Willem Dafoe Biography | Willem Dafoe Bio | Willem Dafoe Wisconsin
William James Dafoe best known as Willem Dafoe is an American actor born on July 22nd, 1955 in Appleton, Wisconsin. He is one of the 8 children born by Muriel Isabel and Dr William Alfred Dafoe.
He is of German, English, Irish and French descent. He attended the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and studied drama but after one and a half year, he joined the experimental theater company, Theater X in Milwaukee but he then moved to New York City in 1976.
He began his career in 1979 when he was in the supporting role in Heaven’s Gate, a film by Michael Cimino. He then went on to star in 1982 in The Loveless as a leader of an outlaw motorcycle club. In 1983, he had a short time appearance in The Hunger before he went on to play the leader of a biker game in 1984 in the movie, Streets of Fire.
Willem Dafoe Age
He was born on July 22nd, 1955 in Appleton, Wisconsin. He is 63 years old as of 2018.
willem dafoeWillem Dafoe Wife
He had a relationship with Elizabeth LeCompte, a director at The Performance Group. They had a son together who was born in 1982. On March 25th, 2005, he married Glade Colagrande, actor and screenwriter. The two met at the premier of her film and he took her out for lunch and asked her if she would marry him the following day. They got married in an afternoon.
Willem Dafoe Son
He has a son, Jack Dafoe, who was born in 1982.
Willem Dafoe Brother
He has a brother, Donald Dafoe, and is a transplant surgeon and researcher.
Willem Dafoe Height
He is 1.75 M tall.
Willem Dafoe Net Worth
He has an estimated net worth of $ 40 million.
Willem Dafoe Movies | Willem Dafoe Movie List | Willem Dafoe New Movie | Willem Dafoe Films | Willem Dafoe Video Game | Willem Dafoe Latest Movie
Movies
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1980 | Heaven’s Gate | Willy | Uncredited |
| 1982 | The Loveless | Vance | |
| 1983 | The Hunger | Youth in Phone Booth | |
| 1984 | New York Nights | Punk Boyfriend | |
| Streets of Fire | Raven Shaddock | ||
| 1985 | Roadhouse 66 | Johnny Harte | |
| To Live and Die in L.A. | Erick “Rick” Masters | ||
| 1986 | Platoon | Sergeant Gordon Elias | |
| 1987 | Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam | Elephant Grass (voice) | Documentary |
| 1988 | Off Limits | Buck McGriff | |
| The Last Temptation of Christ | Jesus of Nazareth | ||
| Mississippi Burning | Agent Alan Ward | ||
| 1989 | Triumph of the Spirit | Salamo Arouch | |
| Born on the Fourth of July | Charlie | ||
| 1990 | Cry-Baby | Hateful Guard | |
| Wild at Heart | Bobby Peru | ||
| 1991 | Flight of the Intruder | Lt. Cmdr. Virgil “Tiger” Cole | |
| 1992 | Light Sleeper | John LeTour | |
| White Sands | Deputy Sheriff Ray Dolezal | ||
| 1993 | Body of Evidence | Frank Dulaney | |
| Faraway, So Close! | Emit Flesti | ||
| 1994 | Tom & Viv | T. S. Eliot | |
| Clear and Present Danger | John Clark | ||
| 1995 | The Night and the Moment | The Writer | |
| 1996 | Victory | Axel Heyst | |
| Basquiat | The Electrician | ||
| The English Patient | David Caravaggio | ||
| 1997 | Speed 2: Cruise Control | John Geiger | |
| Affliction | Rolfe Whitehouse | ||
| 1998 | Lulu on the Bridge | Dr. Van Horn | |
| New Rose Hotel | X | ||
| 1999 | Existenz | Gas | |
| The Boondock Saints | Agent Paul Smecker | ||
| 2000 | American Psycho/td> | Donald Kimball | |
| Animal Factory | Earl Copen | ||
| Shadow of the Vampire | Max Schreck | ||
| Bullfighter | Father Ramirez | ||
