The film adaptation of Hedwig and the Angry Inch has such a cult following. What\u2019s been your most memorable interaction with a fan?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s interesting, Hedwig wasn\u2019t famous, it was a film that so many people found because a friend told them about it. So people don\u2019t come up to you because you\u2019re famous, it\u2019s because they were touched. The most intense interaction was when I was on the subway platform and a kid gave me a tiny piece of paper and hopped on a train. I opened it and it said, \u201cThank you. Hedwig saved my life\u201d. I don\u2019t know what happened \u2013 maybe they felt lonely and then the film made them feel like \u201cThere\u2019s other people for me out there\u201d.<\/p>\n
You recently starred in Oh, Mary! <\/a>on<\/a> Broadway<\/a> \u2013 doing eight shows a week \u2013 what was your post-show wind-down ritual?<\/p>\n I\u2019ve become a late-era pothead \u2013 just a night-time pothead \u2013 and there was a great comfort in coming home, after a long night making people laugh, to a nice bliss. Then I\u2019d settle down with an episode of The Wire. I watched it all over again for the first time since it came out \u2013 and it\u2019s still great.<\/p>\n You\u2019re bringing your Bowie song cycle, I\u2019m Afraid of Americans, to Australia. What\u2019s your favourite Bowie song, and why?<\/p>\n I keep coming back to Heroes: it\u2019s so unique and rousing, and so complex. It\u2019s not just heroic \u2013 he\u2019s like, \u201cI\u2019ll drink all the time\u201d, it\u2019s dark. It\u2019s inspired by him watching his producer, Tony Visconti, have an affair and kiss a woman under the Berlin Wall \u2013 that\u2019s where the lyrics came from. It\u2019s his most moving song.<\/p>\n In terms of song cycles, I would say Ziggy Stardust. One career regret that I cannot live down is that Bowie asked me to consider Ziggy Stardust for the stage and I said no. I\u2019d just finished a decade of Hedwig, which is a rock star on stage, and I couldn\u2019t take it any more. But later, I\u2019m like, \u201cWhy didn\u2019t I just fucking do it? It\u2019s David Bowie<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n John Cameron Mitchell as Hedwig in Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001). Photograph: New Line\/Allstar<\/p>\n You\u2019re also bringing your punk masterclass to Australia. Who is a contemporary punk icon that inspires you?<\/p>\n The entire population of Minneapolis who fought back [against ICE raids]. That\u2019s neo-punk: standing up to the so-called system for the right reason. Punk is not a hairstyle you saw on TikTok, it\u2019s a way of making things that has the same goals as leftist identity politics \u2013 harmony, empathy, justice \u2013 but the tactics are wildly different. These days our sensitivities, especially for young people \u2013 it\u2019s like, \u201cI don\u2019t want to see that. I\u2019m triggered\u201d. But punk is about facing the ugliness to get through it. The ugliness isn\u2019t the point \u2013 the original punks, like Sex Pistols and Patti Smith, were trying to get through the dark into something else.<\/p>\n What\u2019s one punk thing we can all do right now?<\/p>\n Turn off your phone. I think letting go of digital technology opens you up to your natural punk, to your natural self, whereas when we\u2019re mediated by this thing all the time it changes your attention span. When your attention span shrinks, you feel less empathy, and you get numbed out. How do you get back to your real self? Through punk, through music, through art \u2013 in my view. It was art that helped me. You\u2019ll feel better when you keep the phone as a tool to get to the IRL, not to be the IRL. And the more we get into fucking AI, you\u2019re not going to want to trust [your phone] anyway, so why not get off it now? It\u2019s punk to turn off your phone; you\u2019re walking away from the herd.<\/p>\n What\u2019s been your most cringe-worthy encounter with a celebrity?<\/p>\n I worked with Nicole Kidman on a couple of films, and we had a good working relationship, but it wasn\u2019t like a cuddly \u201clet\u2019s hang out\u201d relationship. And I don\u2019t know if that\u2019s her way; she seems socially a little bit nervous, you know? I think she\u2019s happier on a horse, on her farm. Anyway we were in her apartment in the West Village, and I had a CD recording for a certain scene I wanted her to hear \u2013 this is in the old days \u2013 and she didn\u2019t know where the CD player was. It was a white room, and we couldn\u2019t find the stereo, it was just a blank wall. Nicole and I were like, \u201cLet\u2019s hunt for it\u201d. And we were trying to trip the trigger that would open the stereo \u2013 our hands were all over the wall.<\/p>\n Were you stoned?<\/p>\n No, I wish I was! It was almost like a performance piece. Eventually she touched something and the CD player flipped out, and I played the song, and she\u2019s like, \u201cI like it\u201d and then I was off. Another one: I voiced a character in a 90s commercial for Dunkaroos, an Australian-themed cookie that you dip in frosting. I was Sydney the kangaroo, with a terrible Australian accent. So I said to Nicole, \u201cHey, how do you do your Dunkaroos?\u201d in the accent, and she\u2019s like, \u201cNo.\u201d That was cringe.<\/p>\n What\u2019s the strangest job you\u2019ve ever had?<\/p>\n Around the late 80s, I was a ticket cashier at a film festival where I was acting in three films that were in it, but had to pay the bills. My favourite job before acting was janitor for the military thrift shop in Albuquerque, New Mexico, because I could just take anything I wanted. And there were a lot of gay books \u2013 it was the 70s, so even the military had The Joy Of Gay Sex<\/a>. So I kind of learned about being gay from being a janitor and reading these books.<\/p>\n What\u2019s the most chaotic thing that\u2019s happened on stage?<\/p>\n Well, I did fall off the stage in Oh, Mary! I was being a good boy and picking up someone\u2019s prop in the dark, which made me rush and then fall off the stage in the dark into the audience. The lights came up, and I was climbing back on, and the audience applauded like, \u201cOh Mary, the drunk!\u201d Everyone [in the show] was horrified. I actually had a hairline fracture from that, but I went back two days later, because for me, the show must go on. I always get injured in shows. In Hedwig, my knee went out.<\/p>\n If you had to fight a famous person, who would it be and how would you fight them?<\/p>\n Right now, I\u2019d say Pete Hegseth. I\u2019d fight him with giant plastic hands \u2013 not to hurt him, just to slap him until he\u2019s silly. There\u2019s this sort of male peacocking that he does, that he somehow connects to Jesus, and how Jesus wants \u201clethality-maxxing\u201d or whatever Clavicular language he\u2019s using. He\u2019s an avatar of the manosphere, he\u2019s not real \u2013 he\u2019s just a collection of ticks of the worst of the worst of American manhood. And his deep lack of empathy seems to be a plus in the Elon Musk world. You know, I actually heard a Christian preacher talking about \u201cthe sin of empathy\u201d recently. This is America, we can change Christianity into whatever we want. It is fucked up, and it\u2019s repulsive. Having a British mother, and having lived in Britain and around the world, I don\u2019t feel as American as I used to.<\/p>\n I used to love the idea of America as a refuge: come on over; make your life here; we don\u2019t care where you\u2019re from. I love that. I grew up in the military, and that\u2019s the vibe in the US military. No one cares where you\u2019re from. Theatre<\/a> is the same way, and New Orleans, where I live, is the same type of thing. They don\u2019t care where you\u2019re from; it\u2019s like, \u201cWhat you got to bring to the party?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The film adaptation of Hedwig and the Angry Inch has such a cult following. 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