If Sean Penn were only an indisputably great movie actor, that would be OK. But his humanitarian efforts, and struggles with his own humanity, make him as fascinating off screen as on.
The word ‘statuesque’ is used to describe a certain kind of movie star, but to Sean Penn it applies in a very different way. Thick upper arms, which look as if they have been sculpted, curve out of his T-shirt. Lines of his face like sharp stones. Eyes of marble frozen in a gaze. The only sign of life is the American Spirit cigarette, on which Penn drags repeatedly, in flagrant violation of the smoking ban at the illustrious Carlton Hotel in Cannes.
Every cinemagoer knows what strength lies within. It can take on the most varied of forms: the bitter avenger, as in Mystic River, for which the 51-year-old won his first Oscar; the campaigning liberator, as in Milk, which brought him Oscar number two; or the bizarre, as in his latest film, This Must Be the Place, in which he plays a washed-up former rock star, a mixture of Robert Smith and Ozzy Osbourne, flitting round Ireland and the USA. Ask Penn where this energy comes from, and he won’t say.
“I have no interest in analysing myself,” he says, laconically, in a tone that makes it sound like he’s gurgling pebbles. Penn’s voice and gaze then trail off into the ether, before he decides to give insight after all. “I admit that I’ve always been driven by some sort of anger. An anger which is completely undeserved. I wouldn’t recommend it as a source of motivation, but it’s always worked for me.”
Sean’s mother was provocative and prickly towards her eldest son… Her reaction to his first appearance on stage was typical: “You’re awful. Give up now”
It’s anyone’s guess as to what he means by the word “undeserved”. There is good reason to assume that he might put his existential orientation down to the influence of his mother, Eileen, a former actress who gave up her career for the sake of her family and battled alcoholism for much of her life. She was, as she admitted, provocative and prickly towards her eldest son, who therefore spent his youth battling with her. Her reaction to his first appearance on stage was typical: “You’re awful. Give up now.”
Earlier girlfriends tried to get him to see a psychotherapist for his anger problems, but it came to nothing. His marriage to fellow actor Robin Wright, which ended in divorce in 2010, was a 14-year battle of wills between two partners who each gave as good as they got (as had been the case with Madonna, his first wife). When Wright is asked about Sean Penn now, she says: “I don’t think I need to say anything on the matter.”
How bearable is a life when you’re plagued by inner demons? It is no coincidence that Penn’s fourth and perhaps most personal work as a director, 2007’s Into The Wild, tells the story of the rise and fall of a dropout. The need to give up on, and move away from, the bourgeois way of life is his default existential setting.
“I feel it every day and always have done,” says Penn. “There have been times when I’ve dropped out in my own way and that gave me new strength and energy. I can thoroughly recommend it to everyone because you get a whole new kind of perspective on your life. And you should do it over and over again. It’s the healthiest of all the addictive behaviours.”
That said, Penn has yet to wander off into the solitude of nature. “The urge to leave everything behind isn’t as strong if you can make yourself useful, regardless of how you do it,” says Penn. “It’s only when you feel you’re counterproductive that there’s nowhere better than the wild.”
Read the full story in December's issue of The Red Bulletin.
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