Mortensen rooted in his portrayal
Viggo Mortensen, who was nominated for an Academy Award for his riveting performance in EASTERN PROMISES, rooted his portrayal in the father-son dynamic as well. And though at the time he was offered the role, the actor was coming off a period of working a lot and looking forward to a break, he says, but when he got the script and read the book, there was no way he couldn't do it.
"I thought, 'Wow, it's going to be pretty hard to say no to something like this, this kind of character.' It's one of those books that's hard to put down, once it gets going you want to know how it turns out," he says.
When The Road was first published, the novel was chosen by Oprah Winfrey for her influential book list, and that helped get it out there in the universal consciousness, to be accepted by the public in addition to the critics who have always sparked to McCarthy's work. "The reason so many people have read this book," adds Mortensen, "is that It really struck a chord in America. The story is universal. Any parent that cares about their kid, has these feelings, these doubts, these fears, these concerns. What's going to happen when I'm gone? Is my kid going to be all right? If my kid gets sick what's going to happen? But the main one is what will happen when I'm not around."
In this story, Mortensen notes, that basic human concern is cranked up a few notches because it takes place in a bleak universe where every human certainty is gone.  "It's taken to an extreme," he says. "It's not just that I'll be gone and his mother will take care of him or his aunt, extended family or just society somehow. There's nobody. Zero. If I'm gone he's alone in the world. As extreme as that is it still connects for people with their own families. Any mother, any father, how they feel about their child, what they worry about.
"So, all those things are worth exploring," he says of his preparation for playing The Man in this movie of McCarthy's dystopian saga, "I realized that I had that inside of me. I needed to just sort of look inside to play this."
The story of THE ROAD is simple, yet compelling, and though there are other characters, it's really about the father and the son. Mortensen says the deep questions the book raises were what led him to find the soul of his character. "Because of what the story's about, and because of the thoughts I had when I first read the script and the book,' he says, "It made me think about what's happening, what does the future hold?  When we are no more, what does it mean?
"In a way, that's what this story is about. What happens when everything is taken from you? I mean everything. These two people, this man and this boy, that's what's happened. And when you think nothing else can be taken, the boy loses everything.  Even more. That's a pretty good recipe for a drama, if it's handled right.  What happens when everything is taken from you?  How do you behave, how do you react?  How do you deal with people who you fear might take more things from you?  Or people who have things that you don't have. And when you're tired, when you're afraid of them, how do you react.  Do you act aggressively?  Sometimes.  Do you try to stay away from them?  Probably.  If you think you can, do you take their things?  Sometimes you do, even if you think of yourself as a good guy.  All those things happen in the story, all these tests.  The tests of: what happens when you think everything's been taken from you. That's what carrying the fire means, even if you think they've taken everything from you, the fact that you're sitting here, thinking about it and complaining about it means they haven't. You're still here.  Until you're not here, they haven't taken everything from you."
Mortensen adds that the film's title is more than ironic. "I knew that if we did it right, it would be a challenge emotionally. I would have to go on a journey."
For director Hillcoat, there was never any question that Viggo Mortensen should play the father. During the concept stage of pre-production, he says, his vision for the father was one of stolid strength heartened by a palpable inner vulnerability. His ideal for the role would be someone on the order of Gregory Peck. "It became clear that Viggo could be an everyman but also could have the intensity and the physicality the role demands. His character goes through a range of emotions."
If anyone could survive in a post-apocalyptic world, the director says, it would be Viggo. "It's such a challenging and extreme survival world that he has to do things that have to be credible," he says. And yet, the role requires not only physical verisimilitude, but the ability to show tenderness and inner strength. "For some actors it might be a stretch that they're so tender and sensitive to a child and yet be able to physically do what he has to do. Viggo's very intense and very wound up, and that is what the father is all about. He's so haunted by the suicide of his loved one-his wife and partner-and yet he has this incredible protective relationship with his son. It is a love story, and in such a challenging and extreme survival world, he has to do things that have to be credible."
When Mortensen committed to the role, he began a period of intense preparation involving research the character and the extreme milieu of the story. He immersed himself in the world of the novel and its extreme hypothetical situation. His research took him not only to books and materials, but also to noticing the patterns and habits of people in our times who must exist by their wits, scraping the refuse bin of society--the homeless. The actor also had some conversations with Comic McCarthy, mostly about McCarthy's own relationship with his young son John Francis, to whom he dedicated the novel. "We talked about his relationship with his own boy and I talk about my son and how he was at the age of the character in the book," he says. "I thought about what I felt about my own family, my relations. A lot of chapters have ended as I was starting to shoot this and while I was shooting this. It's made me think about things, from years ago that I hadn't thought about. In terms of my son, when he was the age of the character of the boy now.  "
But for this movie, a science fiction tale about two isolated people walking thousands of miles across a dead planet, the actor's preparation would have to be about a lot more than internal geography. Mortensen has been described as a physical actor who incorporates his surroundings into his method, and this is another reason why he was perfectly cast to play the father. When the elements, the weather and the terrain get tough, Viggo gets going.
