Senior Planet talks to…Billy Bob Thornton

Arkansas native Billy Bob Thornton, 69, has been making music and movies most of his adult life. After he took home the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for Sling Blade in 1996, he’s appeared in films like A Simple Plan and Monster’s Ball and  more. Wed six times – most famously to Angelina Jolie for three years – he is now happily married to specific effects artist Connie Angland with whom he shares a daughter.

Today he stars as an oil company “fixer” Tommy Norris in hit TV series, Landman set in the proverbial boomtowns of West Texas. Co-starring Demi Moore and Jon Hamm, the show takes an upstairs/downstairs peek into the lives of the roughnecks and wildcat billionaires fueling the boom.

Take a look at the Landman trailer:

Q: What did you learn about the oil business?

BILLY BOB: I knew a lot of oil people from when I lived in Houston. I knew it was dangerous, but I didn’t realize that a lot of the people who work in the oilfields are felons or ex-cons because these guys can make up to $180,000 a year. They’re not gonna make that kind of money anywhere else, and so they risk their limbs or lives to send the money to their families.

Q: You often play bad guys but in Landman you’re arguably the good guy?

BILLY BOB: It’s a common misconception that I play bad guys but if you really look at my career, I think maybe because some of the bad guys that I’ve played were iconic, like the guy in Fargo, so people assume that I’ve played a lot of bad guys. But when you really look at it, I haven’t played that many.

Q: Which do you prefer to play?

BILLY BOB: First of all, that doesn’t exist in real life. And the other thing is, it’s just not interesting as an artist to do that…you have to show every side of a person.

Q: And often audiences confuse the actors with the characters they play?

BILLY BOB: One of the things that I’ve not done in my career is – and I told agents over the years this – I’ll play a weird or bad guy in something that has an indie feel to it. But I will never play the bad guy who is trying to kill Tom Cruise – because America will not like it. That’s a career-changing thing. But I think with independent film or streaming, you can be a little more hardcore. But if you do a popcorn movie, then either play the good guy or girl. But don’t try to kill Tom Cruise or Tom Hanks because it’ll change your career. I’ve been offered those things and I said, “No, I’m not killing Tom Hanks, sorry.”

Q: Landman plays with stereotypes of Texas men. You grew up in Arkansas and then Texas so what’s your take on that?

BILLY BOB: Well, I grew up in abject poverty so anytime somebody thinks that I’m a weirdo or because of the parts I played or the tours I’ve been doing since I was 16, it’s like they have this idea about you. And honestly, you run into all types in Texas. We actually became friends with a lot of philanthropists in Texas who really take care of a lot of people, so you just can’t judge people until you get around them. There are bad people in Idaho and Jersey and Florida, California, Texas, Arkansas, everywhere – and there are great people there too. And then you run into people every now and then who just look at you under their cowboy hat like they want to kill you.

Q: What scared or excited you most about carrying this whole show on your shoulders?

BILLY BOB: Most of my career, we’ll say from the mid-’90s, there’ve only been a handful of times where I wasn’t carrying the story, so I’m kind of used to it. Also, I think one of the things that helps is if you play a part that you’re right for. I try to only take parts that I can read the script and say, “Yeah, I think I’m the best guy for this job.” I’ll be the first one to tell somebody if I’m not right. I’ve had directors come talk to me about playing people that I was not right for and I’ve said, “Look, you’re gonna have a better movie if you let Frank Langella do this.”

Q: Aside from the oil business, Tommy Norris is also dealing with his divorce and two teenage kids. Does your own experience as a dad help you play that?

BILLLY BOB: Absolutely. When you have sons and you’re a guy, they’re like your buddies. I mean, you’re protective of them, but when they’re little and they climb up on something and they fall and cut their lip, it’s like “Dude, quit climbing up the ladder”. But when your daughter does the same thing, you instantly rush over, grab her around the waist, take her off the ladder, and say, “Honey, please don’t do that.” So Bella, my [youngest] daughter, who is the center of my universe, gave me everything I needed in order to play a protective father.

Q: Would you like to have a fortune like some of the billionaires in the series?

BILLY BOB:  Fortune to me means being able to take care of your family. As long as I have enough to take care of my family, I’m okay. As an artist – if I’m doing my job and I can sit back and look at it, listen to it, read it, and think to myself, “That’s what I wanted to say and that’s how I wanted to say it,” that’s a type of fortune to me. I’m also not one of these guys who makes the gigantic money. It’s like you can look me up on the internet and it tells you how much I’m worth – but I just always wanted to make a living doing what I love. I wouldn’t want to be a billionaire, frankly. If I were, the only thing I would want to do with it is buy everybody in my life, my friends and my family, a house and put money in my daughter’s college fund. And then the rest of it, I’ll just be like: What do I do with this? I got one house and one car, and my wife has a car. I have friends who have houses all over the world,  and they fly on private jets. Now if you ever get on American Airlines to New York and you’re sitting in first class – ’cause that’s a SAG rule – we might be pals. Because that’s where I’ll be. So to me, fortune is really about having enough to take care of yourself and the people in your life.

Q: Where is home these days?

BILLY BOB: I grew up in Arkansas and Texas before I came to LA in 1980. It’s actually odd to me to think about it sometimes because I’ve lived most of my life in California, and yet my roots are still in Arkansas and Texas.

Q: Do you see yourself as a musician-actor or an actor who plays music?

BILLY BOB: I’m a musician-actor because I grew up in music and that’s the only reason I put it in that order. I’ve been touring since I was 16 and I started playing when I was nine. I came to California to play music and accidentally somehow played the pawn shop guy on Matlock or something so then the only time I didn’t play music was in the mid- to late ’80s because I was trying to keep my head above water.

Watch a music video featuring Billy Bob Thornton here.

I wasn’t exactly doing great, so when I discovered I can get $361 a day to do a scene on Andy Griffiths’ show or whatever, I thought, OK I guess, I better do this for a while. Then I grew to love acting. And I think most of my success as an actor came from my own ignorance, because I didn’t know any other way to be than natural. So whatever I played, I would just be myself and I guess they liked that, and then the next thing you know, I’m an actor.

PHOTO CREDIT: James Minchin III/Paramount+

NB: Created by Taylor Sheridan, new episodes of Landman stream every Sunday on Paramount+. 

 

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Gill Pringle began her career as a rock columnist for popular British newspapers, traveling the world with Madonna, U2 and Michael Jackson. Moving to Los Angeles 27 years ago, she interviews film and TV personalities for prestigious UK outlets, The Independent, The i-paper and The Sunday Times – and, of course, Senior Planet. A member of Critics Choice Association, BAFTA and AWFJ, she wrote the screenplay for 2016 Netflix family film, The 3 Tails Movie: A Mermaid Adventure. An award-winning writer, in 2021 she was honored by the Los Angeles Press Club with 1st prize at the NAEJ Awards.