Miles Teller was/is in Cannes this year for James Gray’s Paper Tiger. Miles is 39 years old now, and he’s transitioned to playing more mature characters, husbands, fathers, men with dark secrets and ambiguous ethics. Miles’ career has not turned out the way I expected, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. In his 20s, I thought he would go super-mainstream and try to be a leading man in everything. Instead, he’s taken on some more offbeat projects in film and television, and he often seems fine with playing supporting roles. It should be said that a decade ago, the big conversation about Miles was “this guy is an arrogant douche.” In 2015, Esquire wrote a somewhat scathing cover profile of Miles which arguably changed the trajectory of his career and forced him to change his image and how he does press. Was Esquire sort of unfair to him? Yes. Did Miles legitimately come across like a cocky brat? Also yes. Long-term, it worked out though. He’s happily married, he’s working constantly and it seems like he’s in a good place. While he was in Cannes, he chatted with IndieWire about his career, the LA fires and that 2015 Esquire profile.

He lost his home in the Palisades Fire. “When I met James [Gray] for this movie, our house had just burned down. And I had just lost my grandfather. We were renting a place in Santa Barbara, and then I got the call saying James wanted to meet me for this. That infused this story and performance with a lot of love as well, because of that feeling of home that Keleigh [Sperry] and I had lost. I’d lost it with my grandfather, but then also just the physical place where you can have people come gather, where you have memories attached. We did not have that, so that probably came through.

Growing up, hopefully with his audience: “If you want to have a long career, the audience, hopefully, that you attract in your early 20s, as they get older, and they start having kids or not having kids, but just getting more life experience under the belt, you want to reflect that in your choices as well. And James makes movies for adults, he deals with characters. I’ve loved every one of his films, and I’ve always felt like he gets incredible performances, so I was excited to play a man at this point.

His early choices: “Early on, I didn’t want to feel like I was repeating what I had just done. I didn’t want people to be able to expect what I was going to do next. I always want to defend young actors in their careers, because people say, “Oh, why did you make that choice? Why did they make that choice?” You’re just hoping to get a role, and it’s less than 10 percent of people in SAG who pay their bills off acting alone. We all want to work on the best material with the best directors and the best actors. There’s an ebb and flow. I used to be more critical of work other people were doing, because you get thrown into this rat race when you’re first starting out.

His generational peers: “It was me, and Michael B. [Jordan] and [Robert] Pattinson and Shia [LaBeouf] and [Zac] Efron was big, “The Hunger Games” stuff was blowing up. As I’ve gotten older, I appreciate and have respect for longevity, if you can hang around. I always wanted to contribute. When I was going to the Lee Strasberg Institute at NYU, and looked on the wall, there’s all these incredible actors that went through there. I hold acting and actors in such high regard, whether it’s theater or film or TV.

His 2015 Esquire cover profile: “That was so mishandled. The reason why I have not done profiles is because I said, “Wow, if I’m not doing this interview on camera, this person can misquote things or put things out of order or say things that didn’t happen.” It felt like such a violation of what actually transpired. I told my team, “Guys, I don’t think I’m doing this again, because I’m reading this and this doesn’t sound like me to me. This is not life, so why would I ever want to be a part of something where they can just put that in?” So it’s unfortunate that being a good person, that doesn’t sell. People want to click on the negativity. If you go to bed and put your head on your pillow and how you treat people truly, that’s what matters. That [2015] interview was like 12 years ago.”

[From IndieWire]

It’s true that he probably does fewer print interviews than his peers. Esquire really burned him, but notice how carefully he says this – “because I’m reading this and this doesn’t sound like me to me.” Esquire didn’t misquote him, they just didn’t soften his words or protect him. That’s what I believe! Anyway, as I said, it worked out in the end. Also: it’s wild to hear him list his generational peers. It’s accurate, those guys are all around the same age and they all came up around the same time. Which reminds me – Miles was THRILLED when Michael B. Jordan won the Oscar. They worked together a lifetime ago.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.