+ A
A -
Ian Spelling
NYT Syndicate
Perhaps you've heard the stories that the cast of Suicide Squad bonded. Will Smith, Margot Robbie, Joel Kinnaman, Jared Leto, Cara Delevingne, Jay Hernandez and Jai Courtney, et al., reportedly trained en masse, endured group-therapy sessions, played together in a recreation room requested by Smith and ...
"We all got the same tattoo," Kinnaman said, laughing, during a recent conversation."It says 'SKWARD.' Actually, everyone got one except Will. He did mine and then he flaked. He bailed on it when he was going to get his done. So we all got suckered by him.
"But it was an amazing group," he continued."We're all friends. We hang out. We're in touch almost daily.
"Will came to visit me in Sweden," he said."He was in Stockholm for eight or nine days. I just played golf with Jay Hernandez. I just saw Jai Courtney the other day. As soon as the girls come into town, I'll be hanging out with them.
"We've become a little crew and we all get along really well," Kinnaman concluded."It just became special. It's rare where you have a show or a film where there are so many actors who are in it that much. Usually there are one or two lead actors, and there are three or four others that come in and out. But here, because we were a squad and we were on set every day, there was a lot of bonding.
"I think the preparation also reflected that," he added."So we were all together the whole time, and everyone kind of got used to hanging out in a big group. It's a very positive bunch, a wild bunch."
Suicide Squad is a massive movie based on a popular, if not quite brand-name, DC comic book. Directed by David Ayre and set for release on August 5, the film gathers together an array of villains and other unlikely figures among them Deadshot (Will Smith), the Joker (Jared Leto), Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), El Diablo (Jay Hernandez), Enchantress (Cara Delevingne) and Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje) who are forced to join forces for the greater good. Kinnaman plays their leader, Rick Flag.
Kinnaman is the Swedish star of Easy Money (2010), The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011), The Killing (2011-2014) and Robocop (2014). He admitted, during a recent telephone call from his Los Angeles home, that initially he knew nothing about Suicide Squad, but said that he'd been keeping tabs on the project nonetheless and wanted in on it.
"I was seeing new cast members added, and I was a fan of David Ayer," Kinnaman explained."It just seemed like a very cool and interesting movie. It popped out to me, the whole concept, that it was about villains. Once it came together, I read the comics, and you get inspiration from different parts of the comics, but I felt that the script had the most flesh for me.
"And then I just dove into the reality of the character," he said."I thought about what he'd be like if he were real, and what that would mean."
So who is Rick Flag? What makes him tick as he tries to corral this group of unruly criminals?
"It's a tricky situation," Kinnaman replied."Rick Flag is one of the most seasoned and hardened military operators in the United States. He works closely under Amanda Waller (Viola Davis), who is a very powerful person within the CIA. They sometimes do some ugly stuff, and that's something that's a big part of Rick.
"A person in his position operates in a moral gray zone," the Swedish actor said,"where you do some very bad things to hopefully do good. But when you're at home at night, trying to close your eyes, the distinction may not always be that clear."
All of that appealed to Kinnaman, as did spending time with many real-life Rick Flags. The actor trained with and picked the brains of actual retired and active black-ops soldiers in the course of a few months.
"It's a fascinating world that they live and operate in," he said,"and the decisions that they make with their lives are so interesting, because of the repercussions of what they do and how they do it. It's a sacrifice, in many ways, what they do.
"And I have to say, it was really inspiring to be with these guys," Kinnaman continued."Their moral compass is very strong, and I think it has to be if you're going to take actions that ... if you're going to kill people, in some cases a lot of people, and still be able to sleep at night and feel like you're serving your country. So it was a very rewarding journey to get to know them, get into their psyches, and get to know the sacrifices and pain and the darkness that always lingers in their eyes because of what they've seen and done.
"Anyway, I took that and built Rick from there."
Most of the characters in Suicide Squad are not the big names most people know. Batman (Ben Affleck) does put in an appearance, but Flag ” a character pretty unfamiliar even among hardcore comic-book fans ” has much more screen time.
That unfamiliarity, Kinnaman said, gave him a degree of freedom in interpreting the character.
"I felt no pressure in terms of canon, like he had to be this way or that way," Kinnaman said."But I did feel a lot more pressure than the other actors because David was a submariner and he has a lot of friends in the military. He's very interested in the military. So I think Rick is the character he identified with the most, and I think that's one of the characters where there's a right or a wrong in terms of how you're supposed to behave."
Kinnaman unquestionably plays the film's least-flashy character, a military guy who kicks butt. Given that he's surrounded by larger-than-life super-villains, anti-heroes and sorceresses, one might think that Kinnaman would risk overcompensating on set, amplifying his performance so as to not let Flag get lost in the shuffle.
Apparently, however, that wasn't the case.
"I felt very comfortable in there," Kinnaman said,"and I thought my character's story is kind of the backbone of the whole thing. In comedy you need a straight man, and that's sort of how I saw my role in this. I would have liked to have found more opportunities to play the comic openings, but that just wasn't in the cards for this character.
"He's the straight guy," the actor said."He's the one who keeps the boat steady. And then all these other characters can go wild, and they do. So I carried my story line through it, and then they do all the flash around that. Together it makes for a pretty damn good movie."
There was plenty more to talk about with Kinnaman. He enjoyed a nifty run on 'House of Cards' in Season 4, playing the recurring role of Governor Will Conway of New York, an antagonist to President Underwood (Kevin Spacey). The actor soon will return to Baltimore to shoot several episodes for the upcoming fifth season.
"Suicide Squad was like a six-month teenage fantasy and then 'House of Cards' was like I went to have dinner at my parents' house," Kinnaman said."That's what it felt like. The tone of 'House of Cards' as a show is very much the tone of the set. It's somber. It's very adult. So it took a couple of days to adjust into it, but, damn, I had a good time on that as well."
Also on the way is the film Edge of Winter, a psychological thriller due out on August 12. Kinnaman co-stars in the film with rising star Tom Holland, Hollywood's new Spider-Man.
"I play a father who means well and loves his kids very much, but has a lot of emotional problems and puts himself in a position where he actually becomes a danger to their safety, even though he's trying to save them," Kinnaman said."I'm excited for people to see that one, just because it's so different from anything else I've done."
