The last time Donald Trump “won” an election, Michael Shannon gave a series of hilarious interviews in which he called Trump a “soulless evil piece of sh-t” and told Trump voters to “get in the urn.” I hoped for another round of those kinds of spicy interviews, eight years later. Alas, it hasn’t happened. Shannon is currently promoting his directorial debut, Eric LaRue, and he recently chatted with NPR about his early days as an actor and what age has taught him about love. He also talks about his daughters – he has two girls, both teenagers. Some highlights from NPR:

What he admires about his teenage self: “Well, I was a survivor, you know. I’d, you know, I’d say the years from like 12 to 16 were a real gauntlet. But I got through it. And in that period of time is when I started getting into acting. And I guess I had some guts to get into that, you know, with people that I didn’t really know very well. Just showing up and auditioning for the school play or auditioning to be on the speech team or whatever and getting little opportunities to do that. And then after I got out of high school, I was still a teenager and I was in Chicago and I started going down into the city and auditioning for plays in the city and started getting parts in very small, like, storefront theater productions. And that took a fair amount of guts, I think.”

What age teaches him about love: “They’re very linked obviously. I think when you’re young, love can be very self-serving. You want love from other people. You want to have love. It’s something you want for yourself because it feels, you know, wonderful to feel like you’re loved. And then as you get older, you realize that it’s probably ultimately more important to love others regardless of what you get in return. It becomes hopefully less transactional and more just a state of being, you know? Which is — can be hard to accept. It’s actually kind of going back to that place that I was at when I was younger, where I was, you know, OK being alone — but with a new, with more, I don’t know, more wisdom, some sort of wisdom that I’ve accrued along the way, hopefully.”

Giving love is more freeing: “Well, and it’s liberating in a way, if you can really do it in an honest, authentic way. It’s actually very freeing. But it, unfortunately, seems to be something you can’t get to without experiencing a fair amount of pain.

Everything changes except for how much he loves his daughters: “That is, yeah. Particularly my daughters. I mean, that’s the one thing that won’t change — I love them very much and I always will. And they’re my favorite people. And I’m fascinated by them. And if they’re anything like me, there will probably be a period of time where I don’t interact with them very much, you know?… My 16-year-old is already a very cosmopolitan young woman. But she still makes time for me now and then. Yeah, but she’s so healthy. I mean, it’s all so healthy and it’s exactly what should be happening.

[From NPR]

I was going to say something about how bonkers it must be to have Michael Shannon as your father, but I imagine he’s actually a really good dad? I would love to see his reaction when they give him that teen-girl attitude though. I thought his comments about love were very profound – when you’re younger, love is more transactional and about wanting to be loved so desperately, and then you get older and you just give love without thinking about what you’re getting in return. It’s lovely.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.