| 2001 | Pavilion of Women | Father Andre | |
| Edges of the Lord | Priest | ||
| 2002 | Spider-Man | Norman Osborn / Green Goblin | |
| Auto Focus | John Henry Carpenter> | ||
| 2003 | Finding Nemo< | Gill (voice) | |
| Once Upon a Time in Mexico | Armando Barillo | ||
| The Reckoning | Martin | ||
| 2004 | The Clearing | Arnold Mack | |
| Spider-Man 2 | Green Goblin / Norman Osborn | ||
| Jiminy Glick in Lalawood | Himself | ||
| The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou | Klaus Daimler | ||
| Control | Dr. Michael Copeland | ||
| Final Cut: The Making and Unmaking of Heaven’s Gate | Narrator (voice) | Documentary | |
| The Aviator | Roland Sweet | ||
| 2005 | XXX: State of the Union | General George Deckert | |
| Manderlay | Mr. Mulligan | ||
| Before It Had a Name | Leslie | Also co-writer | |
| Ripley Under Ground | Neil Murchison | ||
| 2006 | American Dreamz | Chief of Staff | |
| Inside Man | Captain John Darius | ||
| Paris, je t’aime | The Cowboy | Segment: “Place des Victoires” | |
| 2007 | The Walker | Larry Lockner | |
| Mr. Bean’s Holiday | Carson Clay | ||
| Spider-Man 3 | Norman Osborn / Green Goblin | Cameo | |
| Tales from Earthsea | Cob (voice) | English dub | |
| Go Go Tales | Ray Ruby | ||
| The Procedure | Christopher | Short film | |
| Anamorph | Stan Aubrey | ||
| 2008 | Fireflies in the Garden | Charles Waechter | |
| Adam Resurrected | Commandant Klein | ||
| The Dust of Time | A | ||
| 2009 | Antichrist | He / The Fox | |
| Affaire Farewell | Feeney | ||
| My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done? | Detective Havenhurst | ||
| Daybreakers | Lionel “Elvis” Cormac | ||
| Fantastic Mr. Fox | Rat (voice) | ||
| The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day | Paul Smecker | Uncredited cameo | |
| Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant | Gavner Purl | ||
| 2010 | Miral | Eddie | |
| A Woman | Max Oliver | ||
| 2011 | 4:44 Last Day on Earth | Cisco | |
| The Hunter | Martin David | ||
| 2012 | John Carter | Tars Tarkas (voice) | |
| Tomorrow You’re Gone | The Buddha | ||
| 2013 | Odd Thomas | Wyatt Porter | |
| Saving Norman | Lionel Pembrooke | Short film | |
| The Smile Man | Willem | Short film | |
| Love’s Routine | Barry | Short film | |
| Out of the Furnace | John Petty | ||
| Nymphomaniac | L | ||
| The Benaki Museum | Antonis Benakis (voice) | Short film | |
| 2014 | A Most Wanted Man | Tommy Brue | |
| The Grand Budapest Hotel | J.G. Jopling | ||
| Bad Country | Bud Carter | ||
| The Fault in Our Stars | Peter Van Houten | ||
| Pasolini | Pier Paolo Pasolini | ||
| John Wick | Marcus | ||
| 2015 | My Hindu Friend | Diego Fairman | |
| 2016 | Mind the Gap | Himself | Short film |
| Dog Eat Dog | Mad Dog | ||
| Finding Dory | Gill (voice) | Cameo | |
| A Family Man | Ed Blackridge | ||
| Sculpt | Unknown | ||
| The Great Wall | Ballard | ||
| 2017 | Do Donkeys Act? | Narrator (voice) | Documentary |
| The Florida Project | Bobby Hicks | ||
| What Happened to Monday | Terrence Settman | ||
| Mountain | Narrator (voice) | Documentary | |
| Death Note | Ryuk (voice) | Also motion capture | |
| Murder on the Orient Express | Gerhard Hardman | ||
| Opus Zero | Paul | ||
| 2018 | At Eternity’s Gate | Vincent van Gogh | |
| Vox Lux | Narrator (voice) | ||
| Aquaman | Nuidis Vulko | ||
| 2019 | Manou the Swift | (voice) | Post-production |
| Motherless Brooklyn | Paul Randolph | Post-production | |
| The Lighthouse | Old | Post-production | |
