5 minutes with Michael Shannon

In Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center, Michael Shannon digs through rubble as Marine Dave Karnes—a far cry from his current role at Steppenwolf, where he plays a mentally disabled adult who might be a serial killer in Martin McDonagh’s terror-comedy The Pillowman.

Your career began with the bloody trailer-park noir Killer Joe by Tracy Letts, who’s also your Pillowman costar. But there’s really not a playwright hotter than McDonagh right now. Have you met him?
Actually, when we were doing Killer Joe in London about 13 years ago, there was this guy who kept coming to the show, and following Tracy Letts around saying, “You’re just brilliant. No one is writing like this for theater. I’m gonna do something like this.” And it was Martin.

You’re also the lead in the film version of Tracy’s play Bug. Have you seen the movie yet?
No. It screened at Cannes, but my flight got in late, so I only got to see the last two minutes—basically just the closing credits. But at the end people stood up and cheered.

Plays like Killer Joe and Bug are pretty gruesome, and The Pillowman is too. How do older audiences respond?
A common misconception is that [they’re] going to be shocked or offended. But they’ve lived through the most, so they’re the hardest to offend. Once, in Killer Joe, in the scene where I make the woman gratify herself with a piece of chicken, an 80-year-old woman in the front row was laughing out loud. She thought it was the funniest thing she’s ever seen.

The Pillowman is in previews at Steppenwolf.