What does Chris Pine do when life gets a little uncomfortable? According to the Hollywood leading man, he cracks a joke.
“We all have our own s***,” the “People Like Us” star tells Zap2It. “You learn early on what your defense mechanisms are, and I love humor. I love joking around, and deflecting is always fun and easy. And we all do it.”
“Go to any cocktail party that’s what everybody’s doing,” he points out. “No one’s talking about anything real. But that’s human nature. What are we gonna do just go cry together and have cathartic words? It’s not gonna happen.”
The movie hits theaters July 29, and teams Pine with stars Elizabeth Banks and Michelle Pfeiffer in a drama about a complex, non-conventional family that seems to match the description of most relationships these days.
Addressing the flaws of his character, the actor says, in many ways, he’s similar to his alter-ego, particularly when all those shortcomings “hit the fan.”
“The fun of it is, these people, who’ve learned to go through life with humor and wit and sarcasm and jabs, finally all that is stripped away,” he says. “All those tools are taken away and what they’re left with is something they’re not very good at. Certainly, I’ve learned to be better about it for sure. Being absolutely present and authentic and real and just absolutely there for the other person.”
“The question actors [get asked] a lot of times – why do you like to play whatever damaged character?” he says. “Damaged characters reflect who we all our in real life, I think. I mean no one’s perfect, there’s the defining feature of growing up and maturing and becoming a better person.”
