BlackBook Magazine

When Gary Cole, as oppressive boss Bill Lumbergh, sidles up to Ron Livingston's desk in the 1999 cult classic Office Space and asks if he can just go ahead and come in on Suuundayyy, a cult comedy icon is born. Lumbergh may not have fucked her, but what he did do was micromanage his way into his very own cubicle in the comedy hall of fame (search Lumbergh on YouTube and you'll find impressions galore). Cole, a versatile theater-trained actor, is most known for that role, but he's managed to elaborate his filmography into a mishmash of goons, deadbeats, cops, vice presidents, astronauts, and baseball players. His latest effort Pineapple Express rolled into theaters yesterday on a track of predictably great reviews. Directed by David Gordon Green (normally an art film poet), produced by Judd Apatow, and starring Seth Rogen and James Franco, the stoner action comedy is poised to be a hit. Cole stars as the murderous sleaze-bag out to get our heroes, and he nails it. Here's the character actor on improving with the best of 'em, almost starring in Miami Vice, and being Bill Lumbergh, m'kay?

Can you tell me about your role in Pineapple Express?

I’m a villain in a team of villains. I’m teamed up with Rosie Perez. I’m a degenerate drug dealer, she’s a police officer, but corrupt.

And how is your character involved in the plot?

What starts the whole ball rolling is Seth witnesses this murder, which me and Rosie perpetrate. And that sets the ball in motion as to why these guys are involved in this epic. Usually they’d be stoned on the couch and all of a sudden they’re involved in an action movie, except it’s real. That’s basically the set up of the story. They get deeper and deeper and dig a hole and find themselves babbling. Ironically I don’t get high in the movie, I think I’m drunk the whole time.

Did they approach you for the role, or did you have to audition for it?

Judd Apatow was involved in Talladega Nights, so I’d worked for him before. He was aware of me, and there was another role they wanted me to come in for. I wound up not going in for that and then I just got a phone call that they wanted to offer me this role, so I took another look.

Would you consider yourself a part of the Apatow universe?

Not yet. I’ve only done two movies. I’m six degrees of Apatow. But we’ll see what happens.

What was it like working with David Gordon Green?  This is the first studio project he’s done, and he’s usually very non-commercial.

David was great. I think it was fun for him, to be like all of a sudden, “I have a lot of money and toys to play with.” But he made really good use of time and money. I don’t know how he shoots the other films he’s done, but it’s very loose. We got stuff that was scripted first, then he would open it up and devise other ways to do it or just let the camera roll.

Did you find yourself improvising a lot on set?

Yeah, that was his intention. Sometimes he just doesn’t yell cut so you continue. He’ll let you stew in your ad-lib juices. Sometimes we would talk about what could possibly happen or things that might be said. In the fight sequence, at certain moments, he would just throw out stuff, “Do it like this! You’re seeing this, you’re seeing that!”

Did you play the role in a more comedic fashion, or did you try to be a more threatening villain?

It’s not a question of taking it seriously as much as looking at an individual scene and going with what David wants to come across. And I’m interested to see the whole movie and see what the tone is. What we did was not anything other than trying to be real, but they were strange characters. They had strange priorities. I don’t know if it’s in the movie but there’s a phone call where I’m supposed to lose it in the film, and I just went off.

Gary Cole and Rosie Perez in Pineapple Express.

Were they smoking real joints on the set?

That I can’t vouch for. I was not around during dope smoking. It could be, I do not know. My guess is they probably weren’t. Maybe they were smoking real joints in the trailer before they came out and smoked fake joints.

So, what role would you say you’re best known for?

It seems to be Office Space.

Lumberg, yeah. He’s become an iconic character. Do you get recognized in the street because of him?

It depends. There’s the airport factor. In the airport you’re in close quarters and you’re not going anywhere. That tends to increase the odds of people paying attention, because you’re in their face, you’re in close proximity, so they recognize you. Sometimes they recognize me but they’re not sure where from. I get the line, “You look a lot like that actor in Office Space.” Or, “Did you go to school with my brother?”

Whose idea was it to play Lumberg the way you did. Was it (director) Mike Judge or you?

It was all Mike Judge. I would love to say I invented it, meticulously crafted it—not even close. It’s based on a cartoon Mike did, I’m guessing in the early 1980s. Lumberg and Milton are the only ones in the cartoon, and then a delivery man. It’s Milton mumbling to himself, then you hear footsteps and it’s Lumberg coming in to torture him for a second, then walking away. Mike did the voice in the animation, so before I went in for Office Space I had seen the cartoon, and I just went with that.

You’ve had a wide variety of roles and have escaped being typecast. How?

There’s always a little luck involved. I’ve had pretty good material to deal with pretty much every time. And good directors, and whether they’re right or wrong, you’ve got to make definite choices. They can always be tweaked later by the director, but if you come in with something very definite, the odds of something working are a lot better. If you come in half-assed because you’re not sure which way it should go, chances are better that it won’t work out. Even if your idea is clearly wrong and won’t work, a good director will fix that.

You also have a strong theatrical pedigree.

Right. And that’s not insignificant ... my background in theater helps me to arrive at stuff pretty quickly. I did all kinds of different things in theater. Moving from comedy to drama or different kinds of roles was just par for the course.

I read that you came close to getting the role of Crockett in Miami Vice?

I was there, I went in front of the network, I don’t know how close it was. There were three Crocketts sitting in the office, none of which got the part [eventually won by Don Johnson].