| The Last Thing He Wanted | Richard McMahon | Post-production | |
| TBA | The French Dispatch | Filming |
TV Shows
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1986 | The Hitchhiker | Jeffrey Hunt | Episode: “Ghostwriter” |
| 1991 | Fishing with John | Himself | Segment: “Ice Fishing in Northern Maine” |
| 1997, 2014 | The Simpsons | The Commandant, Mr. Lassen (voices) | 2 episodes |
| 2010 | American Experience | Narrator (voice) | Episode: “Into the Deep: America, Whaling & the World” |
| 2017 | Piigs | Narrator (voice) | Documentary |
Video Games
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2002 | Spider-Man | Norman Osborn / Green Goblin | |
| 2003 | Finding Nemo | Gill | |
| James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing | Nikolai Diavolo | Also Likeness | |
| 2013 | Beyond: Two Souls | Nathan Dawkins | Also motion capture |
Willem Dafoe Vietnam Movies | Willem Dafoe Vietnam
Here is a list of Vietnam movie;
- Platoon
- Born on the Fourth of July
- Off Limits 1988
- Flight of the Intruder
- Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam
Willem Dafoe Joker | Willem Dafoe The Joker | Willem Dafoe Batman
He was briefly considered to play the role of the super-villain, the Joker in the film,Batman (1989), directed by Tim Burton, Sam Hamm, as screenwriter noticed physical similarities, but was never offered the part. The role eventually went to Jack Nicholson.
Willem Dafoe Spider Man | Willem Dafoe Green Goblin
He played the character role of Green Goblin / Norman Osborn in Spider Man, Spider Man 2 and Spider Man 3. Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) and M.J. (Kirsten Dunst) seem to finally be on the right track in their complicated relationship, but trouble looms for the superhero and his lover.
Peter’s Spider-Man suit turns black and takes control of him, not only giving Peter enhanced power but also bringing out the dark side of his personality. Peter must overcome the suit’s influence as two supervillains, Sandman and Venom, rise up to destroy him and all those he holds dear.
Initial release: 16 April 2007 (Tokyo)
Director: Sam Raimi
Box office: 890.9 million USD
Budget: 250 million USD
Music composed by: Christopher Young, Danny Elfman, Deborah Lurie
Willem Dafoe Van Gogh | Willem Dafoe At Eternity’s Gate
He portrayed Vincent van Gogh in the 2017 movie, At Eternity’s Gate. Famed but tormented artist Vincent van Gogh spends his final years in Arles, France, painting masterworks of the natural world that surrounds him.
Initial release: 3 September 2018
Director: Julian Schnabel
Box office: 5 million USD
Cinematography: Benoît Delhomme
Willem Dafoe Jesus
He portrayed Jesus of Nazareth in the Bible movie, The Last Temptation of Christ. Jesus (Willem Dafoe), a humble Judean carpenter beginning to see that he is the son of God, is drawn into revolutionary action against the Roman occupiers by Judas (Harvey Keitel) — despite his protestations that love, not violence, is the path to salvation. The burden of being the savior of mankind torments Jesus throughout his life, leading him to doubt. As he is put to death on the cross, Jesus is tempted by visions of an ordinary life married to Mary Magdalene (Barbara Hershey).
Initial release: 12 August 1988 (USA)
Director: Martin Scorsese
Box office: 8.9 million USD
Budget: 7 million USD
Willem Dafoe Justice League
His role as Atlantean scientist Nuidis Vulko was deleted in the movie, Justice League that was directed by Zack Snyder.
