Apple picker Steve Jobs. Ashton Kutcher. A pair that will probably be inextricably linked. A legend and its film representative. In an interview with Joshua Topolsky from the Internet show On The Verge, the actor talked about what led him to accept the role, about his relationship with modern technology or how things actually are with his Twitter.
Ashton, you are known for investing in cutting edge technology and startups. You seem genuinely interested. Where does it have its roots?
I studied biochemical engineering and sometime in 1997 we sold one program written in Fortran. I didn't even know email back then, I grew up on a farm. But I programmed. A professor of mine used to say that scientists discover problems and engineers solve them. And I liked that, I wanted to be someone who really solves problems.
I bounced back a bit to acting and modeling, but this taste never left me. I've always been the first to get new technology.
I had a production company when I was twenty. We saw that bitrates were increasing dramatically, so we wanted to get involved in digital video. That was about six years ago. We signed up with AOL and started creating video content for their AIM Instant Messenger.
Everyone used it back then.
Yes. We wanted to put a video on AIM that people would share with each other. Which was actually the same as how people share content today.
So that's when you started saying that it's not just something you like, but something that makes sense to invest energy into?
I was using it back then as a supplement to our production business and I gradually fell more and more into it. And then I also started investing in start-up projects.
What about your relationship with Twitter? For a long time you were his enthusiastic promoter and you were really heard a lot there. Then there were times when you didn't quite get it right on Twitter, and then you backed off.
I didn't back down.
But you canceled the account.
No. I'm just being careful now before I post anything on Twitter. I have certain people read it first so I don't write too lightly. People want forgiveness, but no one wants to forgive others. And when you make mistakes in public, it really shows a lot. And what do I get from Twitter? I don't make money there, it's not my life. So why would I write things there that destroy what I really live by? Why would I thoughtlessly write about something I see on TV and immediately have an opinion about it?
So now I consult with people on my team before I post anything.
And what did you get out of it two years ago? What was your relationship with Twitter then?
I used it a lot personally. I asked questions there, what do you think about this or that. But then it was not such a mass affair, there was only a group of people, eight hundred thousand, a million people, who were really interested in what I was doing and what I was doing. And they gave me good feedback.
I moved elsewhere. When I want to ask something, I go to Quora. It's not quite like a conversation, but if you want valuable feedback, it's a great place. I still post on Twitter, but no personal stuff.
There is one more thing about Twitter that not many people realize. When I go to a restaurant here in the city, when I leave, there will be a bunch of people waiting for me outside. How do they know? From Twitter. They can look up my name and find out where I am.
Let's go to your latest movie. jOBS. It might seem like a rather smug, vain move to say: I'm going to play Steve Jobs. This is true for any actor portraying a major historical figure. What were you thinking when you said "I'm going to be Steve Jobs?"
I played Steve in the movie, I'm not, I can't be Steve Jobs.
But for the purposes of the film, you have to get into that character.
The decision to take the role was quite difficult. I have many friends and colleagues who knew Steve, worked with him and cared about him. When I read the script, I thought that when you tell a person's story, you have to say good things and bad things about them. And Steve often did things that seemed irrational. And when I read it, I actually felt for him.
My first reaction was - if I play this, the people who knew him and worked with him are going to be upset. I had to balance the two things. And I also wanted to protect the legacy of a personality I admired.
Yes, he was an aggressive boss, but he also had almost 90 percent support from his employees. I imagined someone else playing him and not taking the time and effort to explore the character in detail. What he was like, why he was the way he was. What did he have to sacrifice to create the wonderful things we take for granted today. I almost felt the need to protect him. I thought that even if I messed it up completely, it would be better for someone who really liked and cared about him to screw it up.
So that's a special reason to take the role.
That was one. Second, it scared me. And most of the good things I did were the ones that scared me. When I felt that it was beyond my strength, but I went for it anyway.
Third, it was a chance to connect my interest in technology. And last but not least, how I perceive today's world. I feel it's important for people to create, to build things. Great stuff. And they put a lot of effort into it. I think the world needs that. And I wanted to tell a story about a guy who did that. Maybe I inspire other entrepreneurs to follow their dreams and improve the world for others.
How hard was it to be Jobs in that movie? My wife says you look so much alike. You look almost the same, you have the same way of walking, I don't know how you do it - but I never noticed until I saw the movie, but then I saw that it was exactly the way Steve walked. But what interests me is the voice. Steve had a distinctive voice, so did you. Did this play a role, did you change your voice in any way?
When I studied Steve, it had three phases. The first was information gathering. I read all the books about him that are available, listened to recordings, watched videos. I tried to understand him. Because I think that a lot of things that have come out about him are contradictory and you think: this just sounds strange.
The second step was to understand why he made the decisions he made. Why was he getting upset? Why was he sad? Why did he cry, why did he laugh?
I met a number of people who knew him very intimately. What is more important than being exactly like him – gestures, walk, appearance – is to capture the essence of why he did the things he did. And last but not least is the disguise: walking, dressing and so on.
I tried to find records, audio recordings, videos or photos of him where he was not in public. There were two Steves. This is what many people close to him told me. He was a man who stood on stage and spoke and presented. And then it was Steve in the meeting room, the product guy. A guy who had intimate conversations. And I tried to find the bits when he didn't realize someone was recording him. Or speeches that you thought no one would hear in the end. I hope I got a better picture of what he was really like, how he really walked and how he really talked. It wasn't easy to find.
Like the way he spoke. His father was from Wisconsin I think, his mother from northern California, so he was a combination of the two. I didn't catch his voice exactly, but I can imitate it. It's kind of a more open Midwestern licked accent, an open á. Jobs also messed around a little bit, which I also managed to learn.
I had about fifteen hours of his speeches recorded, which I listened to over and over again, and finally I started to hit the little things and his personality.
It is interesting. When Jobs spoke on stage, his voice sounded almost pleading, urgent, really intense.
He was just a salesman. If you look at him, how he presented, he was not so different from those well-known sellers. He was selling the product. He often paused and thought, said a lot of conjunctions and ... those were the moments when he thought about what he was going to say next.
What you really notice is that he spoke very slowly when he was in front of an audience.
Very slowly and very carefully. And he thought a lot about what he was going to say next.
It seemed very thought out, he seemed to be really in the picture.
He also had a lot of non-verbal cues. For example, when he was talking to someone, he would nod his head as if he was really listening. It made you feel noticed. Other times it was the other way around.
Author Štěpán Vorlíček
Source: TheVerge.com
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with a qualified speech therapist (he certainly had clouds there) it went as fast as clouds in a storm ;)
Very interesting article! :)