"Different actors have different process that they use. What I've seen with Viggo is that he is able to use the environment more so than any other actor I've worked with before to put him where he needs to be emotionally," says producer Simmons, who had a lot to do with the physical setup of the film and its locations. "And maybe it's pouring down rain, and he'll walk away from umbrellas, raincoats. He'll walk away from any tent that's being offered or any blanket to be intentionally cold and wet, and it seems to take him to a place that's quite remarkable. I've seen it happen over and over again in the snow, the rain, cold, the fog - anything that he is able to use that puts him in the world of the character. He's a very physical actor as well, and it's been a remarkable process to watch that. I would imagine it takes an enormous amount of concentration to be able to not let the cold ground or the rocks on the road or whatever it may be break your concentration, but it's taken him to a place that is pretty amazing over and over and over again."
Nick Wechsler concurs. "Viggo has the perfect qualities as a man and as an actor to do this part. He's got incredible depth of soul. He so immerses himself in a particular character you think, 'Wow, that is the character. That's not an actor playing the character.' And that's what we wanted for this part-- somebody who submerges himself into the role as well as any actor I've ever worked with."
Though the role of the father was sought after by many leading actors in Hollywood, there was never a question in the minds of the filmmakers that if they could get him, he would define the character. "Viggo was born to play this part, and he's absolutely riveting," says producer Steve Schwartz. "Part of the challenge for an actor doing a movie like this--where the material is so dark and where there is so much sadness and cruelty--is to stay in role amidst the tumult of the set. There's a lot of stuff going on on this set. There's stuff being moved, there's noise, there's rain and horrific weather--a lot of diversions. I was overwhelmed by the actor's ability to stay focused and stay in role. And I hope I'm not saying something out of school here--and I don't know how Viggo will feel about this--but for the first few days of the shoot, he slept in his clothes to stay in role. He paid attention to every detail. If his shoes weren't wet enough, he would spray himself. He was totally absorbed and obsessed with the part. He became The Man."
The producer continues, "As a result of that, I would say that this probably wouldn't be described as a particularly chatty set because when Viggo and Kodi were in the zone, people didn't want to mix it up with them. So, I don't know how Viggo and Kodi felt about being ignored sometimes, but when we saw them in that zone, we gave them space. And Kodi had his own way of staying in his zone. It was very impressive."

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Casting the role of the boy was crucial
In order for THE ROAD to come together, it was clear to the filmmakers that casting the role of The Boy would be crucial. As grueling as the shoot was for Mortensen and the crew, the pre-teen actor who plays the son would have to be both a survivor and a great natural actor to keep up. After a series of casting sessions, they found that actor in Kodi Smit-McPhee, scion of a thespian family whose father Andy is an acting coach. Kodi's portrayal of another son opposite Eric Bana in ROMULUS, MY FATHER brought him to the attention of the filmmakers.
Though the casting process was thorough, encompassing a few hundred boys from around the United States and in Canada, an audition tape that Kodi's dad had sent from Australia was the one that won out. Wechsler explains that Kodi was the obvious choice. "This movie rises and falls with how well the actor does that plays the boy," he says. "And Kodi survived the challenge of all those boys and ultimately was the one that we had to go with because he had a soulful quality to him. He had charisma if you can attribute that word to a young boy. We knew that he would pop. We knew that he was the one."
The choice of Kodi Smit-McPhee made sense for many reasons, not the least of which was his affinity with the camera. The producers--and Mortensen, his co-star-- were taken aback by the young actor's talent, professionalism and work ethic. "What does it mean to have talent as an actor?" says Simmons. "You look at Kodi and he can get to these moments that are real. It's a remarkable thing to see from take to take. He'll be working on something and all of a sudden he'll hit it and it just rings true. The thing I'm most impressed about with Kodi is his discipline - his concentration.
"I mean he's an 11-year-old boy. I remember what I was like when I was 11. I was running around playing army, doodling cartoons, and all of that. But Kodi comes in--Kodi works nine hours a day. He comes to set in the morning, goes through make-up and hair, he's on the set and he's focused like an adult actor. He has a presence that's quite remarkable. And then he'll turn right around and run off the set and play with another 10-year-old boy, and they're out there playing cowboys and Indians and it's a great thing to see. And then when he's done with that he comes back on the set and he's this amazing actor again."
To hear Viggo Mortensen tell it, the movie will be memorable not because of anything he might have done, but because of the extraordinary talents of his child-actor co-star.
"He's an extraordinary, extraordinary actor." Mortensen says. "I think that his performance will be a historic performance. Honestly, I think it's going to be one of those that people remember for years … for years."
Were it not for the young actor's intensity, he adds, the movie would be a good movie, but with it, it'll be a real film. "When I read the script, I thought 'Well they need to find the best child actor ever, or the best young actor in the world to play this part. With an actor as good as Kodi it could be a really good movie. I have really enjoyed being on the ride with him."
And like the father in the saga who learns from his son, Mortensen says that working with Kodi was a revelation as an actor. "Kodi has great instincts, great presence and most importantly he has the gift of being able to relax to the point where he's always in the moment.  He's almost never out of the real moment that's happening, not the script but what's really happening on the set, what's happening between the two of us. Most of the story is these two people--a man and a boy. They are pretty much always wearing the same filthy clothing. They don't talk much. The weather is uniformly terrible. it's brutal, very hard core. But if it works you can go on a real emotional journey, you could use the word spiritual journey."
