Alex O’Loughlin Talks to Filmink about Truancy, Potty Training and his Wild Streak

May 23, 2010 By 6 Comments

Australian film magazine Filmink recently featured Alex O’Loughlin in their “Actor Spotlight”, an in-depth interview in which he opens up about finding his place in the world and why he is very happy being where he is at the moment. A scan of the article – courtesy of Ozbella – can be found in the gallery!

In Conversation: Alex O’Loughlin

By Gill Pringle

There are overnight stars, and then there are those whose careers take a little longer to percolate. Enter 34-year-old Australian actor ALEX O’LOUGHLIN, a Hollywood transplant of five years, and the survivor of two high profile cancelled US TV series, Moonlight and Three Rivers. His role opposite Jennifer Lopez in the rom-com THE BACK-UP PLAN, however, might be the one to seal the deal for him in Hollywood. Raised in Sydney – the son of an astronomy teacher and a nurse – this high school dropout backpacked around the globe before following his dream to become an actor, winning his first lead role in the local hit Oyster Farmer six years ago.

Do you have to fight harder, as an Australian, for roles in Hollywood?
“No, but you have to work harder to do the accent. I’ve been working on my US accent for quite some years now, so it’s usually pretty good.”

How was your first year in Hollywood? When you were struggling to find work?
“I had nothing. I ended up sleeping on my pal’s office floor while his house was getting sand-blasted and all the floors were being done. The office was sealed off in plastic, so I was literally living in this plastic bubble while the rest of the house was being worked on. I had really dark thoughts in that time. I was very depressed, and I went through a lot of pain. I couldn’t see beyond each day. That might sound overly dramatic, but that’s what I experienced. I didn’t know what to do. I had a good friend who came by every morning and took me for coffee and worked out the plan for every day. I didn’t have the money to go home to Australia even if I’d wanted to. It was friendship that kept me strong. Eventually I just thought, “What the hell! Until you hit your knees, it’s not worth it anyway.”

Did you do crummy jobs to support yourself?
“I’ve done them my entire life. I grew up digging holes and working in construction and demolition. I’ve worked in restaurants and bars. No pun intended, but the shittiest job that I’ve ever done was working for a plumber when I was seventeen. That was shitty! But I don’t care about that. I’m not above that, but it’s good not to have to do it anymore. I’m very happy to make a living from acting.”

Who is your mentor in LA?
“Jack Thompson, for sure. I’ve had a few mentors over the years, some incredible actors have taken me under their wing and really helped me. But Jack? We’ve done a few pictures together now [Oyster Farmer, Man-Thing, Feed], and he potty-trained me! That’s a ‘Jack-ism’ – when we talk about an actor not behaving well, his response to that is, ‘Aaah mate, bad potty-training.’ He’s absolutely right. So if I behave badly at work, there’s no excuse for it, because I’ve had the best potty-training with Jack. The man has such talent, and such integrity. He and his family have become my family over here.”

You’re starring opposite Jennifer Lopez in the rom-com The Back-up Plan. One of the themes in the film is that you can never really plan your life, and that love shows up when we least expect it. Do you relate to that?
“Yes. There’s an expression: ‘If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans,’ and it’s true to a certain extent. Especially when you’re a parent [Alex has a twelve-year-old son named Saxon], your life moves into another area, you grow up and you move into that level of living. When other people come before you, there are certain considerations that you have to make. You can plan certain things and you can plan for the future, but when it comes to affairs of the heart, you never know who you’re going to meet or when.”

Was Jennifer Lopez very different from her public persona?
“Believe it or not, I really didn’t have any preconceptions. I mean, she’s smoking hot, and she’s super famous, but I don’t read any of that gossip type stuff. I don’t allow it in my house, I don’t give a shit about it, I never have. I mean, sure, there are certain things that you can’t get away from. For a long time, I’ve had people who are being gossiped about in my life, since I was very young, so I know that it’s all bullshit. I’ve never plugged into it. I’ve never fed it, its a very dangerous part of the machine. That being said, Jennifer was a surprise to me. For someone as hugely famous and popular as she is, I never thought of her as a ‘celebrity’. I just saw her as a grounded person. She’s a terrific woman with a lot of spunk and fire. She’s my kind of person; there’s a lot of joy and a lot of humour in her. All my dearest friends from Australia have that quality – there’s a certain irreverence, and that joie de vivre. I feel totally comfortable talking to her; I don’t have to worry about censoring myself. We laugh about the same things, which only helped us even more when it came to working together.

