J. Rentilly
NEW YORK (TNA) – Once you’ve seen the ravaged, solipsistic face of actor Tobin Bell, particularly in the wildly successful “Saw” film franchise, part four of which opens in theaters Oct. 26, you will not forget it. The 65-year-old Bell is possessed of an indelible visage that, despite a career that spans more than three decades, has only recently sunk its hooks into the collective consciousness.
“I don’t how mainstream the success of the ‘Saw’ movies is, really. I don’t see too many country-clubbers at the multiplex, if you know what I mean,” he deadpans. “But I guess these movies I’ve been making recently are more mainstream than the ones I did that were seen by, uh, nobody.”
In the “Saw” films, Bell is John Kramer, aka Jigsaw, the Bogeyman personified, a bent collision of Rube Goldberg devices and radical Old Testament pathology. As played by Bell, Jigsaw has become one of pop culture’s most celebrated film characters.
Though the Massachusetts-raised Bell had fleeting roles in Martin Scorsese's "Goodfellas" and TV's "24," it wasn't until the "Saw" film franchise launched five years ago that the tide turned significantly in the actor's favor. He is now recognized often and routinely makes guest appearances at fan events worldwide.
“That’s always a good thing, unless of course I’m playing a guy who’s supposed to disappear into the woodwork,” he says.
“Someone asked Anthony Hopkins once how he prepared to play the butler in ‘Remains of the Day,’ and Hopkins said he’d talked to a butler for some famous person and the guy said, ‘Your main job is to not be there. Be invisible,’” says Bell. “I’m going to have to work on that, I guess. Especially if someone wants me to play a butler.”
For a lot of years, despite solid chops, no one wanted Bell to play much of anything. As a child, Bell followed his mother into the world of theater, appearing in a handful of plays as a child actor, parking cars at a summer stock theater in upstate New York, and graduating to spotlight operator in his teens.
“It was a 1,000-seat house with an aluminum roof and they’d do these musicals, ‘Oklahoma,’ ‘Brigadoon,’ ‘Anything Goes.’ It was just marvelous stuff, and I got to watch it all from my perch, above everything, running the spotlight, smoking cigarettes, feeling like a big deal,” he says.
“But when it rained, you couldn’t hear anything but that aluminum roof,” he says. “It just drowned out everything.”
Still, Bell was not convinced he was an actor, and instead spent his college years pursuing a master’s degree in environmental education from Boston University. Then one night, legendary actors Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn visited campus to discuss their lives and careers in the entertainment industry.
“It sounded so … civilized,” he recalls. “Like the pursuit of something of value, as opposed to, you know, getting a job for an insurance company. It seemed special. Distinguished.”
After graduation, Bell packed his belongings into his old Studebaker, tied his mattress to the roof of his car, and drove to New York to pursue his dream. Day one, the aspiring actor grabbed a burger from a hole in the wall on 79th Street and returned to find himself the victim of a classic New York robbery.
“Everything that was in the car was gone – my entire record collection, record player, some books. All of it,” he says. “Except the mattress. It was still tied to the roof.
“That was my intro to the Big Apple.”
Undaunted, Bell found his way into acting classes with theater guru Lee Strasberg and Oscar-nominated actress Ellen Burstyn, and continued plugging away.
“I had no idea it would take me 20 years before I began to work,” he says.
To keep the roof up, Bell worked myriad odd jobs, but “emerged pretty much unscathed from the potential for lots of trouble,” he says.
“I worked in a lot of restaurants, a lot of bars, and stayed up way too late, drinking way too much, but I stayed clear of trouble almost all the time.”
The exception? Bell was arrested once for refusing to leave a storefront on a police officer’s request.
“I thought I was a tax-paying citizen and didn’t have to move on,” he says. “It was a minor infraction, although it was pretty major when I saw the inside of that cell.”
Then the work began – small but significant roles in films like “Mississippi Burning,” “In the Line of Fire,” and TV shows like “NYPD Blue” and “The X-Files.” Because of his prodigious abilities at portraying multi-dimensional villains, even with limited screen time, Bell has become one of the big- and small-screen’s go-to guys for dastardly doings. He says he is not concerned with typecasting.
“This is a business and if people have seen you do something and do it well, they think of you as doing that. That doesn’t concern me,” he says. “It’s my job as an artist, as an actor, to change that if I want to change that. But I welcome playing the guys I play – they’re often times rich, powerful, and edgy. They’re fun. They’re all part of the human palette.
“Besides, I have no doubt that when the right role comes around I will play it and play it well,” he says. “I haven’t yet played the role that I will be most known for.”
That said, audiences around the world do know Bell, and know him well, for his disturbingly controlled performances in the “Saw” films, diabolical thrillers with sudden gusts of labyrinthine and soaring gore. Bell, who has coached little league sports for many years and is also a noted wildlife photographer, says he can relate to the “Saw” character Jigsaw ”on a human level.”
Though Bell favors the psychological thrills of films like “Jacob’s Ladder” and “The Dead Zone” over the shred-‘em-behead-‘em gore of films like “Hostel,” he sees horror films as a key part of pop culture, and refuses the notion that violence in film generates violence in the “real world.”
“Having talked with as many ‘Saw’ fans as I have, I have to tell you, I think these people approach horror as a hobby, almost. I don’t think they take it particularly seriously,” he says. “I think it’s a visceral experience they have when they go into the theater.”
Bell certainly understands if Jigsaw’s horrific executions are not everyone’s cup of tea.
“I don’t think anyone’s misrepresenting what the ‘Saw’ films are. You know what to expect when you buy a ticket.
“My job as an actor is to create and interpret the human condition, whatever it is,” he says. “If it is written, I will play it, and some people may be offended by it. Please, don’t come.
“I’m much more frightened by the real world, and how human beings seem incapable of learning from their experiences and continue creating the same problems around the world over and over again,” he adds.
But does the actor himself have such a devilish streak? Is there anything truly naughty about Tobin Bell?
“I don’t know. I was raised a Catholic, so there must be some naughty, hell-bent side of me. I can’t believe there isn’t,” he says.
“I hope there is, anyway,” he laughs. “I don’t want to be too much of one thing.”