In the political comedy "Dave," Kevin Kline plays an ordinary citizen asked to stand in for the president at a photo opportunity. He is under orders to say nothing, simply walk through a crowded room, smile and wave and head straight for a limo waiting out front.
Followed by nervous aides, Dave makes his entrance and the people love it, applauding and cheering as he passes by. Just as he's about to leave the building, however, he decides the performance calls for an encore. He turns to face the crowd, raises his arms in triumph and cries out "God bless America!"It's the kind of scene that recalls an actor incapable of sticking to the script. It's also one of the few scenes in the film for which Kline himself proved capable of sticking to the script.
"That's sort of why I'm usually not very good with a director who's dictatorial, authoritarian," he says with an innocent smile, being sure to credit "Dave" director Ivan Reitman with giving him plenty of freedom.
"I believe in the actor's input, perhaps to a larger extent than a lot of directors imagine. In the old days, you had sort of personality actors: `Let 'em be themselves, let 'em have that Clark Gable thing.' I like leeway. I believe in a quid pro quo: `I'll do it your way, but let me do it my way, too.' "
Kline has dual roles in the movie, which co-stars Sigourney Weaver as the first lady, Ben Kingsley as the vice president and Frank Langella as the Machiavellian chief of staff.
Briefly, Kline is seen as President William Harrison Mitchell, a typically slick politician choreographed down to the last hand movement. But much of the time, he plays citizen Dave Kovic, a Mitchell look-alike who ad-libs all too well after a series of bizarre events sweeps him from an employment agency in Baltimore to the Oval Office at the White House.
Neither part required much research. As a man who only loosely follows politics, Kline could understand Dave's mix of awe and bewilderment as he suddenly finds himself commander in chief. As an actor, he could summon the politican's gift for communication. As a celebrity, he knew all about the frozen smiles and other survival techniques of public appearances.
"There's a scene where Sigourney and I get out of a car and we looked to each other and said, `Boy, have we been here before.' When you have to do those idiotic premieres with the television cameras and the reporters are shouting questions and fans are asking for autographs.
"The film is as much about acting as anything else," he said. "It's about having a spotlight thrown on you and hearing, `Act! Be the president! Convince me!' "
If Kline was acting during a recent interview, it was the most convincing kind of acting, so natural you'd swear it was real. He was thoughtful and funny, somber and silly, relaxed enough to handle some surprise guest appearances.
Weaver dropped in at one moment, kidded Kline about his cardigan sweater - "You look like Mr. Rogers" - and invited him to dinner. Next, Kline's wife, model-actress Phoebe Cates, emerged from the other room of their hotel suite, carrying their baby son, Owen. Kline picked up the crying boy, nuzzled him and apologized for having an actor for a father, his performance rewarded with squeals of laughter.
"Back in college (Indiana University), I discovered that acting allowed me to be foolish," Kline said upon resuming the conversation. "Actors have the luxury of a mask behind which we can hide.
"I could reveal myself because I had the mask. I didn't have to be in control, which is more the way I am in life: in control, on top of the situation. It's more fun to be out of control - in a controlled way."
Kline, 45, a St. Louis native, emerged as a Broadway star in the 1970s, winning a Tony Award as the narcissistic actor of "On the Twentieth Century," a role made famous on screen by John Barrymore. In the early 1980s, he broke into films, remembering his surprise at how actors sometimes were guided through a scene.
"The director would lead you through every movement," said Kline, who then cupped his hands and began shouting as if barking out commands through a megaphone.
"OK, WALK OVER TO HIM, SHOW HIM THE DOOR. WALK OVER AND OPEN THE DOOR FOR HIM. NOW, CLOSE THE DOOR. YOU HEAR THE PHONE RING. PICK IT UP. THEY'RE GIVING YOU TERRIBLE NEWS. LOOK STUNNED AND HANG UP THE PHONE.
"It happens once in every film," the actor said. "If you haven't had time to rehearse and it's a scene without dialogue. NO, TWO FEET TO YOUR RIGHT. DON'T GO IN. NO, DO GO IN! OHHHHHH!! It's acting by numbers."
On stage, however, he once wished he had the numbers. It was an actor's nightmare: a line forgotten. And what a time to forget: right in the middle of Hamlet's famous soliloquy, during a show a few years ago at Manhattan's Public Theatre.
"There are a lot of `to dies' and `to sleeps' in that speech," he said, easily falling into character as he begins reciting. "It's the part where I'm saying, `To die, to sleep, perchance to dream.'
" `To die, to sleep, no more. And by asleep to say we end the heartache, and the thousand natural shocks. . . . To die, to sleep, to sleep, perchance to dream.'
"One day, where I've done a matinee and I've already said all those words, I was doing the evening show. You go, `To die, to sleep.' Then I thought, `I just said that. Did I just say that now or did I say it this afternoon? How many times have I said it. Is it time to say, "To die, to sleep, to sleep, perchance to dream"? Or is it time to say "To die, to sleep, no more . . . " Which is it?'
"You do get out of it. You do one of those great, dramatic Barrymore pauses and go back into the speech. The audience says, `Wow! He's really in it now!' "