What first attracted you to acting?
“I did a play at school when I was about nine years old. I did this skit with two Fish Fingers up my nose, lying on my back, dead. It was a funny skit, and I keenly remember the audience roaring with laughter. I realised that if I did something, there was cause and effect. So the storytelling seed was sown within me, and I loved it. It made perfect sense. I went to drama school when I was 23. I wanted  to get the best possible understanding of what I was involved in and where the story comes from and all that stuff. I wanted to learn about the history of theatre, and I wanted to learn about my voice and my body. Before that, I started at the very bottom. I washed dishes in restaurants in Kings Cross to pay for night classes in acting. I worked as an extra, just to see how a film set works. I started at the very bottom and worked my way up, which is a really good way to go. I got bits and pieces of work here and there on the other side of the camera too.”

And you left school at seventeen? Did you truant a lot?
“Umm, a bit! You know, I truanted a bit, and I’d smoke cigarettes at lunchtime. It wasn’t necessarily rebelling, it was more like, ‘Who gives a shit!’ School was such a bullshit, flawed system anyway – that was how I felt at the time. I’d ask a teacher a question, and I wouldn’t get clear answers. They weren’t actually helping me get through the system. It was a combination of my attitude and the pockets of truth that I was in, and also that ridiculous age when everything’s so important. I had a bit of a wild streak, and I didn’t want to conform. I wasn’t interested in one specific thing. What I was interested in was the world, and travelling, and seeing things and hearing different languages.”

How has fame changed you?
“I’m very private, and I keep a very low profile. I just do all my normal things. I live my life, but things are starting to change. We got chased by paparazzi the other night, who were trying to find out where we live. Just little things like that. But I’m not going to change the way that I live. I still ride my motorcycles a lot. I have a Triumph Thruxton and a friend just built a Harley for me, which was my first Harley. It’s the great American dream to own a Harley. It’s a custom chopper, built from the ground up. It’s very simple, and very cool, sort of like a Mad Max bike. I’ve been riding since I was five-years-old, so it’s like a part of me. I also love rock climbing. I’m very active; I love boxing and running too.”

What are your dreams for the future?
“It would be crazy not to say it, but one of them is to continue to work. I want to continue working because when I’m working, there’s stability in my life. As an actor, you’re either incredibly unstable or incredibly stable. We get paid well when we work, and everything’s okay, but when you’re not working – and those periods can go for years – it can be very disconcerting. I’m living my dreams, and that’s really cliché, but I’m so happy right now. I’m so happy with my work. I’m healthy, I’m fit, I’ve got a great job, and I’ve got friends. I go home and I’m just me! I am who I am, I’m Alex – I’m a son, I’m a brother, I’m a father, I’m a lover… I’m a whatever I am. But it’s just me.”

[tags]alex o’loughlin, alex o’lachlan, the back-up plan[/tags]

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Alex O’Loughlin: Raw Appeal of Aussie Export

May 19, 2010 By 3 Comments

Another great interview with Alex O’Loughlin comes our way from Down Under – this time from the HIT supplement of The Advertiser in Adelaide (May 20). A scan has been added to the gallery; the transcript follows below.

Raw Appeal of Aussie Export

The ridiculously buff Alex O’Loughlin is set to make female hearts swoon, writes Andrew Fenton

There’s a scene about midway through The Back-up Plan in which Alex O’Loughlin takes off his shirt to reveal a ludicrously muscular chest and a six-pack.

He plays Stan, a cheese-seller. And from the looks of things, Stan is the fittest cheese-seller in history.

“Cheese-sellers are pretty big, though – so I went method on this one,” laughs the Australian actor on the phone from Los Angeles, the day after the film’s premiere. He explains he was offered a physical trainer by the filmmakers – but then got a bit carried away.

“When I saw it last night, I was like: ‘Dude! You’re too fit! You shouldn’t have got that fit for that movie!”

But on the scale of things, being overly fit to play an entirely credible cheese merchant in a romantic comedy opposite Jennifer Lopez is a fairly good problem to have.

