10 Questions with Sebastian Stan

From superhero Bucky Barnes – Marvel’s Winter Soldier – to rocker Tommy Lee (Pam & Tommy), an actor with neurofibromatosis (A Different Man) and a pre-president Donald Trump (in biographical film The Apprentice), Sebastian Stan, 44, is a Hollywood chameleon. Fjord, his Cannes-winning movie, casts him as an evangelical Romanian émigré, whose strict parenting leads to a battle with Norwegian educators. With Avengers: Doomsday due next, it’s going to be a busy couple of months...

Like Mihai, your character in Fjord, you have Romanian roots [Stan was born there, but left aged eight during the Romanian Revolution]. Was that appealing?

I’ve never gotten to play anyone Romanian before. For years I’ve been wrestling with my past and trying to understand how it’s helped and hindered me. How my own traditional Romanian upbringing, which helps me understand the story and this character, contributed to who I am today. How much of that do I want to pass on to my children, and how much of that essentially doesn’t work any more? I had a lot of similar questions myself about parenthood and manhood as it pertains to this character and story.

Did your upbringing hinder or help you create a belief system?

As this movie tries to highlight, the harder answer, unfortunately, is that it did both. That two truths can exist at the same time. And I think it’s a little bit of trying to get the best of both worlds, and you can’t do that if you’re just simply living in – and are totally dominated by – one absolute belief system.

Do you go back to Romania much? Are you treated like a hero there?

I have felt very embraced, yeah, and it’s been extremely gratifying. I’m not always a very big fan of this word “healing”, but there’s no other better word… because, again, another reason I understood the movie and I wanted to do it was because I felt a similar experience as an immigrant coming to the US – like the kids in the movie. Feeling different and feeling like I couldn’t really talk about where I was from. There was a certain degree of secrecy that I had to carry about my past – this is all part of the Communist upbringing – and a degree of shame about where I was from. I really wanted to fit in and be liked.

So, was some of the ground that the film covers familiar to you?

Well, I didn’t know much about the different worlds of Eastern Europe and the Nordics. I never anticipated it becoming a battleground of clashing cultures and socioeconomic systems that are built very differently. But, with what’s happening in the US and other places where families are being torn apart, you start to make the connection and go, “OK, there’s a bigger thing here.”

There was a degree of secrecy that I had to carry about my past... I really wanted to fit in

Like Pam and Tommy, A Different Man and The Apprentice, you undertook another transformation here, shaving your head. Why?

For a lot of my younger years, my 20s, I felt very trapped being so typecast as a result of the way I looked. I found it very limiting, acting-wise. It didn’t allow me to do much. So when I get to change my look, it relaxes me in a way. It takes me out of my head and I’m able to focus on the story of the character. It’s liberating.

Did you get blowback for playing Trump in The Apprentice?

I didn’t look to be honest. Now you’ve got, for instance, the Alex Gibney Musk documentary, and the trailer isn’t being played on X… that’s the US at the moment. Anytime a movie tries to get at the core of the situation, it gets harder. That’s why a lot of film-makers are looking to Europe to have more freedom with their projects.

Do you feel you have struck a good balance between indie films and Marvel movies?

It’s been a serendipitous balance. I’m not sure how long that will last.

In what sense?

Because everything changes and evolves. The last few years, I’ve really felt like I’ve borne the fruits of this 15-year commitment that I’ve had to Marvel
[he first appeared as superhero Bucky Barnes in Captain America: the First Avenger in 2011], which afforded me something sustainable in a profession that’s not certain at all. I’m not sure how long that’s going to keep going.

You’re next in Avengers: Doomsday. Are you prepared for the hype?

At this point, I’m just enjoying the ride. I’ve been so lucky to be there for as long as I have, and it’s bizarre to return to something with all of these people that I’ve known and grown up with for the last 10 to 15 years… its nostalgic. It’s almost like a college reunion. It’s going to be a very celebratory situation.

Is it hard to keep the plot secrets of these big blockbusters?

As of recent years, you only get to see what you’re involved in. For Thunderbolts* I did see a script. It was a different environment. But in terms of people speculating about what’s going to happen… I love the passion, but why not go to the movie theatre and be surprised? It’s more fun. People get on these sets where we’re shooting outside, and the whole scene gets filmed and ends up online, where everyone’s picking it apart. They don’t even know what’s going on. I guess it’s hype for the movie, but I hate that aspect of our lives now. That everything just gets recorded to no end.