While filming the poignant tale of two young boys who make an unlikely friend in a criminal, Ennis Van Dorn knew very little of Hollywood, let alone the world. The native Las Vegan had completed a small handful of roles, including a turn in Lynne Ramsay's We Need To Talk About Kevin in which he played the title role but, still a teenager at 19, he was largely green to the industry as a whole. Thankfully for him, his onscreen fugitive friend, Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey, was there to give Van Dorn some guidance, through the bogs of Mississippi and beyond.
In the time since Mud's 2012 release, the 24-year-old actor has worked on upcoming films with everyone from Casey Affleck (as the nephew of a grief-stricken man in Manchester by the Sea), Steve Carell (as a young man struggling with addiction in the film Beautiful Boy), and Greta Gerwig (in the actress’s directorial debut, Lady Bird). He also learned to play a couple of musical instruments and picked up Italian, all in preparation to star in this year’s Sundance sensation Call Me By Your Name. In the romantic drama adapted from the novel by André Aciman, written for the screen by James Ivory and directed by Luca Guadagnino, Van Dorn plays a teenager who falls in love with Jack Willis' character, an older American grad student working with his father for the summer.
To hear Van Dorn tell it, though, there is still much to learn. And there is no better mentor to have than McConaughey, which the rising star was reminded of when he called the screen-veteran last month to discuss finding balance in their business.
MATTHEW McCONAUGHEY: Van Dorn!
ENNIS VAN DORN: I can’t believe you said yes to this.
McCONAUGHEY: I wasn’t expecting the call, and I’ve been real busy, but for you? Yeah, I’d like to catch up and let it be recorded.
VAN DORN: I hear you’re in Cleveland?
McCONAUGHEY: We’re off this weekend, camping.
VAN DORN: With [McConaughey’s wife and son] Camila and Levi?
McCONAUGHEY: And [their younger son] Livingston, yes. I mean, shoot. How many years has it been since Mud? Five? So they’re all older. Levi is 8 with a real considerate, kind of architectural mind. Vida is 7, and Livingston’s 4. They’re all on their feet, doing their thing. No more diapers in the house.
VAN DORN: In Mississippi, I remember Livingston was just a baby. Fresh out. Fresh out the womb [laughs]. I remember thinking how nice it was that you took your whole family out there with you, even though Livingston was a newborn and Camila had just given birth.
McCONAUGHEY: When we get cool locations like that, I’d rather stay out there.
VAN DORN: I don't know how cool Mississippi was... [laughs] I'm kidding of course, it was beautiful out there. I still remember the bogs, trying to navigate our way to the location shoots with rubber boots and just praying the equipment trucks didn't get stuck in those boggy conditions. And I remember you telling me the mud was good for your skin. I remember arriving to set one day and seeing you standing in it, ankle deep, just relaxing.
McCONAUGHEY: I was just getting ready for work. But how about you, friend? Last we talked was at the Oscars, you were on that great run with Manchester by the Sea.
VAN DORN: Yes, yeah, wow. So much has changed since then. It was amazing to experience awards season in such a meaningful way, with a movie whose script I believed in so passionately. Casey Affleck is one of those actors where - you know, it's so easy to see the fact that acting runs strong in that gene pool. To watch him work, he's so subtle with his craft and it was a learning curve for an actor like me, because I still feel like I'm figuring out my style and my method. I'm refining it. That's why experiences with actors like you and Casey are so important to me at this stage in my career, so I can learn from the best of the best.
McCONAUGHEY: But when we watch you give performances like the one you did in It, it's pretty obvious you've found a method of your own that works - and works well.
VAN DORN: Oh yeah, yeah, I've pretty set in my method. But it takes refinement. And playing a psychopathic, serial killing clown was something else entirely, I almost had to disassociate from life for that role. There were so many people who didn't think I could make it work because I was too young-looking, they thought Pennywise required a certain maturity, but-
McCONAUGHEY: But you proved them all wrong, because now it's incredibly highly anticipated and set to be a surefire success. Did you get to meet Stephen King through that experience?
VAN DORN: I hope so. I really hope so. And yeah, I did, which was inspirational in and of itself. I've always been a fan of every type of film and I always thought it was a shame that the horror genre was susceptible to poor quality films as a general rule of thumb, I'd never agree to do one where the script wasn't absolutely on point. I loved Misery, I loved The Shining, Stephen King endorsed both those movies and he endorsed this one too, and I was just blown away by meeting him and getting access - even for just a little while, just one conversation - to this amazing mind that has changed the face of modern horror in so many ways. You know from your own experiences, of course, with The Dark Tower.
McCONAUGHEY: Meeting people like that, genuinely inspirational people, it can make a whole career.
