He's a nice kid.
No, really, he is.
But fresh-scrubbed, well-behaved Canadian Hayden Christensen isn't exactly being introduced to the wide world in the most flattering light.
The 20-year-old actor greets us in his first major movie role -- a surly, confused, Marilyn Manson wanna-be in the family drama Life as a House -- by attempting auto-erotic asphyxiation on his mascara'd, chin-pierced self. We soon discover that the character is even more obnoxious than initial impressions suggested.
And when we become even more familiar with the tall, athletic and eminently unpierced Christensen next summer, he won't be doing his job unless he terribly disturbs us. Christensen has the coveted role of Anakin Skywalker, who evolves from noble Jedi Knight into symbol of all evil Darth Vader over the second and third installments of the Star Wars prequel trilogy. Episode II: Attack of the Clones hits theaters in May.
"I saw about 100 actors for this role," says Life as a House director Irwin Winkler. "I didn't know who Hayden was or what he had done, and he didn't tell me. After I cast him, I found out about Star Wars, and it wasn't until recently that I had a conversation with George Lucas. We both asked each other why we cast him, and we both came up with the same reason: that there is a sense of toughness about him behind this very sweet guy. That's what George wanted for Anakin, obviously, and what I needed for Sam here."
Sam is the deeply alienated son of a divorced California architect, George Monroe (Kevin Kline). His mother Robin (Kristin Scott Thomas) and stepfather can't do a thing with the rebellious boy, and George -- who lives alone in a shack on a posh, Palos Verdes cul-de-sac -- is too boggled by his own midlife crisis to do much in the way of parenting.
But when the old movie medical problem turns George's midlife into a few precious, remaining months, he is determined to build a fine house on his land -- and forces the extremely reluctant Sam to help him do it as a last-gasp bonding effort.
"Sam, for me, was a complete invention," Christensen says. "Every sensibility that he has is so far removed from what I know about myself that it really took a lot to get my head around the concept of why he would put blue eye shadow on or why he would pierce his ears. It's just not anything I would do.
"So I talked to a lot of people who were suffering some of the same dilemmas that he was and opened my mind up to different things," adds Christensen who, after breaking into television commercials as a child, entered a performing-arts program at his Toronto high school and spent two summers studying at the demanding Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute in New York. "Not so much Goth kids but kids who were using drugs as an escape mechanism or people who've had to deal with the loss of a family member."
Sam starts off, at least, at a pretty high pitch; his whole existence seems to be one continuous tantrum. This proved technically difficult at times. The character's chin stud, for instance, was held in place by a magnet between Christensen's lower gum and lips, and particularly passionate exchanges were often ruined when the jewelry would fly off in the middle of a take. And one effective bit of improv, in which Christensen unexpectedly slammed his fist into a wall when Sam learns the truth about his father's health, resulted in a hairline finger fracture.
"And they didn't even use that take!" Christensen complains, with a grin. "I turned around and I was crying, my hand was bleeding real blood. It was great!"
While Lucas might have hired Christensen for the same basic qualities that Winkler wanted, the trick to playing Anakin was almost exactly the opposite of creating Sam.
"There's an immense challenge to doing something that has already been predefined by another film or someone else who has played the part," Christensen notes. "I wasn't walking into a part which I could openly explore. I couldn't just do what I wanted to; the lines within which I had to create were very defined. But that made it interesting, really. I knew there was an audience that I'd have to please and bring certain sensibilities to the character. At times, that can be added pressure and, at times, it made it that much more exciting."
Although most of Episode II was shot before Christensen made Life as a House, he and other cast members -- including Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman (whom, no, Christensen says he's not dating, despite fan gossip to the effect that they're involved) -- are still on call for additional shooting for the digital production.
Without giving too much of the top-secret project away, Christensen proudly affirms that he performed all of his own Episode II action stunts, including a good amount of Crouching Tiger-style wire work.
"Every Anakin you see is always me, never a double," he says, then qualifies. "Although it could be a digital me; you never know when they do that."
Already, there has been one invaluable benefit from hooking up with the most successful movie franchise in history.
"It's enabled me to be very choosy with my work, the films I want to commit to," Christensen admits. "I feel very thankful to be a part of the Star Wars saga because it is such a moving and prominent one. But it also affords me the opportunity to make a movie like Life as a House. I don't have to work for necessity, which is a privilege."