Five years ago, when the AFI-nominated actor (The Incredible Journey of Mary Bryant) moved to Los Angeles, he was greeted with characteristic indifference.

“I didn’t work for the first few years, times got a bit tough and I found myself on a mate’s couch,” he says. “But then things came good.”

Now 33, his luck changed when he was cast as Detective Kevin Hiatt for a seven-episode run in The Shield. He followed that up with the family feature film August Rush and began to develop a massive female following thanks to his starring role as vampire-cum-private investigator Mick St. John in Moonlight.

Some of these female fans appear very devoted.

“I dare say,” he says. “It’s kind of weird. I really appreciate the support, it’s very validating. But they only know a version of me; they know what my face looks like and there are only a few people who really know me.”

Unfortunately for O’Loughlin though, the show never really recovered from the halt in production caused by the Hollywood writers’ strike and it wasn’t picked up for a second season.

His next show, medical drama Three Rivers, suffered a similar fate, getting the chop after just eight of 13 episodes were screened.

Little wonder he’s developed something of a nihilistic coping strategy.

“There are moments when you grab for hope, but if you grab for hope, you’re dead,” he says. “You can’t hope, it’s the nature of the world, the nature of this industry and how it works. All you’ve got is you, and so you show up, you do your best and then go home and try to forget about it.”

That probably explains why O’Loughlin is trying not to get his hopes up about his latest role as Detective Steve McGarrett in the CBS remake of Hawaii Five-0. While only a pilot has been filmed so far, the series looks very promising, coming from the writers who recently resurrected Star Trek.

He says he’s under strict instructions not to talk about it. “What I can say is that we’ve finished the pilot, it’s gone in (to CBS) and we don’t know about a pick-up yet; but it’s something I’m very excited about,” he says. “I was a bit young to be a fan of the show, but I knew it and this is a very modern take on it – it’s a really good remake.”

The vast majority of O’Loughlin’s television work has been with CBS – so it’s no surprise to see the actor headlining The Back-up Plan, which comes from CBS Films.

“Bonds of trust exist, he explains. The film is fairly high-concept – after waiting all her life to meet the right man and start a family, Zo (J.Lo) becomes pregnant through artificial insemination on the very same day she meets Mr Right (O’Loughlin). Hilarity ensues.

“You couldn’t have made this movie thirty years ago, it wouldn’t have fitted the zeitgeist; but today you can,” O’Loughlin says. “It’s about women who have their lives together but don’t have a partner and want a family – and can do it now.”

In real life, of course, Lopez got pregnant the old-fashioned way (to singer Marc Anthony) and gave birth to twins in 2008.

After having been provisionally offered the role, O’Loughlin dropped by the Lopez family home on Long Island with director Alan Poul (Six Feet Under). “I met her and Marc and the kids, and we hung out,” he says. “Then Jen and I had a ‘chemistry meeting’ with the director, Alan. Essentially what we do is find out if we get each other – are we going to have a laugh?

“It’s like when you go to the pub and you meet someone, you work that out pretty quickly: You’re like, ‘Yeah, nah, I don’t want to have another beer with you’, or, ‘Let’s hang out’. It was just like that.”

[tags]alex o’loughlin, alex o’lachlan, the back-up plan, cbs films, steve mcgarrett, hawaii five-0, hawaii five-o, hawaii 5-0, cbs[/tags]

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Sydney Morning Herald Interview with Alex O’Loughlin and Jennifer Lopez

May 13, 2010 By 4 Comments

The Back-up Plan opens May 20th in Australia, so it’s wonderful to see that a leading newspaper in Alex O’Loughlin’s home town has a great article in their Friday edition based on an interview with the movie’s leads last year. A scan of the article has been added to the gallery and a full transcript follows below.

Baby, I Love Your Way

Aussie actor Alex O’Loughlin helps Jennifer Lopez face her biological clock in The Back-up Plan.

By Jenny Cooney

Australian actor Alex O’Loughlin looks curious as he sits beside Jennifer Lopez on the Culver City soundstage where they are shooting romantic comedy The Back-up Plan. Lopez has been asked why she chose the 33-year-old to play her love interest.

“You mean, besides the obvious?” Lopez, 40, says with a giggle as she playfully squeezes his arm in acknowledgement that it’s no coincidence he’s shirtless more than once in the film.