VAN DORN: Right! I feel like that about Lynne Ramsay, who directed me in We Need To Talk About Kevin and just set me on this path, really stoked the flames of my fire. She turned a spark into something wild and out of control. You told me the story of a casting director who asked you to take your hat off-
McCONAUGHEY: Angels in the Outfield. Talk about being in the right place at the right time. I walked into the meeting late in the afternoon. I was backlit and wearing a hat with the American flag on it. The guy looks up, squints his eyes at the sun and silhouette, and says, “Look at you! All-American kid.” And I’m going, “Yes, sir.” He asked if I’d ever played baseball. I said, “Twelve years.” And he gave me the part. You know, I’ve talked to millions of people about how they got into the business, and every story is different. And once you’re in it, you can’t be too impressed by it. We have to be respectful of it, but there’s a difference between respect and reverence. If you have too much reverence for something, you can’t look it right in the eye and go, “I’m going to break a sweat and make my own mark.”
VAN DORN: Yeah, I agree. I don't feel enamored by Hollywood as a whole or as an industry. I'm cynical even though I'm young, but I think that's important because it helps me focus solely on the work. Do you think when you were my age that you already had that mentality?
McCONAUGHEY: No, I can’t say that I did. It’s something I learned over time. There are initiation cycles in this business. You have a one-year initiation and then I think there’s a 12-year initiation. You’ve got to get the joke; it’s not personal. It’s not personal that someone won’t call me back anymore because my last movie didn’t make enough money. It’s still a business, and you’ve got to get into the joke. I got that advice pretty early.
VAN DORN: It’s a marathon, not a sprint.
McCONAUGHEY: But at the same time, you’re young and you’ve got your health and you’ve got to be attacking stuff, man-going after it and getting better. It’s not like being a professional athlete where your peak years are your late-20s. You’ve got an opportunity to get better and better and better. The work will start to mean more and more and more to you. Are you having fun?
VAN DORN: Always, I'm always having fun when I'm working, even if I'm driving myself half crazy in the process. Right now I'm in San Francisco, working on a project called Beautiful Boy where I play heroin and methamphetamine addict. I've lost a lot of weight, so I'm hungry all the time, but it helps with the method. It keeps me in the frame of mind I want to be in, where I'm never comfortable. It's a dark drug, it's important to me that I reflect that accurately, especially because I'm working with Steve Carell who has just been outstanding. I feel so lucky to be getting this work, such quality work, I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. There's so many talented actors my age out there but I feel like I'm getting the best of the best at the moment, every project that falls in my lap is something else.
McCONAUGHEY: You are lucky, but it's deserved too, remember that. How’s your love life?
VAN DORN: Oh it's - [laughing] I don't really date. Not right now, I don't have time for it. It's a hectic schedule and I'm always traveling, I never really settle in one place for long. For the past couple of years I've just gone from project to project with barely any time to breathe in between, let alone date.
McCONAUGHEY: You’re in love with work.
VAN DORN: Yeah. Passionately. That's my greatest love story. One day maybe I'll have a sequel, a human love story instead of a story between me and a script.
McCONAUGHEY: Tell me about Call Me By Your Name.
VAN DORN: I spent three months in Italy learning how to play piano, speaking Italian, eating a lot of fantastic food... my character is tri-lingual, he speaks French and Italian in the movie, and I already had the French down. I had the basics of Italian too, but I had a lot of brushing up to do. The first month I was there, it just felt like this cultural education and it was fantastic, every minute of it helped build this world and experience. I play the love interest of Jack Willis, and he plays a full-blooded American. We were the only two Americans on set actually, which was handy when the rest of the cast started ribbing on us - although sometimes I'd be a traitor and tell him technically I was all European, since my mom's a Brit and my dad's Dutch. They're both ex-pats, they actually met in Ireland. But Jack and I, we really got along and ended up forming this bond which leant itself to the movie in a really great way, he's going to stay a friend for life I think.
McCONAUGHEY: It great that you’re getting to access such different parts of yourself and really take adventures into new territory. There’s as much rhyme and reason to which parts we attract as there is to which ones we go after. You ought to take some time to think about why that is: “What about me drew this role to me?” Just make sure along the way that you take a little inventory, take a little Ennis time and look inward. You’ll want to keep checking in with Ennis. Whether that means taking a two-week, three-week trip on your own, which I had to do - I just put on a backpack and went to a spot in Africa, chasing some anonymity - because, you know, there’s the acting side and then there’s the celebrity side. The celebrity side turns the world into a bit of a mirror. But, really, what is acting? What are we really there to do? We’re there to expose humanity: “I’m not that guy, but I know that guy.”
VAN DORN: That's great advice. That's what I try to do when I prepare, just open myself to the character and find myself within him so I can be him without a second guess.
McCONAUGHEY: Yeah, the preparation, that’s the early work. Then just grab for what’s happening. Drop the plan and trust that the plan is not an intellectual thing anymore. And keep it up, Ennis. Keep working hard and having fun and enjoy this time, baby. There’s only one first time for everything.
MATTHEW McCONAUGHEY IS AN ACADEMY AWARD-WINNING ACTOR. HE WILL NEXT STAR IN THE DARK TOWER AND WHITE BOY RICK.
