saw of Jake Gyllenhaal in Southpaw (out July 24) made the actor look like an entirely different person than the man last seen as a rail-thin psychopath in Nightcrawler. Bruises had replaced the dark circles on the Golden Globe nominee’s face, and every other inch of him was tatted, ripped, and muscular. This wasn’t Lou Bloom. This was light heavyweight champion Billy Hope.
Whether he’s playing a sociopathic stringer, a gay cowboy or a boy in a bubble, Jake Gyllenhaal has wowed us on the big screen for decades—but the Oscar nominee really surprised us when he made his off-Broadway debut in 2012, playing a supporting role in Nick Payne’s If There Is I Haven’t Found It Yet. He must have had a blast, because he’s back on the New York theater scene, making his Broadway debut in another Payne drama: Constellations, opposite The Affair star Ruth Wilson. In the ethereal British import, Gyllenhaal plays Roland, a beekeeper who meets Marianne (Wilson) at a barbecue, unleashing a myriad of infinite possibilities. Gyllenhaal recently chatted with Broadway.com about his “beast” co-star, why he wants to put a beehive on the roof of the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre and more.
Former teen heartthrob Jake Gyllenhaal has, as of late, been favoring violent character studies over broad studio fare like “Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time” and “Love & Other Drugs.” Following intense, acclaimed performances in “End of Watch,” “Enemy” and last year’s hit thriller “Prisoners,” Gyllenhaal turned in what is arguably his best and darkest performance in this year’s “Nightcrawler.”
