For Hollywood actor Willem Dafoe, his experience in the Philippines in 1986 — where he wound up joining the EDSA People Power Revolution — will always be memorable.
He had arrived in the Philippines to make "Platoon," a movie about the Vietnam War that had ended more than a decade earlier. Instead, he found himself stranded inside a country confronting its own political history in real time.
Dafoe landed in the Philippines in February 1986 to work on Oliver Stone's movie, fatigued from an international flight but ready to report to work.
FROM 2019: Willem Dafoe recalls being at 1986 EDSA Revolution
"Platoon" had already survived a remarkable journey to the Philippines because Stone had spent years trying to get the story made. Inspired by his own experiences as a soldier, Stone eventually was able to start production with a reported budget of about $6 million.
For a production built around the chaos of war, the Philippine People Power reality had supplied a striking interruption for Dafoe and cinematographer Robert Richardson, who went into the streets and found themselves among the crowds around one of the focal points of the EDSA revolt. It was an experience that Dafoe still remembers through the warmth of the people who recognized what it meant for foreigners to stand alongside them.
"I went to the Manila Garden Hotel, I remember, and I closed the shades and took a nap. And when I woke up, I opened those shades and saw tanks down the street. And then I turned on the TV, and the news was going crazy," he recalled.
"And it had started, you know, this face-off with Marcos and people on the street. And then, I get a phone call that said, 'You cannot— We can't get you out now. Just sit tight. The film is canceled, but we'll get you home when we can.' So I was there. I had never been in the Philippines before at that point. So eventually, Robert Richardson, the DP (director of photography), and I went out and were on the streets, and we were there in the blockade of Camp Aguinaldo, you know," he added.
"And that was crazy, also because a lot of Westerners had been kicked out by that time. So when the Filipino people saw Western people supporting their efforts, they were very sweet. So they were like, 'The world is watching.' That was very sweet. And I saw the power of the people."
The "Platoon" shoot resumed shortly after Marcos left, and it ultimately completed its 54-day production in the Philippines, with the cast going through military-style training in the country's forests.
The film that emerged from that historic Philippine period became one of the most acclaimed American movies about Vietnam.
Released in December 1986, "Platoon" received eight Academy Award nominations and won four, including Best Picture and Best Director for Stone. Dafoe was nominated for Supporting Actor for Sergeant Elias, the compassionate "Platoon" leader whose moral center gives the film a lot of its emotional weight.
Courtesy: Apple Original Films
In a recent conversation about his new Everest expedition film "Tenzing," Dafoe resists the idea that an actor's career should be understood as a climb toward a single summit. Clad in a plain, dark blue sweater and tailored pants, he sat comfortably in a Beverly Hills hotel room that's been converted into a press-junket space, answering questions with a fair amount of enthusiasm and openness.
His cheerful demeanor contrasted with the menacing villain roles he'd played so many times on-screen.
"First of all, I never think of it as a business," he says, talking about his acting career. "I think of it as an adventure. Yes, I'm very ambitious. I'm very disciplined in many ways. But I never had that monolithic thing, and I think it's maybe because I grew up in a very big family. I just saw there's so many ways to live. I'm interested in other people's Everests."
For decades, the actor has made a career out of inhabiting unusual characters and somehow finding the humanity beneath the surface. His sharp features and mischievous smile are familiar to generations of moviegoers.
Dafoe first found his footing in theater before earning early acclaim for films such as "Platoon" and "The Last Temptation of Christ".
Since then, he has moved freely between enormous studio productions and intimate independent films, playing everything from the Green Goblin in "Spider-Man" to the deeply compassionate motel manager in "The Florida Project".
His work has brought four Academy Award nominations and a reputation for choosing roles that other actors might hesitate to touch. Yet Dafoe's achievement seems less about longevity or acclaim than about the remarkable freedom he has maintained throughout his career. Even after decades in the spotlight, he remains an unpredictable actor who seems willing to follow curiosity wherever it leads.
It's an idea that has remained central to his working life. "Being an actor affords you, you know, leaving behind your held beliefs and going towards other people and kind of trying them on for size," he says. "I was an actor for many years before I really thought, 'Oh, I'm an actor'. It sounds strange, but it's true."
His approach becomes especially clear when he talks about his latest role as Colonel John Hunt in Jennifer Peedom's "Tenzing". The Apple Original Film, based on true events, follows Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary's Everest story. Genden Phuntsok plays Tenzing, Tom Hiddleston is Hillary, and Dafoe is Hunt, the British expedition leader.
Courtesy: Apple Original Films
The film is scheduled for select theatrical release on October 9, followed by its global Apple TV premiere on October 16.
For Dafoe, the challenge was less about constructing a character in isolation than understanding his function inside a moving organism.
"The challenge is always finding your place in the group," he says. "The story really isn't about Colonel Hunt, but I had to find out what his part was in the trajectory of the movie, and also as we're doing a lot of the climbing, I'm trying to find my place in relationship to the other actors, just to try to serve the movie best as I could."
He adds: "It's always about how to be that puzzle piece that completes the picture."
The philosophy extends beyond "Tenzing". Dafoe prefers discovering what the material, director, and other performers require of him.
"I seldom think in terms of character as much as the whole project and the people I'm working with," he says. Preparation matters to him, though he distrusts the kind of preparation that becomes rigid enough to dictate what must happen once cameras begin rolling. "Sometimes where people shoot themselves in the foot is when they prep everything in advance, and then they get there and they try to put a square peg into a round hole and force it," he says.
But if there's anything he's learned in the profession, it's adapting to the flow. Much like when, after finding out that he would be indefinitely stranded in Manila that fateful day in 1986, he figured out a way to do something that matters by participating in a rally that helped topple a dictator.
Similarly, during the "Tenzing" press conference the morning of our one-on-one interview, the 71-year-old actor described the logistics of filming in the snow-covered mountain. The cast and crew packed their own equipment, took helicopters to remote locations, and then worked after the aircraft disappeared from sight.
The practicalities of doing something as common as eating lunch provided him with amusement. "You'd carry a sandwich and something to drink, and the sandwich inevitably would be frozen solid. So, if you didn't eat it right away, you could forget that sandwich. I don't think I ever ate on the mountain," he says with a laugh. "I thought, 'This is ridiculous.' I even took a selfie of how hard it was."