The ex-convict that inspired Mark Ruffalo’s criminal character: “He was a complete con his whole life”
As a generally affable man who radiates positivity at all times, Mark Ruffalo has hardly made a name for himself playing irredeemable villains, scheming tricksters, and nefarious criminal masterminds, which is fair enough when it would be difficult to buy a known beacon of wholesomeness as such.
He has played with plenty of grey areas to varying degrees of success, though, whether it was his caddish rogue Duncan Wedderburn acting as the erstwhile antagonist of Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things and landing him his fourth Academy Award nomination into the bargain. Still, the same can’t be said of the reveal that he was the brains behind the entire convoluted spot of sleight-of-hand crime caper Now You See Me.
Ruffalo did make a decent fist of embodying a conman in Rian Johnson’s uneven frolic The Brothers Bloom. Interestingly, he was lent a helping hand getting into character by a friend who was more than familiar with skirting around the fringes of the law for their own personal and financial gain.
He may have been able to draw on first-hand experience when preparing for the role. However, he may never have needed to if writer and director Johnson followed through on his initial intuition, which had him envisioning Ruffalo as Bloom Bloom, the younger of the two titular siblings, ultimately played by Adrien Brody.
The filmmaker admitted as much to LAist, confirming that “when I first sat down to meet with Mark, it was actually about the part of Bloom.” Like most people familiar with Ruffalo’s work, Johnson imagined him as a more soulful, introspective, and restrained type of performer. When he realised the star was “kind of a really, big friendly Italian papa” instead, he decided he made for a much better Stephen.
After spending almost his entire life swindling folks, Brody’s Bloom wants out of the business he and his brother have been operating since childhood. Naturally, Stephen doesn’t take too kindly to his life’s work being drawn to a close, so he dangles the carrot of the fabled ‘one last job’ to send them out in style. Rachel Weisz’s Penelope is the target, but matters are complicated when Bloom falls for her hard.
It required a Machiavellian turn from Ruffalo to convey the self-serving, selfish, and treacherous nature of Stephen, which he mastered by turning to an old buddy for advice. “I hadn’t played a part like this before – you know, the trickster, the rogue – so I was nervous about it,” he confessed, not that he had to turn too far to find inspiration.
“I have an old friend who’s a diamond thief, an ex-convict, a writer, producer, director, furrier,” he continued. “He’s the most gregarious, fun-loving, deeply-feeling person I’ve ever come across, and he was a big influence on this part.” Hammering home how “Stephen was based on this guy,” Ruffalo did offer that “he’s not just a diamond thief,” but “he was a complete con his whole life.”
His assessment was intended as a compliment in this case, and having that fountain of knowledge to lean on certainly came in handy based on Ruffalo’s memorable performance.
