“A Different Man’s” point of view is layered, introspective, and completely unique. The second collaboration between actor Adam Pearson and writer-director Aaron Schimberg — the two previously worked together on Schimberg’s “Chained for Life” — is based on a real-life dialogue between Pearson and Schimberg (with Sebastian Stan joining in later on) on disfigurement, visible difference, and the ongoing process of self-acceptance.
Pearson advised Stan on his role as Edward, an aspiring actor with neurofibromatosis (often shortened to NF1) who gets everything he thought he ever wanted when he signs up for an experimental procedure that makes him look like everybody else (or like Sebastian Stan, even better). Then Pearson — who also has NF1 — enters the narrative as the cocky, gregarious Oswald, whose charisma holds a mirror up to Edward’s lack of confidence and makes him question everything he knows about himself and the world.
Schimberg approaches the material with both vulnerability — the subject is personal for him, too, as he explains in our interview — and a refreshingly dark and sardonic sense of humor. Edward’s fate is a cosmic joke being played on him by his creator (i.e., Schimberg), who’s written a script that continually brings suffering upon a character he also says is partially based on himself. The complicated cycle of self-awareness, self-hatred, and meta commentary at play in that dynamic is typical of “A Different Man,” a film whose nuances beget more nuance in turn.
We spoke with Pearson, Stan, and Schimberg after a screening of “A Different Man” at Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas, in an interview that went deep immediately — so much so, that we only got to ask a small portion of the questions we had prepared.
Adam, you told Sebastian some stories from your life to inform his performance — what was the back and forth between you guys in developing your characters? They really are two sides of the same coin.
Adam Pearson: I think when you enter an endeavor like this, be it creative or otherwise, honesty and transparency are always beneficial. Unless I can get to a place where I’m going to be open and honest [with] Sebastian, then there’s no point in doing it. I go into everything with a clear head and a full heart and complete openness and trust. In a weird way, I let people potentially disappoint me, [but that] was never going to happen on this [project].
We were just honest with each other. We had the open conversations. Some things were more comfortable than others, but unless we were prepared to go there and push through the discomfort, we’d have no right to ask an audience to do the same when they’re watching the film. So the ethos off screen was used to design the ethos on screen.
Sebastian Stan: The dynamic was very clear in the script, so I just felt that it [would be] good for us to meet and connect and figure out how we work and how we can get in there and make sure we’re all on the same page. A lot of those early meetings were [about], do we all share the same goal? Because sometimes you get into a film and someone’s in the wrong movie.
Of course, I was also excited to see Adam and how he was going to fully steamroll into the film. [Laughs]
So what was the goal, then? Was it what Adam was talking about, honesty and pushing through?
SS: The goal was serving Aaron’s vision of the film, and serving the story as truthfully as possible without falling into any of the tropes and stereotypes of trying to be funny or trying to educate or wink at the audience or make them feel bad. There’s a real tightrope of tone that I think Aaron can speak to, in terms of really giving the audience an elevated experience beyond our surface-level reactions towards people that look different. And judging by the disabled people who have said to us, “I just want to say thank you,” I think we’ve reached that goal.
What do you think about what Sebastian said about tone, Aaron?
Aaron Schimberg: Tone comes naturally to me. I don’t really judge it — actually, I do, I agonize about it beforehand. But then it becomes what it is. And it’s really just my point of view on the subject, which is personal for me. I’m always coming from a personal place about it.
Some of the tone comes from trying to avoid the tropes and cliches about the subject. I’ve always felt sort of oppressed by [the way] we view disability. I’ve always been scared of people with a positive attitude — when I was growing up, it was the Special Olympics, and being “special,” and these infantilizing ideas about disability that bothered me, even as a child. You think you’re giving me a compliment, but it’s not really a compliment.
It’s patronizing.
AS: Yeah, it’s patronizing. I’ve always felt patronized. So I always [thought] you couldn’t show somebody who feels positively about disfigurement or disability in a film, because it’s tied up with this infantilization, this patronizing attitude. This film comes out of trying to ask, “how do I get there? How do I show a positive representation of disfigurement?”
I started on the other end, with the cliché of the lonely sad disfigured man. If I do that, I’m also able to put my own pain and the real microaggressions and aggressions that come from that [into it], so it’s a more well-rounded portrait at least. Then we slowly pass the torch to Adam.
None of this ever would’ve occurred to me without knowing Adam. Adam played a shy character in my first film who is based on myself. I’m shy. And I’ve never really had a positive attitude about — not only about my disfigurement, but about anything. I’ve always blamed [everything] on my cleft palate. And so meeting Adam, and seeing that he’s somebody who takes control of how he wants to be perceived, that was an inspiration to me.