Willem Dafoe Aquaman
In 2018, he was in the movie, Aquaman where he portrayed Nuidis Vulko. Once home to the most advanced civilization on Earth, the city of Atlantis is now an underwater kingdom ruled by the power-hungry King Orm. With a vast army at his disposal, Orm plans to conquer the remaining oceanic people — and then the surface world.
Standing in his way is Aquaman, Orm’s half-human, half-Atlantean brother and true heir to the throne. With help from royal counselor Vulko, Aquaman must retrieve the legendary Trident of Atlan and embrace his destiny as protector of the deep.
Initial release: 7 December 2018 (China)
Director: James Wan
Budget: $160–200 million
Production companies: Warner Bros., DC Entertainment Inc, Cruel and Unusual Films, DC Films, The Safran Company
Producers: Peter Safran, Rob Cowan
Willem Dafoe Death Note | Willem Dafoe Ryuk | Willem Dafoe Netflix
He voiced the character Ryuk in this motion picture movie. A high school student discovers a supernatural notebook that has deadly powers. He can kill anyone he wishes simply by inscribing their name within its pages. Intoxicated with his new power, he begins to eliminate those he deems unworthy of life.
Initial release: 20 July 2017
Director: Adam Wingard
Budget: 40 million USD
Story by: Tsugumi Ohba, Takeshi Obata
Producers: Masi Oka, Roy Lee, Dan Lin, Jason Hoffs, Ted Sarandos
Willem Dafoe Florida Project
He was Bobby Hicks in this 2017 movie. Warm, winning, and gloriously alive, Sean Baker’s The Florida Project is a deeply moving and unforgettably poignant look at childhood. Set on a stretch of highway just outside the imagined utopia of Disney World, The Florida Project follows six-year-old Moonee (Brooklynn Prince in a stunning breakout turn) and her rebellious mother Halley (Bria Vinai, another major discovery) over the course of a single summer.
The two live week to week at “The Magic Castle,” a budget hotel managed by Bobby (a career-best Willem Dafoe), whose stern exterior hides a deep reservoir of kindness and compassion. Despite her harsh surroundings, the precocious and ebullient Moonee has no trouble making each day a celebration of life, her endless afternoons overflowing with mischief and grand adventure as she and her ragtag playmates—including Jancey, a new arrival to the area who quickly becomes Moon’s best friend—fearlessly explore the utterly unique world into which they’ve been thrown.
Unbeknownst to Moonee, however, her delicate fantasy is supported by the toil and sacrifice of Halley, who is forced to explore increasingly dangerous possibilities in order to provide for her daughter.
Initial release: 5 October 2017 (USA)
Director: Sean Baker
Budget: 2 million USD
Willem Dafoe Hunter | Willem Dafoe The Hunter
He portrayed Martin David in this 2011 movie. A shadowy corporation sends a mercenary (Willem Dafoe) to Tasmania to track down a nearly extinct tiger whose genetic code holds the secret to a dangerous weapon.
Initial release: 6 October 2011 (Australia)
Director: Daniel Nettheim
Story by: Julia Leigh
Producer: Vincent Sheehan
Awards: AACTA Award for Best Original Music Score, AACTA Award for Best Cinematography
Willem Dafoe Streets of Fire
In 1984, he portrayed Raven Shaddock in this movie. Raven Shaddock (Willem Dafoe), along with his gang of merciless biker friends, kidnaps rock singer Ellen Aim (Diane Lane). Ellen’s former lover, soldier-for-hire Tom Cody (Michael Paré), happens to be passing through town on a visit.
In an attempt to save his star act, Ellen’s manager, Billy Fish (Rick Moranis), hires Tom to rescue Ellen. Billy and Tom, along with former soldier McCoy (Amy Madigan), battle through dangerous cityscapes, determined to get Ellen back.
Initial release: 15 December 1984 (South Korea)
Director: Walter Hill
Music composed by: Ry Cooder
Box office: 8.1 million USD
Willem Dafoe Finding Nemo
He voiced the character Gill in this 2003 animated movie. Marlin (Albert Brooks), a clown fish, is overly cautious with his son, Nemo (Alexander Gould), who has a foreshortened fin. When Nemo swims too close to the surface to prove himself, he is caught by a diver, and horrified Marlin must set out to find him.
