Paul Dano is no stranger to critical acclaim, having appeared in a string of critical darlings over the last twenty years, but he isn’t exactly a household name yet. That’s set to change with this weekend’s premiere of The Batman. The film, which is already pulling down a good share of critical acclaim, will almost certainly be one of the year’s biggest hits, and send Dano’s Q rating into the stratosphere.
So what took so long?
Dano’s indie credits are about as impeccable as an artist can have without actually transforming into Wes Anderson, but none of them have come off as calculated, star-making turns. Dano’s more recent efforts have been thoughtful character work, like Love & Mercy, or independent quirk fests like 2016’s Swiss Army Man. Dano’s two major breakout roles, in Little Miss Sunshine and There Will Be Blood both took in modest box office returns under $100 million — not even half the budget of tentpole films like Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Dano’s reviews have rarely been anything but superlative, though. He’s had the juice to break into the mainstream for a while now. So why has he waited so long to pull the trigger?
“I am more clear in myself now about what I want and what I get from my work,” Dano told The Hollywood Reporter. “That allows for a more healthy sense of not just artistry, but also ambition. It feels really good to me to have done this now, and I can enjoy it now, where I don’t know if I would have in my 20s.”
Dano, who made his Broadway debut at age 12 and has, more or less, worked steadily ever since, doesn’t seem to seek the accolades that motivate many among his acting brethren. “I don’t know that I’m a natural performer. I don’t know that I get my ya-yas from entertaining. I knew what I wanted, but I didn’t know if it was possible.” he told The Hollywood Reporter. Jake Gyllenhaal, with whom the actor worked in his first directorial effort, also commented to the Reporter that Dano was “openhearted but quiet and in no need of an actor’s typical desire for attention.”
Nor was Dano’s decision to play The Riddler, a character that has been embodied memorably but comically onscreen by the likes of comedians Frank Gorshin and Jim Carrey, motivated by the need for attention, or even the lucrative payout of a big-budget blockbuster. Dano was purely motivated by director Matt Reeves’ intriguing script, which approaches Batman as both a detective, and a psychologically disturbed human being — the first time a big-screen version of the character has been so explored.
Upon reading the script, Dano approached his long-time domestic partner, Zoe Kazan, and asked, “I think this is kind of really good?’ ” Dano went on to explain that he felt that “the audience is sort of indicted. I’ve not seen that before in this kind of mass entertainment.”
It’s perhaps no coincidence that Dano found himself so captivated by the script, as Reeves had written it with Dano in mind; the writer/director began to conceived his version of the supervillain with a mind towards Dano’s critically lauded performance as tortured artist Brian Wilson in 2014’s Love & Mercy.
“That character, he’s caught up in his artistry and he struggles to communicate with those around him,” Reeves says. “That was spiritually connected to the idea of this isolation that the Riddler felt. The Riddler is a product of our time, the way that people become isolated online and retreat to mental activities that substitute for not having contact. Paul is just off-center in a way that makes him very relatable,” Reeves told The Hollywood Reporter. “I didn’t want this character to be a villain. Even in his darkness, I wanted to see that humanity.”
The Batman hits theaters this weekend with tickets currently available for presale.