Michael Keaton says there are similarities between reporters and actors. The 64-year-old Birdman actor was talking about his role as investigative journalist Walter “Robbie” Robinson in Spotlight . The hard-hitting drama directed Tom McCarthy and starring Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams and Stanley Tucci explores the true story of The Boston Globe ’s investigation into child abuse by Catholic priests.
The film, with six Oscar nominations, including in the Best Picture category, will be released in India on February 19. Excerpts from an interview with Keaton and Robbie in London.
Michael, could you tell us about your working methods?
There is a responsibility first of all. In The Founder , I play Ray Kroc, who called himself the founder of McDonald’s. I also played James Angleton (chief of the Central Intelligence Agency’s counterintelligence staff from 1954 to 1975) in The Company . You research and you have to be responsible enough not to take advantage of people. But at the same time, your work is your work.
You are also limited by what is and what isn’t. Robbie does play golf, he does have a sister… You have all the information. But you have to be accurate, especially in this case. The facts are the facts, which I think makes the job easier. There is a kind of freedom in that.
What did the research entail?
We just talked. To me, Robbie had an interesting background as a person so I was already interested.
I can be a really curious person to the point where it probably annoys people. I wanted to know how he covered certain campaigns, or the White House.
Usually I do a back story for a character which I create. I even did it with him a little bit. I set it down. You take his essence, and then there is part of you in it.
Was having Robbie on set a good thing?
It was really nice to have him on set. Sometimes I would tell him to say a particular word for me so that I could pronounce it correctly and that would remind me of a whole bunch of other things. It wouldn’t be just that one word, but all these other things that would fall into place. And I would remember how he typed and how he wore his glasses, how things looked… We kind of became reporters. I know it sounds pretentious. But you kind of are a reporter anyway if you are an actor. You need to be curious, you need to find and gather information and present it to people.
So life imitates art…
Weird how these things happen because sometimes Mark (Ruffalo) would be goofing around and we would be ready for the shot and I would do a Robbie on him.
On the first day of shooting Clean and Sober , I was supposed to be hung over, having done a lot of coke the night before. I really prepared for a long time to find out what an addict is like blah, blah, blah… Once the camera began to roll, my nose started to run — just gushing like I’ve been doing cocaine for years! It is so, so mysterious to me.
What attracted you to the project?
Keaton: I wanted to do the film because of the really good script, director and cast. I also wanted to do it because this interests me. The film says, here is what is going on in the world.
Robbie: One thing I think will happen is that journalism students or people who want to be journalists would be inspired by the film. The stories we did got a lot of attention back in 2002 and 2003.
The power of this film is increasing public consciousness not just about the sexual abuse of children by priests but also quality journalism and the possibilities of that.
What do you think is the future of quality journalism?
Robbie: Grim. I haven’t talked to a reporter yet whose news organization hasn’t been to one degree or another hollowed out by economics.
This morning I was talking to a reporter from The Times in London. There were 42 reporters when he was there 20 years ago and now there are eight. There are so many examples of that sort of thing in the United States. Even the Boston Globe , where we are relatively better off than most major papers, we had 550 people in the newsroom 10, 12 years ago when we were doing these stories. We are now down to 350. Many major papers of our size are below 200. So the issue in many communities is there is no watchdog journalism. There is no investigative reporting and papers don’t even cover City Hall. So if the mayor is corrupt, and there is a whistle-blower, who is he going to talk to?
Have tweets, blogs and social media contributed to this?
Robbie: So much of what is being reported is being re-circulated right? And so the amount of original reporting has gone way down.
Keaton: …Or cherry-picked. You go ‘there’s an opening here for me and I’m in a position to grab a really good story’.
I think what is happening, stuff is being cherry-picked which may or may not be holding any truth. You go ‘Oh here is something I can get eyeballs on or there is something I could get likes… it is flashy, right?
Robbie: One thing we hope, which is why we reporters are here, is this film and the extraordinarily powerful acting by Michael and the other members of the cast can help focus public attention on the need and the importance of journalism.
Has investigative reporting decreased because of the lack of funding or because there isn’t interest?
Robbie: It is a combination of both. Editors, at least in American newspapers, have been pretty stupid.
Whenever you do a readership survey, and you ask people who read daily newspapers about what is important to them, the highest on the list almost always is investigative reporting. Or reporting that holds public institutions responsible.
But it is expensive to do that kind of reporting and is the first thing that editors cut. This causes a vicious circle because you cut reporting and you lose readers so you have to make more cuts so you cut more reporting.
So eventually what are you running?