The interaction between the boy and his father is what carries the story and elevates it above mere science fiction. While in the novel, there is much description of how the two interact with the tortured landscape and the battered environment, in a movie, which is a visual medium, all that must be conveyed with nuance and acting alone. Mortensen is convinced, he says, that the core of this inspired exposition in THE ROAD comes from Kodi.
"The book has some vivid descriptions of these barren landscapes of this inhospitable weather, it's very beautiful," he adds. "But we don't use that. What you get though, that you can't get in book, is all the subtleties of the interaction of the character with their environment and most especially of the Man and the Boy, how they relate to each other.  So much happens between the words, and that is especially true because Kodi is such a fine actor.  He's very attuned to what's going on, anything that happens, any error that happens. He welcomes the little accidents that happen. Kodi always goes with it so there is something extra.
"Each scene that's already on the page looks likes it's charged with emotion and you think, 'Well, how are we going to there,'" Mortensen says. "I think without exception, thanks to Kodi's way of working, we've always taken it a step further. There has been another layer, there's been something unexpected that came out of him or that happened between us. It has been a great ride, I can honestly say that in all the movies I've been a part of, all the scenes, all the rehearsals with actors from all over the world--I've been lucky, I've been able to work with some very good performers--I have never had a better acting partner, ever. That's from the oldest most experienced decorated performers to newer, younger, raw talent. I have never worked with someone who is so consistently in the moment, so consistently there with you. His performance will make this one of those movies that you watch years from now. I really think that."
There is a pivotal scene in THE ROAD which illustrates the bonding that took place between the two actors. During an encounter with a member of a roving gang, the father has to shoot the man to protect his son. Later, he takes the boy to a stream and attempts to wash the boy's hair in the freezing-cold water. "Now, that stream is snowmelt, so that stream is probably forty-five degrees - it's really cold," says Rudd Simmons, who along with an astonished crew watched the scene in awe. "The man takes the boy in his arms, and he dips his head in water--the blood and the gore from the gang member is splattered all over the boy--and he very gently rubs away the blood, and the boy comes back to life. Now that's the way it's scripted."
Simmons continues to explain the scene: "What happened was Viggo picked up Kodi, dipped his head in water, and the water was such a shock to Kodi, it literally jolted him alive. And he started to cry because it was so painful, and he couldn't stop. And so Viggo took him in his arms and cradled him, and literally brought him back to life in that moment. It's a remarkable scene. Viggo picked him up in his arms and took him over to a clearing right away from the stream in the sunlight. And he put him down, and he just cradled him and rocked him in the sun.
"Kodi's dad, Andy, came over and--if that had been my son, I would have jumped right in to see what I could have done. But Andy's a wonderful actor, he's a wonderful director, he's been working with Kodi as an acting coach. And Andy knew to step back and let Viggo and Kodi as actors have that moment together, where Kodi has gone to a place--a bad place--and Viggo is now helping bring him back. It was a remarkable thing to see. I think from that moment on, their relationship changed, and they became inseparable for the rest of the movie. They became like father and son to each other."
Mortensen picks up the story of that pivotal scene from his own generous point of view: "It was quite cold, there was still snow on the ground, and when I had to wash Kodi's head in that stream it was really, really cold water--there was still ice on the edges. And it was one of those moments that actually could have gone different ways, but the way it went was that when I pulled his head out of the water on the second take he was almost in shock, his head was hurting so bad from the cold, and I didn't realize how much it had upset him until I looked right into his eyes, right in the middle of the take, and he wasn't gone but he was really in real pain."
The actor, who has played opposite some of the seasoned greats--Al Pacino, Sean Penn, Ed Harris, Cate Blanchett, Robert Forster, Armin Mueller-Stahl--speaks of his young co-star in tones normally reserved for some icon of the Actor's Studio. "And I just looked at him, but he stayed in character, this is the kind of actor he is," Mortensen says, "And he called me Papa and he's crying there for real, but he played the scene, yet I knew that it was really him. He's a brilliant young actor. He has a presence, he is appealing to look at and he is consistent from take to take … pushing himself, pushing himself, pushing me … pushing everybody."
It is both a tribute to Mortensen's own generosity and to Kodi's talents that Viggo's assessment of Kodi's performance is so effusive. "That day, it was almost like something broke and expanded inside him as an actor," he continues. "I've seen ROMULUS, MY FATHER, the movie he won awards for in Australia, and he's very good in that movie--really good--yet I think, however, that in this movie he goes way beyond what he did in ROMULUS. He had already done that by the time we were done shooting the scene by the stream.  But that day he kind of stepped it up, he went into another gear and most importantly I think the connection between us really was cemented somehow, in that moment and in the aftermath of that take. His father Andy is really good with him and he's also an actor, so he's very grounded and he has a real understanding of the process of preparing from day to day and what goes into a scene. There have been many, many moments like that that have led us deeper into the story than you would expect when you read the script, and closer to each other as people too."

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