March 19, 2010
Michael Shannon has a knack for playing unsettling characters, the kind of parts that are a tad uncomfortable to watch. After a string of theatrical roles, he introduced himself to audiences as an eerily unhinged soldier in William Friedkin’s paranoid thriller Bug, opposite Ashley Judd. His big break came in 2008’s Revolutionary Road. Sitting at a dining table across from Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, he stole the show. His performance as the mentally disturbed truth-teller John Givens earned him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination. Now, Shannon takes on the role of Kim Folley, the eccentric, kinda creepy band manager of an all-girl rock group in Floria Sigismondi’s The Runaways, starring Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning. We sat down with Shannon to talk about the burden of playing a real person, his upcoming HBO show Boardwalk Empire, his love of all things music.