“But honestly,” Lopez adds before the chagrined O’Loughlin can react, “my character is independent and ready to have a baby without a man, so she needed someone who could really challenge her and when we had our first meeting, Alex and I also had this playful push-and-pull banter and I thought, ‘Oh, this guy is not going to back down to me,’ so that was a good sign.”

The pair certainly have a playful energy and genuine respect for each other as they talk about the high-concept comedy that marks not only O’Loughlin’s first leading role in a Hollywood film but also Lopez’s return to work after the birth of her twins, Max and Emme, now two.

In The Back-up Plan, Lopez’s character, Zoe, is artificially inseminated and on the way home she meets Stan (O’Loughlin). As the pair fall in love, Zoe drops the bombshell and they attempt a courtship in reverse.

“What makes this film modern and cutting-edge is that this is a situation that is happening to a lot more women today, who get to a certain age and face the choice of doing it on their own or not having a child at all,” Lopez says, wearing a simple pink sundress and thongs before heading into wardrobe and make-up for today’s shoot.

“But why I really liked this film was it’s also a throwback to the old style of romantic comedy, with really great physical comedy.”

O’Loughlin graduated from NIDA in 2002 and was active in Sydney theatre productions until he starred in the 2004 Aussie film Oyster Farmer and headed to Los Angeles. “But my faith rapidly diminished after a year of unemployment, “O’Loughlin humbly reveals, shattering the “overnight star” myth. “I couldn’t get arrested in this town and just when I felt I’d run out of resources, I got a small movie [teen thriller The Invisible] and then The Shield.”

O’Loughlin’s edgy role on the Emmy-winning police drama led to his own series in 2007, vampire drama Moonlight, and when that was cancelled after two (sic) seasons, he starred in last year’s short-lived medical series Three Rivers.

Now he’s waiting for reaction not only to his movie role but also a pilot he filmed recently for a television remake of Hawaii Five-0, in which he’ll play Detective Steve “Book ‘em Danno” McGarrett.

“The Back-up Plan is my first lead in a movie in this country at this level and I guess it’s the first time in my career I went, ‘Wow, I’m here and I’m really doing it,’ so the decision to sign a seven-year contract for a TV show was very difficult,” O’Loughlin says, “but I really liked this take on the original show and this character… so I have no regrets.”

Lopez, who broke out as a star in the 1997 biopic Selena and has starred in Out of Sight, The Wedding Planner and Monster-in-Law, continues to expand her empire with another album and a possible tour, as well as a revamp of her clothing line.

But she says her twins go wherever she goes. “I love my babies and it’s hard to be away from them but what I do as an artist is such a big part of who I am and the best mum that I could be is to be a fulfilled mum,” Lopez says.

Almost on cue, the nanny in her dressing-room trailer beckons and Lopez bids us farewell.

O’Loughlin says the toddlers gave the project a family atmosphere, even if it did come with a downside.

“It’s usually an adult playground when you’re making a film, so I love the days when we know they’re on the set – usually when you hear the director say, ‘Cut! We have to go again, Max is crying in the background.’”

[tags]alex o’loughlin, alex o’lachlan, the back-up plan, cbs films, steve mcgarrett, hawaii five-0, hawaii five-o, hawaii 5-0, cbs[/tags]

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It’s All About Alex O’Loughlin in the June Cosmopolitan

May 12, 2010 By 4 Comments

The Australian edition of Cosmopolitan too includes Alex O’Loughlin in their June issue. Alex answers three questions in the feature “Men & You”:

What was it like working with Jennifer Lopez?
She’s a great, fun person. Not only was she not a diva, she kept me on my game. She would be punctual, prepared, professional and very active in bringing things to the table when we were shooting.

When you first moved to the States, you struggled to find work. Were you ever tempted to pack up and come home?
I first moved here when I was 21 and five years ago I moved over [permanently] with money I’d saved. I did hundreds of auditions and was living in a mate’s office, but something in me was saying, “Whatever you do, don’t [go] home.” And I didn’t. And then I got a job.

What have you learnt about relationships by being in this movie?
I learnt that older women – by that I mean women out of their twenties – are clearer about what they actually want. What else did I learn? Be careful about falling in love with someone up the duff!

