Peter Sarsgaard discusses his role in 'Experimenter'
“We’re all living under rules that don’t make any sense, and we pay homage to it constantly: some of them are just inconvenient, and some of them are morally wrong.” - Peter Sarsgaard
“They almost didn’t feel like experiments – it felt like candid camera”, says award-winning actor Peter Sarsgaard who is referring to the obedience experiments carried out by social psychologist Stanley Milgram – the focus for Michael Almereyda’s latest feature, Experimenter.
Sarsgaard takes on the lead role of Milgram, who, in 1961, conducted a series of controversial experiments at Yale University that measured the willingness of students to obey an authority figure and perform acts that go against their conscience.
“I was interested in the style that he had – this dispassionate, academic attitude,” says Sarsgaard, who across his career has demonstrated a wide range as an actor, most notably as the murderous John Lotter in Boys Don’t Cry (1999), the kleptomaniac stoner Mark in Garden State (2004) and con-man David Goldman in An Education (2009).
Sarsgaard stated that the script for his latest film was by far his most unconventional to date. “This movie functions in a different way from other movies. It seemed so different, and it was honestly the most unusual script I had read in years.”
Milgram’s obedience experiments urged contributors [mostly young male stundents] to participate in a routine act that would allow them to shock a fellow applicant each time they would answer a question incorrectly. These experiments remain radical in the study of social psychology with many recordings of the sessions available for the public to view today. “He was very aware of the camera and acted not very well,” explains Sarsgaard. “Everyone perceived him to be pushing the boundaries of what was expectable. Meanwhile, he was acting like a visitor from another planet.”
Ironically, Experimenter itself is constructed to be viewed as an experiment, challenging the viewer of what is fiction and what is the reality. “This film is like a box of mirrors: there are elements that seem realer than other elements intentionally,” says Sarsgaard. “I was trying to latch on to reality, and there are so many levels [to that]. He created artificial layers so people couldn’t see the true interior of the guy: that’s an interesting thing for an actor to portray.”
Sarsgaard stars alongside Oscar nominee Winona Ryder, who takes on the role of Milgram’s wife, Sasha. “In terms of her character, she was afforded an opportunity to create something more authentic than I was,” he says. “As an onscreen couple we wanted to play with the idea that he was constructing an image of himself.” Both Sarsgaard and Ryder got to the opportunity to meet Sasha as well as several other members of Milgram’s family. “This was a person who reacted to fame in a very interesting way. Doing the experiment changes principles but the idea of being watched changes your behaviour and who you are.”
Experimenter director, Michael Almereyda, has, like Sarsgaard, had a varied career that began back in the 1980s when he started out as a screenwriter, documentarian and short filmmaker. Sarsgaard sees similarities in the approach Almereyda takes with his films, with that of Woody Allen, whom Sarsgaard was directed by in 2013 when he starred in Blue Jasmine. “Michael is very quiet, quiet calm and allows you to explore your character – Woody Allen is like that,” says Sarsgaard. “Halfway through this movie, I realised that this was like a Woody Allen movie: talking into the camera, talking about your life. I imagine Woody Allen would do a very different rendition of Stanley Milgram [laughs].”
Having started a career as a writer, Sarsgaard believes that storytelling should be the starting point for any actor beginning a new project. However, this was not the approach he took with Experimenter. “The story is always paramount to me, and this was dramatically different. I can’t think of any other movie where I didn’t think about the story – this was the only one.”
Experimenter premiered earlier this year at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival to critical praise. “I had no idea that the film was going to be as successful as it has. I was shocked,” says Sarsgaard. “Regardless of what you think of Milgram’s experiments, they ring true and say something about human nature that only somebody detached could have observed: for the rest of us it’s like ‘oh my god, I’ve been living this lie – this is wrong, morally wrong.’ This has rung true with a lot of people who have seen the film, and I’m glad we got to honour him.”
Sarsgaard recounted a recent experience that he had in which he had bought a toy for his daughter that was broken. Returning to the shop less than five minutes later, the store assistant explained that he would not allow Sarsgaard to replace the toy because he had not kept his receipt. “We run into this every day – I experience it all the time,” he explains. “We’re all living under rules that don’t make any sense, but we pay homage to it constantly: some of them are just inconvenient, and some of them are morally wrong.”
Experimenter depicts the commendable and eye-opening theory that Milgram studied, denoting that society abides by rules that don’t always meet our scruples. Sarsgaard affirms that since working on the film, his morals and ethics of obedience have altered. “Having seen the footage and knowing how hard it was for these people to stand up for themselves, I now have a lot of compassion that I didn’t have before – but it’s not something that we’re going to get rid of easily.”