The single moment Nicolas Cage agreed he was no longer an actor
Before Nicolas Cage‘s fear-mongering turn as Longlegs earlier this year, a fair few of his roles were being called into question. Cage’s previous performances prompted criticism and often downright bewilderment from audiences, even though we all know to expect the unexpected from him, and when Sean Penn got in on the action, many thought it could come to blows.
From the mid-1990s, Cage was on an action film rampage, churning out one after the other, with something left to be desired for a lot of them. Sean Penn publicly drew the line at Con Air, a 1997 Cage flick which, in the last decade, made for a great meme used all over social media, with Cage’s long hair flowing in the wind.
Con Air follows newly paroled ex-con and former U.S. Ranger Cameron Poe as he finds himself trapped in a prisoner-transport plane when the passengers seize control and aim to cause as much destruction as possible during their escape. As you can imagine, this makes for a pretty ridiculous and now characteristic action romp from Cage, but Penn had such a visceral reaction that he just had to share: “Nic Cage is no longer an actor,” he stated at the time. “He’s more like a performer.”
Penn added frankly: “If there’s anything more disgusting in the movie business it’s the whoredom of my peers. It’s a guy’s arm coming out of the screen [and] jerking you off. I prefer to do it myself at home than have some guy contriving wet dreams for me.”
Penn himself hasn’t always been taken seriously, and with more recent controversies surrounding his role in Milk as an openly gay politician, and his outspoken nature on plenty of issues, it’s understandable why he could see his own issues reflected in others’ performances. I don’t mean to psychoanalyse Sean Penn here, but his criticism of Cage would have been a product of the context of the time.
At the time, Cage responded to Penn’s criticism in an interview with The Guardian, suggesting that his previous co-star was far too concerned with his work. “He’s paying a little too much attention to my career, I think,” he responded, “I’m not thinking too much about what he’s doing, you know.”
In a subsequent interview with The Guardian, Cage changed his tune, saying: “In a way I agree with him […] I would rather be a performer than an actor. Acting to me implies lying. ‘He’s the greatest actor in the world’ is like saying, ‘He’s the greatest liar in the world.’ To perform, in my opinion, is more about emotion.” Who doesn’t love a bit of introspection? Perhaps less introspection, more twisting Penn’s words… but if that’s what Nic Cage needs to feel better, we’ll go along with that – besides, he could be right.
Cage has never been afraid to fully devote himself to the craft of acting. While Penn may now attribute that more closely to putting himself into the spotlight to try and actively deliver a performance instead of letting the character inhibit him, the majority of audiences will have found Cage’s ludicrous devotion to be, at worst, charming and, at best, providing some of the best shows to see in the cinema.