A blue reef fish named Dory (Ellen DeGeneres) — who has a really short memory — joins Marlin and complicates the encounters with sharks, jellyfish, and a host of ocean dangers. Meanwhile, Nemo plots his escape from a dentist’s fish tank.
Initial release: 30 May 2003 (Canada)
Directors: Andrew Stanton, Lee Unkrich
Featured song: Finding Nemo: Nemo Egg (main title)
Father: marlin
Willem Dafoe John Wick
He was Marcus in this 2014 movie. John Wick is an American media franchise which consists of action thriller films created by Derek Kolstad and directed by Chad Stahelski. The first film also included David Leitch as an uncredited co-director. Keanu Reeves stars as the eponymous character, a retired but deadly hitman seeking vengeance.
Creator: Derek Kolstad
Original work: John Wick (2014)
Characters: Cassian, Bowery King, Ms. Perkins, Santino D’Antonio, MORE
Directors: Chad Stahelski, David Leitch
Production companies: Lionsgate, Legendary Entertainment, Summit Entertainment, Thunder Road Pictures
Willem Dafoe Wild at Heart
He played the character role of Bobby Peru in this movie. After serving prison time for a self-defense killing, Sailor Ripley (Nicolas Cage) reunites with girlfriend Lula Fortune (Laura Dern). Lula’s mother, Marietta (Diane Ladd), desperate to keep them apart, hires a hit man to kill Sailor.
But he finds a whole new set of troubles when he and Bobby Peru (Willem Dafoe), an old buddy who’s also out to get Sailor, try to rob a store. When Sailor lands in jail yet again, the young lovers appear further than ever from the shared life they covet.
Initial release: 17 August 1990 (USA)
Director: David Lynch
Featured song: Love Me Tender
Screenplay: David Lynch
Awards: Palme d’Or, Independent Spirit Award for Best Cinematography, NME Award for Best Film
Willem Dafoe Mississippi Burning
He played the role of Agent Alan Ward in this 1988 movie. When a group of civil rights workers goes missing in a small Mississippi town, FBI agents Alan Ward (Willem Dafoe) and Rupert Anderson (Gene Hackman) are sent in to investigate.
Local authorities refuse to cooperate with them, and the African American community is afraid to, precipitating a clash between the two agents over strategy. As the situation becomes more volatile, the direct approach is abandoned in favor of more aggressive, hard-line tactics.
Initial release: 2 December 1988 (USA)
Director: Alan Parker
Screenplay: Chris Gerolmo
Willem Dafoe Shadow of The Vampire
He portrayed Max Schreck in this 2000 movie. F. W. Murnau (John Malkovich) is struggling to create his silent classic “Nosferatu” on location in Eastern Europe. The director is obsessed with making this the most authentic vampire movie ever.
To that end, Murnau has employed a real vampire, Max Schreck (Willem Dafoe), explaining to the crew that he is the ultimate of that new breed, the “method actor” — trained by Stanislavsky himself. Schreck will appear only in character and only at night.
Initial release: 25 January 2001 (Australia)
Director: E. Elias Merhige
Budget: 8 million USD
Willem Dafoe The Fault In Our Stars
In 2014, he portrayed Peter Van Houten in this movie. Hazel Grace Lancaster (Shailene Woodley), a 16-year-old cancer patient, meets and falls in love with Gus Waters (Ansel Elgort), a similarly afflicted teen from her cancer support group.
Hazel feels that Gus really understands her. They both share the same acerbic wit and a love of books, especially Grace’s touchstone, “An Imperial Affliction” by Peter Van Houten. When Gus scores an invitation to meet the reclusive author, he and Hazel embark on the adventure of their brief lives.
Initial release: 2 June 2014 (New York City)
Director: Josh Boone
Featured song: All of the Stars
Budget: : $12 million (gross); $8.5 million (net);
Willem Dafoe The Loveless
He was Vance in 1982 in this movie. In the 1950s, a rich Southerner falls in love with a biker who’s on his way to the Daytona racetracks.