“Up the duff,” by the way, means pregnant! :D

A high-res scan has been added to the gallery.

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Alex O’Loughlin’s “Charismatic Appeal Extends into the Kitchen”

May 9, 2010 By 5 Comments

No, I don’t have pictures of Alex O’Loughlin showing off his culinary skills, but I do have a fresh wave of reviews of The Back-up Plan! The movie opened in the UK and South Africa on May 7th and below is a selection of the latest critiques – and of course I’m only directing your attention the the ones worth your time! Interesting is that most of these reviews were written by… men! :wink:

Critic Graham Young of the Birmingham Mail (UK) gives the movie 4 stars:

May 7, 2010 – Having been lucky enough to have witnessed three births myself, this is the best cinema version I’ve seen.

Just the right gas-and-air mixture of reality with heady unreality.

The Back-up Plan will be an easy target for some critics.

But as an enjoyable night out this is a romcom which rises well above more recent efforts like The Bounty Hunter and Leap Year.

Four stars too from Matthew Bond of The Mail on Sunday (UK):

May 9, 2010 – The result is broad-brush comedy that pushes beyond the boundaries of a 12A film but is undeniably funny. I loved the earnest single mother’s group, the wonderfully over-the-top home birthing scene and the description of parenthood Stan gets from an experienced dad in a children’s playground: ‘It’s awful, awful, awful, awful, awful – then something incredible happens – then it’s awful, awful, awful…’

The chemistry between Lopez and O’Loughlin convinces, but it’s Lopez who ultimately deserves most of the accolades. It’s her best performance since Maid in Manhattan back in 2002, and while The Back-up Plan won’t set the world on fire, it should send a lot of people back on the street happy.

Barry Ronge rates the movie three stars for the Sunday Times of Johannesburg (UK):

None of that would matter much if Poul had chosen the wrong actors, but Lopez and O’Loughlin are perfect, because they know exactly what they are doing. The don’t mistake The Back-up Plan for a movie classic, or even a serious examination of women and motherhood.

It’s a chick-flick, chirpy and fluffy, and all the actors have to do is make it look sexy, romantic and funny. Both Lopez and O’Loughlin can do that with their eyes closed.

O’Loughlin is a relative newcomer (he played Detective Kevin Hiatt in TV’s The Shield and had a supporting role in the thriller Whiteout) abut he’s one of those guys who looks hunky and brash but is actually sensitive and considerate.

Three stars from Theresa Smith at Tonight.co.za:

Even if it is totally unbelievable that any guy would agree to raise someone else’s children right from the get-go just because he likes the girl, O’Loughlin makes Stan such a likeable character you want it to be true.

The Australian actor has paid his dues, he’s not as unknown as you might think. That was O’Loughlin as Kevin Hiatt in The Shield, he was in Jonathan Rhys Myers’ back-up band in August Rush and was the one lead having the journey of self-exploration up the river in the beautifully filmed romantic drama Oyster Farmer.

Director Alan Poul gained his experience on television shows such as Swingtime and Six Feet Under, but here displays an – until this point – unknown ability to do a good rom-com. He keeps the pace up, the romance light and the comedy even lighter.

It’s sweet, charming, got a great soundtrack and it’s an absolute no-brainer which sometimes is exactly what you want.

Neither South African nor British, but still worth a mention is Sy Becker’s review at WWLP.com (three stars):

Alex O’Laughlin (sic) isn’t just a charter member of the hunk of the month club, but the clincher comes when his charismatic appeal extends into the kitchen.

What’s a romantic comedy without the insecure lover having the voice of parental experience like Anthony Anderson guide him over those emotional land mines?

“The Back-Up Plan” actually holds its charming sweetness in reserve. This is a very likable slice of romantic fluff. The stars are supported by familiar faces from a bygone era that should give veteran moviegoers no end of nostalgic pleasure.

The writers have sprinkled this romantic confection with plenty of Sugar and Spice. “The Back-Up Plan” couldn’t be any better calibrated to warm and amuse you with 3 stars. With this feel good movie, you won’t need a back-up plan.

For the reviews that are not available online you’ll find the scans in the gallery. Just scroll down to the bottom of each page and click on “download photo”, click again and the scan will show up in its true size.

[tags]alex o’loughlin, alex o’lachlan, the back-up plan, cbs films[/tags]

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