Peter Dinklage Steps Into the Spotlight With Cyrano and a Telluride Tribute

Even earlier than the world premiere of Cyrano on the Telluride Movie Competition, business insiders had been buzzing concerning the awards potential of the musical by Joe Wright— notably for its star, Peter Dinklage.

He’s, in spite of everything, a document four-time Emmy winner for his work on Sport of Thrones, a two-time SAG Award winner, and had a strong profession in movies like The Station Agent and Elf even earlier than Westeros got here calling. And within the stage model of Cyrano, which was written by his spouse playwright Erica Schmidt and performed Off-Brodway in 2019, Dinklage’s work as Cyrano de Bergerac had already been widely praised. So why wouldn’t the movie model elevate that work to a different stage?

It was one other signal of confidence that Dinklage was the primary tribute honoree at this yr’s Telluride Movie Competition, which kicked off Thursday night time. Earlier than the world premiere of Cyrano Dinklage took the stage to obtain his silver medallion and have a dialog about his profession, from his first characteristic—1995’s Residing in Oblivion— to The Station Agent and Sport of Thrones.

Dinklage was requested about Residing in Oblivion by which his character, an actor, yells at a director for utilizing a dwarf in a dream sequence as a result of it’s such a cliche. When requested how he approaches scripts that will use his dwarfism as a strategy to poke enjoyable at a personality, he mentioned “it’s all concerning the good writing and the way it’s addressed.” He added, “I feel it’s important to clear the air to make folks snug. It’s alright to chuckle at me, with me—my rage or the character’s or humor about it. After which we are able to transfer ahead. Not that I’m some kind of pioneer, however I feel it’s essential for all of us to have some humor about it after which we are able to transfer ahead.”

Dinklage additionally spoke about his time on Sport of Thrones as Tyrion Lannister, and the way he made positive that the character wouldn’t be a fantasy style cliché. Taking part in Tyrion for years, he mentioned, he was capable of finding an increasing number of depth within the character.

“TV just isn’t valuable. Actors could be so valuable. Actors generally are so valuable and the second needs to be excellent, however I talked a fuck-load on that present, and while you do 10 years on a TV present… that goes out the window,” he mentioned. “However in that, it’s like somebody who builds homes, each home is best. You lean into the textual content. In case you’re fortunate sufficient to have good writers, you simply belief that. You’re not valuable anymore.”

With Sport of Thrones in his rear-view mirror, Cyrano could possibly be the movie that strikes Dinklage from the Emmy dialog to the Oscar dialog. Primarily based on the traditional 1897 play, this model modifications Cyrano’s bodily hangup from a big nostril to his peak. The story follows Cyrano as he pines after his love Roxanne (Haley Bennett), however is satisfied she may by no means love somebody who appeared like him. So as a substitute, he helps a good-looking man named Christian (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) write love letters to Roxanne.

When Cyrano started after Dinklage’s Q&A, the movie swept up its first-ever viewers in a romantic story filled with lavish costumes, attractive backdrops and spirited musical numbers. All of it results in an emotional and tragic third act of the story (a number of members of the viewers could possibly be heard crying). On the middle of all of it is Dinklage, who delivers a charming and emotional efficiency—sprinkled with straightforward humor and wit—as a person who feels undeserving of affection.

That mixture of dramatic chops and comedic timing was a key component of Tyrion on Sport of Thrones, and Dinklage proved he possesses loads of it himself on that stage. “Painters can paint by themselves. Actors can do nothing by themselves,” he mentioned. “We’re depending on writers and administrators to carry our hand. We’re instructed the place to go, when to eat, what to put on. We’re actually simply huge fats infants.”