It also discombobulated me because I thought, “I could have been different. Could I have viewed all this differently? Could I have not let this stop me? Have I been leaning on this too much?” I was dealing with those feelings honestly in the script. It allowed me to create a new kind of portrayal, which I know to be truthful because Adam showed me a new way to be disabled.
Actually, that does lead me to something — I wanted to talk to you about your performance, Adam. These guys were saying it’s an exaggerated version of you in real life. What was exaggerated?
AP: The clothing was greatly exaggerated, which I appreciated. But also the mannerisms, bigger movements, a different kind of voice work — I would never be that chipper in real life. If I did, all my friends would be like, “what are you doing? How much do you need to borrow right now?” So yeah, just turning the volume up ever so slightly. The whole jujitsu saxophone thing is completely made up.
Yoga in the park.
AP: I can’t do any of that. He’s just such an interesting character. “I ran off to Tangiers with my professor.” Of course he did. Surprised, but not.
Speaking of these two characters being two sides of the same coin and what you were saying about representation that isn’t patronizing: In my mind, Edward and Oswald represent two paths forward for people with disfigurements. Are you going to be confident like Oswald and let your personality push through, or are you going to collapse inside of yourself like Edward does? That choice, or that message — it is part of what you were trying to do here?
AS: A lot of people seem to come away with the message of, “the grass is always greener. You should accept yourself and love yourself.” And those issues are brought up in the film. Is the grass always greener? Can you accept yourself?
But to me, there’s no moral judgment on self-acceptance. Not everybody can do it. I haven’t been able to fully accept myself. Anybody who posts an Instagram story where they put a filter on themselves — in some ways they’re creating a mask. And I don’t judge that. To me, the movie is about that struggle. Some of it may just be the way Edward was born. Some of it is what he’s been made into, or what society or other people’s judgments have made him, or the way he was raised, or any number of things. And when you can’t accept yourself, or you have to struggle to do it, it’s easy enough to say, “well, just love yourself.”
And that can be trite and patronizing, too.
AS: And maybe you get there some days but you fall off and you wake up and you’re struggling again. So it’s not a judgment for me, but it is about that process and how painful it can be.
AP: It is a rough process, self-acceptance and self-love. I don’t think it’s a one-size-fits-all shop, and we all have good days and bad days. I think in order to love yourself, you’ve got to wake up saying, “Alexa, play ‘Macho Man’ by The Village People” and dance around in some kind of bizarre ritual of self-confidence.
And I think that’s particularly true now that we all have our little low self-esteem machines in our pocket, and we’re forever comparing our behind-the-scenes to other people’s greatest hits. And no one’s taught these young people any sort of media literacy to be like, “A) that’s one moment in time, and B) that’s airbrushed to high heaven.” We’ve got all these people chasing something that they’re never going to get, because it doesn’t exist. Even if they did get it, they’d have no idea what to do with it. It’s a dog chasing a fire engine. There’s a Jim Carrey quote — and I hope that I don’t butcher it here — but he said that he wishes everyone could achieve their hopes and dreams, so they’d realize it won’t make them happy.
SS: I think there are a million Edwards walking around, and they’re not necessarily disfigured. [There’s] this obsession we’ve all succumbed to with other people’s lives, and I really blame social media for that, in a lot of ways. It’s so detrimental to the self, the consumerism of it all in America and how we take advantage of each other for profit. You have people that are truly looking for any kind of validation to feel okay about themselves. And instead we’re just pulling them and coaxing them and manipulating them. So they’re just constantly chasing this ghost, a shadow version of themselves.
How did you put it, Adam? The dog chasing the car?
AP: The dog catching the fire engine. What are you going to do now? You can’t drive!
SS: This film obviously deals with a lot of that. I worry that people aren’t interested in going that deep and actually asking themselves, “what is it about me that I hate? What is it about me that I judge or I love or I’m happy with?”
AP: And if you can’t do it in 280 characters, it’s “too long, didn’t read, on to the next one.”
SS: The other thing that I worry about is that we’ve gotten into such a selective thinking mindset that we’re at risk of depriving ourselves of going deeper. It’s much easier to just write something off. “That’s wrong, that’s right, that’s it, I don’t have to think about it any more.”
AS: “Do better.”
SS: Right. “Do better.” Do you have the solution, then? I love that everyone’s a critic, but where’s the solution on your part? What’s your contribution?
AP: Where’s the nuance? Nuance is one of the saddest bits we’ve lost in our society.