Initial release: March 1982 (USA)
Directors: Kathryn Bigelow, Monty Montgomery
Music composed by: Robert Gordon
Initial DVD release: 16 November 2004
Screenplay: Kathryn Bigelow, Monty Montgomery
Willem Dafoe Platoon | Willem Dafoe War Movie
In 1986, he played the character role of Sergeant Gordon Elias in this movie. Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen) leaves his university studies to enlist in combat duty in Vietnam in 1967. Once he’s on the ground in the middle of battle, his idealism fades.
Infighting in his unit between Staff Sergeant Barnes (Tom Berenger), who believes nearby villagers are harboring Viet Cong soldiers, and Sergeant Elias (Willem Dafoe), who has a more sympathetic view of the locals, ends up pitting the soldiers against each other as well as against the enemy.
Initial release: 19 December 1986 (Los Angeles)
Director: Oliver Stone
Screenplay: Oliver Stone
Music composed by: Samuel Barber, Georges Delerue
Willem Dafoe Oscar
He has been nominated in 3 Oscar Awards;
- 2018: Best Supporting Actor in the movie, The Florida Project
- 2001: Best Supporting Actor in the movie, Shadow of the Vampire
- 1987: Best Supporting Actor in the movie, The Platoon
Willem Dafoe Twitter
Willem Dafoe Interview | Willem Dafoe Interview Aquaman
Willem Dafoe NEWS
Willem Dafoe: ‘With success come certain things that corrupt you’
Source; theguardian.com
You can’t confuse Willem Dafoe with another actor. That red hair, those fierce eyes, the gaunt cheekbones that make him look hungry for the next intense role – whether it’s as Jesus, the Green Goblin or a motel manager in The Florida Project, the part that just scored him his third Oscar nomination. Even in a fine art museum, his face is still unique.
“I think maybe there’s some figures in a Bruegel painting or something that I thought, ‘Oh, that’s an ancestor of mine,’” Dafoe says. But in his new biopic, At Eternity’s Gate – the film that might get him his fourth Oscar nomination – artist-turned-director Julian Schnabel sticks a paintbrush in Dafoe’s hand and plasters a bandage over his ear and, suddenly, he’s the spitting image of Vincent Van Gogh.
“It never really occurred to me,” says Dafoe of the resemblance. Yet the connection is more than skin-deep. Van Gogh and Dafoe share a restless creativity. Van Gogh moved constantly, searching for inspiration in 20 cities before dying aged 37 of a gunshot wound in Auvers-sur-Oise. “I’d like to find a new light,” he insists in the film.
And Dafoe refuses to sit still. “Flexibility is important for an actor,” he says. “Otherwise corruption sets in. You get stuck in certain patterns, and a certain kind of performing language that keeps you from a kind of sense of discovery or danger or mystery.”
He has four films hitting US cinemas between this week and Christmas, and three more already in post-production for next year. “I’ve been apart from the world, working away on these little interior worlds,” says Dafoe. “Basically, I’m like a cloistered nun.”
Still, the director of Basquiat and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly wasn’t going to shellac Van Gogh in some staid biography of suffering for one’s art. At Eternity’s Gate’s Van Gogh is wily and unpredictable, as is the camerawork bringing him to life.
Schnabel shoves the audience inside the painter’s point of view, tramping across fields, staring down at his shoes, squinting at trees and faces so garish and distorted that his attempts to capture them in oils make sense. Schnabel shoots Dafoe from manic angles, somersaulting around him until the audience isn’t sure if the artist has both feet planted in sanity.
Van Gogh isn’t sure, either. When interrogated by a local priest, played by Mads Mikkelsen, who wants to know why he gave his severed ear to a sex worker, Van Gogh has a calm defence: it was meant for Paul Gauguin, played by Oscar Isaac. But when the priest questions his art – “God gave you a gift so you could paint this?” he sneers – a wounded Van Gogh counters: “Why would God give me a gift to paint ugly and disturbing things?”
