Meet Adam F*%#@ng Scott

I've seen Adam Scott have all kinds of sex. I've seen him make frustrated love, passionate love, even detached love (by far the hottest). I've seen him try to impregnate his wife and fail. I've seen her emasculate him in front of friends, I've seen his private confessions to a couples therapist, and I've seen his penis. But relax guys, it's just a TV show, albeit a hyper-realistic one. HBO's classy relationship drama "Tell Me You Love Me," is stuffed with are-they-or-aren't-they sex scenes that have gotten the show and its actors a lot of attention. It's one of the first things I ask Scott about, and he's quick to clear it up.

It’s taken Adam Scott a lot of time, and a lot of rejection to get where he is today. In the mid-nineties, he was losing roles to the Freddie Prinze Jr.’s and Skeet Ulrich’s of the young acting world. But after bigger and bigger roles in bigger and bigger films, and one very memorable role as a self-important male nurse in Knocked Up, Scott is now a main player on an acclaimed drama, and the possessor of a blossoming film career. This month he stars alongside Josh Hartnett in the moody drama August, and with Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly in the blockbuster-to-be Step Brothers. I spoke to the self-deprecating, teensy bit foul-mouthed actor about prosthetic privates, improvising with Will Ferrell, and the effect Martin Scorsese has on his bowels.

I Googled your name and there’s this other Adam Scott who just completely dominates you on the search results. Do you know who that is?

Right. The golfer.

The golfer. He’s everywhere. You have to overtake him.

I know! He’s apparently very good at golf. I don’t follow golf, but I got a letter the other day from a New Jersey high school student asking me to help with a golf charity at their school, and I had to write him back and let him know that he got the wrong guy. He found the Adam Scott that doesn’t give a shit about golf.

I feel like unless you watch “Tell Me You Love Me”, you’re one of those actors that has face that everyone recognizes, but no one can quite remember where it’s from. Do you consider yourself a character actor because of that?

I guess so, I’m either a character actor, or just a nominally successful actor. Either one fits.

Have you been recognized more after the HBO show?

Definitely, yeah. I mean, now it’s like, people are walking up to me and actually—

Calling you Palek.

Yeah, stuff like that, and wanting to talk about the show, wondering if that’s really my dick.

Is it?

No! For the first couple weeks I just wanted to walk around with a t-shirt that said, “It’s prosthetic.”

Did they give you that option, or did they want you to be naked first and you said “no, I won’t do that,” and then they compromised?

I think for the most explicit scenes, my thinking was if it’s real, it crosses a line into documentary.

The girls don’t get prosthetic breasts, though.

No, those are all prosthetic. The whole show is actually CGI. I don’t know if you know that.

It’s motion capture, isn’t it. Gollum has nothing on you guys.

The dude that plays Gollum plays every character in the show. He deserves like, four Emmys.

Scott as Palek in “Tell Me You Love Me.”

You started off doing TV shows at a young age, then went to small movies and eventually to smaller roles in big movies. And now you’re headlining some more notable films. Do you sense that you’re finally at a place in your career where you’ve hit a stride?

No, I’d never believe that. I think when you start thinking that way you get buried. I don’t feel entitled to anything. I’ve been here for a while, and I’m lucky to have some of the roles I’ve had, and I just try to keep moving.  I guess it’s a lot different than it was five years ago, which is a lot different than it was five years before that, but each time you get to another “level,” you have to stay afloat somehow, and it’s all relative. I still feel like I’m nineteen and I just got here and I’m just trying to get a guest spot on “Boy Meets World.”

Was there ever a point where you were really frustrated, when you were acting in films that didn’t get the kind of release you were hoping for?

Yeah, totally. Early on I did these indies, and I didn’t know. I thought if you go do an independent movie, it’s gonna turn into Pulp Fiction. Little did I know you go to North Carolina for like a month, and then you don’t hear from these people for six years, and then it’s on IFC at four in the morning. Which is fine, because that’s what happens to most independent movies, they just float away because they don’t work.

Were there every any major roles that you came so close to getting?

I auditioned for Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, all that shit. I just wanted to be in all that shit so bad, because I started in ‘93, so I was around all that garbage. But I just didn’t know what I was doing. I would look at the way people were acting in Scream movies, and try to emulate that. In the mean time, you’re getting rid of anything that might be unique about yourself.

And when Scream came out and was a massive hit, were you even more pissed about it?

Oh yeah. I didn’t know how I’d get from the seat in the theater to up there, in a movie that people go see. I didn’t know how you do that. It’s frustrating, it takes forever. Well, it took me forever. Some people it happens really quickly for, and I’m just an idiot.

What can you tell me about August?

August is a really cool movie. Josh Hartnett and I are these brothers that start this internet company, and it’s on the verge of folding in August of 2001. And 9/11 is kind of a specter in the background throughout the film.

How did you guys evoke September 11th when in the world of the film, it’s completely unknown and unimaginable?

It’s incredibly subtle, but there are a couple of shots where in the background, you can see the towers. But also culturally, the stuff that was going on, not only with the dotcom boom and the crash, but also the pop culture. It’s all that shit that you was happening in 2001, when our country’s kind of back to being obsessed with all the garbage we forgot about for a while. It’s interesting that the audience knows what the characters in the movie don’t, that all of this is going to be wiped clean in a matter of days.

Adam Scott in August.

Everyone remembers your cameo in Knocked Up as the male nurse. Did that lead to your role in Step Brothers?

I auditioned for Step Brothers a couple times and never thought I would get it, so I just kind of went all out. I tried to act like the biggest prick I could, because my character is just a dickhead. It’s Will Ferrell’s younger, uber-dickhead successful brother. And I got it, which was a total fluke. I knew Judd a little bit, so maybe it helped.

I imagine you’re character is pretty hilarious.

Yeah, they wrote the most hilarious shit ever for him. I remember when we were getting ready, Adam McKay, the director, was like, “I don’t want you wearing any outfit in this movie that costs less than $4,000.” I’m just always talking about how much money I have, just a fuckin’ dick, like a real douchebag.

Was there a lot of improvisation on the set?

Yeah, totally, which scared the shit out of me, but it’s flattering for them to include you in that. These guys roll out on every take, meaning they go until the film runs out. So at the end of the day it’s exhausting, because I’m improvising with Will Ferrell, and I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.

On “TMYLM,” what’s it like shooting and watching the sex scenes?

It’s uncomfortable shooting them. Thank God me and Sonya Walger [his onscreen wife] get along so well, because otherwise it would be brutal.

Are you able to relate to the marital problems on the show, as a married man?

Yeah, some of it. I think it’s all pretty universal. I think anyone that’s been in a relationship can probably find something that’s pretty dead on. I think they hit the nail on the head most of the time.

Last question. What was it like working with Scorsese in The Aviator. Was that amazing for you?

Oh yeah, I would shit my pants every day! I got it, and then all of a sudden I’m in a room with he and DiCaprio in Canada, rehearsing. And I’m just like, what the fuck is going on?

And was it weird taking direction from a such a legend of cinema?

I think he’s well aware of how much he freaks people out because of who he is, so he has this way of directing that causes a particular panic in me. But when we were on set, he would soothe me with these cool stories, and then throw in a little direction at the end. I wouldn’t even realize he was directing me until I got back to the hotel room that night. He’s fine-tuning your performance without you even knowing. He’s a magician, and he’s really sweet. I’ll never forget a single detail of that whole experience.

Adam Scott with wife Naomi Sablan.