Russell Crowe has stated that he has "mismanaged my relationship with Hollywood greatly" as he reflected on his career. The 62-year-old New Zealand-born actor broke through in Romper Stomper in 1992, before starring in L.A. Confidential and The Insider.
His credits include Gladiator, A Beautiful Mind, Cinderella Man and Nuremberg, earning him an Oscar, Bafta and two Golden Globes. Appearing at the Venice Film Festival for the premiere of his documentary What Love Builds, Crowe discussed his industry journey. He said: "I think I’ve made it pretty clear that I’ve mismanaged my relationship with Hollywood greatly, you know, but always to my benefit.
"It’s taken a long time actually for people to realise that I’m not American, you know, because in that first flush of success, people just made a huge assumption. I’m not driven by the same things that people who come necessarily from that culture are driven by. "My sense of humour has got me into trouble so many times because we like to call things as we see them where I come from.
And that’s not often, well, not always appreciated, shall we say?" Discussing script selection, the actor described how physical intuition guides his work choices. He added: "I have to do what becomes apparent to me as me needing to do. "I can read 100 scripts, but I’m only going to do the one that when I was reading it – and people, I don’t know why, but they always thought I was making this up, I’m not making it up – if I’m physically reading a script, and I start to feel it on my skin, even if I pre-decided I’m not doing this job, I don’t want to work with that guy or whatever, if I read that script, and I get that feeling, I have to do it.
"It’s like it becomes this thing where I’m connected to this. "I know now that this is important because it came up on my skin, so I need to do this. It’s not necessarily the right way to construct a career, but it’s the right way for me." New subscribers only. £9.99/mo. after free trial.
Plan auto-renews until cancelled. This revenue helps to fund journalism across The Independent. Written, directed and produced by Crowe, What Love Builds follows his musical work alongside acting, featuring the collective Indoor Garden Party and his band, The Gentlemen Barbers.
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