“He felt like he was painting in a new way,” says Dafoe. In Van Gogh’s letters, which Schnabel used as the film’s foundation, the one thing he trusts is his own talent. “One of the things that changed for me in making this movie was the joyous part of him that we don’t see. He’s usually depicted as the poster boy for the tortured artists, but I would definitely say he’s a hopeful character,” says Dafoe. “History lies!” he laughs.
Dafoe has never hero-worshipped artistic suffering. “I’m not one of those guys that had a picture of Marlon Brando on his wall when I was a kid,” he says. That would have been particularly weird in Appleton, Wisconsin, where Dafoe grew up. His father was a doctor. His mother, a nurse, and most of his seven siblings followed suit.
“I was just a dopey kid that loved being in plays,” says Dafoe, “but I thought that was something that would pass, and one day I’d grow up and become an adult. It’s only after you’ve been working for a while that you say, ‘Well, I guess I’m an actor.’ It sounds suspicious, it sounds like, what, was I asleep? But somewhere deeply, I always thought I’d do something else.”
But the man who would grow up to fake his own castration for Lars von Trier’s Antichrist was always pushing limits. For a class project in his senior year of high school, Dafoe filmed on-camera interviews with a pothead, a nudist and a satanist.
“Let’s just say they found some of the shooting a little too transgressive, so they locked me out of the editing room, told me to go home and expelled me from school.” He wound up leaving town altogether, first for a year and a half of drama school at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and then New York, where he joined the infamous Wooster Group, began dating its superstar director, Elizabeth LeCompte, and collided with the rest of the city’s wildest artists, including a young Julian Schnabel.
“It was a very exciting time, but also it was a time of struggle,” says Dafoe. The company’s groundbreaking adaptations of Chekhov and Shakespeare won major awards while the ticket sales barely covered their costs. “It was difficult to survive.”
Dafoe began landing film work – villain roles, mostly – until Oliver Stone and Martin Scorsese saw past his sharp features and gave him more empathic parts in Platoon and The Last Temptation of Christ. From there, Dafoe began to fill his career with whatever he found fascinating, be it erotic thrillers with Madonna and action films against Ice Cube, or Wes Anderson wundercabinets and Marvel flicks. He was one of the first actors to straddle superhero blockbusters and serious indies, and still gets asked about selling out.
“I’m not down with the idea of the poor unknown artist is the true artist,” he sighs. “But I do think that with success comes certain things that can corrupt you. That’s the oldest story in the book and I think you just have to be careful.”
An actor has a harder time assembling a defined body of work than a painter who controls every brush stroke. Onscreen, even an unusual creature such as Dafoe is still seen through his director’s choices. Line up his films in a gallery and it would be hard to spot the creative through-line except for the intensity of his performances.
“Look, it’s always on your mind: ‘Jack of all trades, master of none,’” he says. “To some people, I’m Willem Dafoe of Spider-Man movies. For other people, I’m Willem Dafoe of Lars von Trier. Those two worlds don’t always intersect in people’s minds.
“Actors are famously inarticulate about what we do because it’s mysterious work. Any time you really try to describe it, buzzers and lights go off in my head because of the lie-lie-lie-bullshit-bullshit- bullshit,” says Dafoe.
Kind of like that scene in At Eternity’s Gate when Van Gogh tries to explain his method of painting trees to a group of kids who pelt him with rocks. At least Dafoe has been rewarded with fantastic feedback while alive.
“I think you do need encouragement,” he says. “There are people that it wears down.” But he has been acting for longer than Van Gogh was alive – and still approaches each new film with the openness of a blank canvas.
“I like working from a place of zero and going towards something. Some people really respond to the idea of nailing it or executing it to perfection. I like perfection, I appreciate that. But I’m much better trying to find something than I am knowing something and executing and explaining it,” says Dafoe. “I think it’s the difference between a craftsman and an artist. I aspire to be an artist.”