John Turturro on being a bad guy in The Batman, and his love of Irish literature

'I didn't recognise Colin Farrell at all'

John Turturro in a scene from The Batman.

HE’S THE much-loved character actor who’s worked with greats like Martin Scorsese, Spike Lee and The Coen Brothers. But John Turturro has made a rare move into superhero blockbuster territory with The Batman - revisiting a world that had captivated him as a boy.

Turturro returned to the DC comics he had read with his own sons and was reminded of the noir-ish atmosphere he loved about them in the first place. It’s very much part of The Batman, Matt Reeves’ epic new take on The Caped Crusader.

“Some the actual comics that it was based on, I was aware of. It's like he's not fully realised yet,” he says via Zoom. “It's exploring that in-between period, from his earliest days, and how he's fuelled by vengeance. Matt’s hit on it was very film noir, which was an inspiration for a lot of those comics, and I actually am a big fan of the really classic film noirs like [post WWII movie] Out of the Past. Matt was very enthusiastic. I liked the whole concept, but what could I do with that?” 

A great deal, as it turns out. Turturro is characteristically great as the powerful mob boss Carmine Falcone, a prominent character in the original comics. The former head of the Gotham City Mob, he ruled and thrived with his personal crime syndicate and is an ally of Oswald Cobblepot (The Penguin), played by our own Colin Farrell. The Irish actor and the Italian/American are having a whole lot of fun playing mobsters onscreen, even if Turturro didn’t initially realise the dramatically transformed Farrell was his co-star.

“I didn't recognise Colin at all. I'm in a couple of little moments we have together and I was like: ‘He looks like people that I know’. I mean, that was an amazing transformation and makeup job that they did on him. It looked real. The whole design of the film, it's really kind of cool. It was an inspired set, I just loved it.”

 Turturro has been on a lot of film sets over his career, but he says nothing can prepare you for seeing the iconic Batman character, played by Robert Pattinson, in the flesh for the first time.

“Listen, I used to play (Batman) with my oldest Amedeo and my youngest, Diego. I had a Batman figure. So it's kind of bizarre, actually, when you actually see someone dressed as Batman, you're like: ‘Oh my God’. I've been doing this for years, but that figure was really small!” he laughs.

“There is something that kids have, they really get lost in their make-believe. That's a good springboard when you start out with something like this, because it means so much - that outfit and the whole idea of the Dark Knight.” 

Jason Momoa, Zoë Kravitz, and John Turturro at the premiere of The Batman. 

Turturro says the London-set shoot was a memorable experience, not least because he worked very well with Reeves, who previously brought us the most recent Planet of the Apes movies. “I’m not just saying that because I’m doing an interview,” he adds. “I actually had a good experience with him, which is not always the case.” 

As an actor who is passionate about bringing something to the table, collaboration is important to him. “I mean, that's kind of your job, whether it's your physicalisation, your hair or your accent. I did have these great, fantastic glasses which is sort of my mask. And then you just piece it together.” 

One of cinema’s most respected actors, some of Turturro’s most successful collaborations has been with the Coen Brothers. He’s worked on several of their films including The Big Lebowski and opposite Gabriel Byrne in Miller’s Crossing.

At this point of his career, he feels it’s about the people you work with as well as the project itself. “It's almost more of who you get to work with I have to say. There are directors I've worked with and haven't worked with a second time who I would love to. You never know what the experience is going to be. And someone can pontificate and seduce you and say: ‘I love your work’.

“At this stage of my life, I like to have some kind of collaboration. That doesn't mean you have to change the words or anything like that, but just how you do it, how you move, where you move, so it's like changing jobs all the time. And I think when you click with people, and you get the privilege of working with them again, you're building on that.”

 Like his friend Martin Scorsese, who he worked with on The Color of Money (Scorsese also cast the young Turturro in a non-speaking role in Raging Bull), the actor is a passionate movie fan. He speaks fondly of Scorsese, who has shared some of his favourite films with him.

“I have VHS tapes that he made for me of certain films that you couldn't get that he taped, and he wanted me to see a certain director to work with. Francesco Rosi [The Truce] was one of them. He made all these copies for me so I could watch them on my VHS. How he introduced a great director to me, it was just with such care. People don't really do that. People are in their own camps and they're worried about their next film, if they can get money to do it, but I have so many great letters from him and things that I've made that he's watched and he really enjoyed.

“You value those things because those are people that you look up and you go: ‘Now I got to meet them. I got to work with them a little bit’. But more than even that there's something kind of inspirational. There are certain people who've made films that for me, are a reason why I wanted to go into that world.”

Colin Farrell as Oswald Cobblepot/the Penguin in The Batman. 

 Does he have an all-time favourite movie list or is that constantly changing? “It’s expanding, you know? I’m a huge Italian neorealist fan. I also love a lot of Japanese cinema. I'm a huge Kurosawa fan, obviously, Mizoguchi. Jean Renoir was one of my heroes, Bresson - it goes on and on. I recently discovered an amazing Spanish film on Criterion, called The Executioner - El Verdugo. He made it during Franco, the guy who directed it, Luis Berlanga, and I was just floored on how good the movie was.” 

 His love of storytelling extends to Ireland, and he took part in The Ulysses Project, an adaptation of Joyce’s opus, with an Irish cast including Patrick Bergin and Hazel Doupe. The online event during summer’s 2020 restrictions raised funds for charity.

“I'm a huge Beckett fan. I've done a lot of Becket - I've done Godot, I've done Endgame. My connection to Joyce is through Beckett. The book of The Dead and the movie of The Dead, I happened to discover at a very critical time in my life. So that also means a lot to me and it's hard material, but I thought: ‘Hey, you know, I've done all this Beckett material. So I think I have a little bit of a grasp, there's some connection’. It was obviously an intense book! I like doing or attempting to do difficult texts.”

•  The Batman is in cinemas from Friday, March 4