The Dorchester, London. On 28th January, Editor-in-Chief of A Rabbit’s Foot Charles Finch sat down with Academy Award-winning actor Adrien Brody, for a conversation about his career, craft as an actor and specifically his role as architect László Tóth in Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist, for which he has been nominated for an Academy Award in the Best Actor category, 22 years since first winning an Oscar for his role in The Pianist.
“You immediately give this heart-wrenching performance within the first few minutes of the film, and the audience is just staggered by it… Yet Brady and you carve this story that allows for the entrance of all these other facets, Laszlo’s dreams of success, his addiction,” said Finch of Brody’s performance.
“László Tóth is a fictional character—when Brady and Mona Fastvold wrote this film, they wanted to research a successful Bauhaus architect who had made his way to the states. And there were no survivors, so they made a fictional story,” responded Brody. “So it represents the tremendous loss for humanity of all the immense creativity and artistry that has been erased from this planet. He’s an amalgamation of beautifully architects of that era that managed to flee prior. Marcel Breuer, Louis Kahan, Mies Van Der Rohe.”
Brody discussed his love of Brutalist architecture, that far preceded the making of The Brutalist. “I don’t like all structures, some of them look like a parking lot,” joked the actor. “I remember seeing a brutalist structure in Prague and someone saying that it was a brutalist building and just thinking: that is the perfect word for it.” Brody explained the specific inspiration for his role as Tóth, who is hired to build a public institute for a wealthy landlord. “I spent 7 years renovating an old barn that I had bought upstate 22 years ago. I wanted to run from the trappings of Hollywood. I moved upstate to a dilapidated barn that came with a broken pickup truck.”
The pair also discussed the highs and lows of Brody’s career. “Persistent happiness is unrealistic. It’s not the human condition,” mused Brody, reflecting on how so many actors struggle to make ends meet. He explained how painting had become a fruitful creative endeavour during quieter periods. “A lot of actors are painters,” he noted. “It’s a lot easier to sell paintings when you are a famous actor.”
