Interview

GYLLENHAAL: So, then, let me ask you this: If you could get into a time machine, to what place and period would you travel?

PORTMAN: Well, right now, I’m very fascinated with 1920s Berlin. I mean, probably the more interesting thing would be to go to the beginning of civilization or precivilization—like polytheistic times. It would be interesting to see what came before modern religion and culture—what circumstances created the environment or the need for it. I actually felt like I was in a time machine last week when I went with Jay-Z to the Laserium in Los Angeles (click here to learn more about the Laserium). Have you been there?

GYLLENHAAL: Is that the laser show that was at the Griffith Observatory?

PORTMAN: There’s a new one now at Hollywood and Vine. I think it’s the one that was at the observatory and it moved down there. But, dude, watching this display is like you’re in the ’70s. There were all these lasers, and out of the lasers, this man emerged with a noose. The lights were just going up and down, and side to side . . . It was like a Zeppelin show. You could just see how these lasers were once the peak of technology and why everyone was so stoked about them.

GYLLENHAAL: I hope you were sober. Were you sober?

PORTMAN: I was so sober, but I’ve been really tired lately, and that feeling kind of resembled being out of sorts—for me, at least.

GYLLENHAAL: I went to the Smithsonian just the other week—probably around the same time as you were at the Laserium. I saw this show that Liam Neeson narrated about black holes. I think they had it at the Rose Center for Earth and Space in New York City first, and now it’s at the Smithsonian. But it was also one of those things where you felt like you were being transported back to the ’70s. We watched it in this dome, so it kind of felt like a black hole. It would have been weird if we were having these parallel hallucinatory experiences at the same time.

PORTMAN: Those kinds of shows really do take you back to a more innocent time when that stuff was superimpressive . . . Well, not even a more innocent time but maybe a more drugged-out time.

GYLLENHAAL: Okay. What’s your favorite food?

PORTMAN: Well, I don’t think you can really improve upon Carvel ice cream cake.

GYLLENHAAL: I’m more Baskin-Robbins style myself.

PORTMAN: Oh really? I am so Carvel. Did I just bring us back to 1985 Long Island?

GYLLENHAAL: Who would you rather have dinner with, Barack Obama or Nicolas Sarkozy?

PORTMAN: Uh, Obama.

GYLLENHAAL: I read recently in this book about Barack Obama called Renegade that he and Michelle first kissed at a Baskin-Robbins.

PORTMAN: Maybe I should switch over from Carvel then. That might be enough to convince me.

GYLLENHAAL: What song best describes your current state?

PORTMAN: My current state . . . I’m trying to think of a song that feels like sleepwalking. [laughs] I don’t know. I’ve mostly been listening to dirty rap lately. That’s sort of my scene.

GYLLENHAAL: Your affection for dirty rap is something that people really don’t know about you, which I think is fascinating. You do incredible things for the world, and then you listen to just completely obscene hip-hop music.

PORTMAN: Really, really obscene hip-hop. I love it so much. It makes me laugh and then it makes me want to dance. Those are like my two favorite things, so combined . . . I’ve been listening a lot lately to “Wait (The Whisper Song)” by the Ying Yang Twins, where the lyrics are like, “Wait ’til you see my dick”—which is just amazing because it’s whispered. [whispers] “Wait ’til you see my dick . . . ” [laughs] Crazy. So I just listen to it like I’m a five-year-old, like, “Oh my god! I can’t believe he just said that!”

GYLLENHAAL: It’s interesting that you think the lyric “Wait ’til you see my dick” describes your current state. I think people are learning more about you right now then they ever have in an interview. I’m proud of that.

PORTMAN: [laughs] Well, you’re really good at getting out the dark secrets. But actually, as far as the more general state of things right now, I think it’s kind of an exciting time. I mean, everyone is cutting back. It’s happening in every industry—including our own. But I think that’s going to translate into a situation where people aren’t motivated by money as much as they have been in the recent past. A lot of my friends from college went into fields like banking for financial reasons—obviously people have school loans and things to pay off.

And now, all of a sudden, they’re doing jobs that they hate and they’re not making as much money as they thought they would or they’ve lost their jobs entirely. So I’ve started to see people looking more toward their own passions and what really excites them. Obviously it’s much easier to say that you’re going to follow your passions when you’re financially secure, but at least we can take solace in the fact that we now have the time to pursue the things that we really want to pursue because now the option of doing things just for the money isn’t necessarily there.

GYLLENHAAL: If you were out on the job market and had to put your skills down on a résumé, what would you write?

PORTMAN: As far as skills go . . . I don’t have that many skills.

GYLLENHAAL: Oh, come on!

PORTMAN: I’m serious. I really wish I could make something. I mean, you’re a really good cook, you know how to build things—you can make things with your hands. I can’t make anything . . . Well, I can make chitchat, but not much else. I mean, I’d basically have trouble with any job that doesn’t require me to wear silly clothes and talk in funny voices.

GYLLENHAAL: And so you’re an actor.

PORTMAN: And so I’m an actor.

GYLLENHAAL: There’s very good money in that—not a lot of skill required, but very good money.

PORTMAN: [both laugh] I agree. Lucky. I mean, I can ride a bike, but I feel like most people can do that.

GYLLENHAAL: You could be a bike messenger . . .

PORTMAN: I could totally be a bike messenger.

GYLLENHAAL: That would be a badass thing. I would see a movie about you as a bike messenger in an instant—it would be like Quicksilver [1986], that Kevin Bacon movie.

PORTMAN: Oh yeah. A chick bike messenger.

GYLLENHAAL: If you did that, I would see that movie.

PORTMAN: I can’t really see that so much . . . But we’ll take that pitch out next week.