The scene outside Venice’s Electric Lodge on a recent Sunday night could easily have been mistaken for a film premiere. There was a red carpet, a swarm of autograph hounds waiting in the parking lot with stacks of laminated photos in hand, and throngs of well-wishers waiting to congratulate a movie star on a performance they had witnessed inside the venue’s theater.
The hubbub followed the final performances of David Mamet’s new play, Henry Johnson, starring Chris Bauer, Dominic Hoffman, Evan Jonigkeit and Shia LaBeouf. LaBeouf made jaunty rounds in the parking lot — greeting actor Nat Wolff with a “What’s up, doggie!” — and after he’d received heaps of praise for his work in the Marja-Lewis Ryan directed work, LaBeouf politely granted THR’s request for a brief parking-lot interview about his turn as the brooding cellmate of the show’s titular character (Jonigkeit), a lawyer who has suddenly found himself behind bars for his misdeeds.
That parking lot, LaBeouf said, has become “a pretty fertile little chat station,” where he’s huddled with A-list peers like Sam Rockwell after they’ve checked out the production, which was completely sold out during its extended run. He didn’t discriminate, either. The night THR attended, LaBeouf gave time and attention to a group of twenty-something actors who attended together, giving the impression that they came directly from acting classes. “Because it’s so close to where I grew up, it’s a lot of friends and family in the groups here so it feels very community theater, like some summer camp shit,” says the actor, who has also been supported by the Westside recovery community, members of which have turned out in droves to see the show and support the actor. “I got a lot of love in my life and guys I look up to have come through, guys I’ve talked to about theater for so long, man. I was such an insecure actor for so long, and it’s still there. Theater for a film actor is always like this scary no-man’s-land if you’ve never done it. So, a lot of the guys that I know who had done it have been involved in my process here. I’m pretty social so I’ve asked for tips and shit.”
It’s a bonus of bringing to life the words of Mamet, his favorite writer. “I’m not super studied. I’m a street kid, so David Mamet for me is Shakespeare,” says the 37-year-old. “I never gave a fuck about Shakespeare. I always loved Mamet. He understands subtext in a way that I’ve never seen with any other writer. His subtlety… He’s the greatest joke writer that ever lived. His structure’s so fucking brilliant. You could literally get up there and sleepwalk and be good. I think it’s really hard to fuck it up, man.”
LaBeouf reveals that Mamet wants to film an adaptation of the play for the big screen, although those details are still being worked out. Mamet presumably has more time in his schedule now that Barry Levinson has taken over directing duties of the John F. Kennedy–centered film Assassination, which Mamet had intended to direct from his own script. LaBeouf remains attached to star opposite Al Pacino.
When that film stalled, LaBeouf reached out to Mamet via email and asked if he could “audit” writer sessions with him in order to learn more of his process. “I was like, ‘Can I just be around and watch you do something?’ He was like, ‘Well, as a matter of fact, I got this play,’ which he had in his back pocket,” LaBeouf recalled. At the time, LaBeouf admits, he wasn’t sure if he was hirable anymore due to a lawsuit filed by former girlfriend FKA Twigs, who accused the actor of “relentless abuse,” sexual battery, assault and emotional distress. The trial is scheduled for Oct. 14, 2024.
“I’m lucky to really be able to act,” LaBeouf told THR as a nod to the allegations he has faced, detailed in a New York Times interview with FKA Twigs in 2020. (He told the paper “I have no excuses for my alcoholism or aggression, only rationalizations. I have been abusive to myself and everyone around me for years.”)
LaBeouf’s collaborations with Mamet seem to have provided a creative buoy. “If you spend all your time reading about the way the Internet views you, you forget about any love that exists in the world,” LaBeouf says. “And if you have an obsessive myopic alcoholic mind, it’s really easy to write these narratives where you just give up. I got a fault-finding mind, and my outlook already swings negative, so if my life is swinging a little bit negatively, it’s really hard to stay afloat,” he explained. “For both work and mental health reasons, it’s cool to be here. But also, it’s surprising because I didn’t think that I had a squad. Like our program says, you wake up one day and turn around to find that you’ve got 50 people that fucking ride for you in your life that you didn’t have before. This is the fruit of that. I can’t talk too much about it, but that’s what it is.” With that, LaBeouf shook hands and walked off into the night.
A version of this story first appeared in the Oct. 25 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.
