FILM
Metallica’s James Hetfield returns to the big screen
The 61-year-old and co-founder of the legendary rock band plays a character in the new western ‘The Thicket’.
Metallica frontman and co-founder of the iconic rock outfit James Hetfield is back on the big screen with a role in The Thicket, a new western starring Peter Dinklage, Tyrion Lannister from Game of Thrones. The musician and songwriter expressed his gratitude for the opportunity to play role in a major film again, although he concluded that acting has its downsides. In an interview with Blabbermouth, Hetfield explained how he landed the role and how he views the acting process.
“Peter Dinklage reached out to me through management and said, ‘Hey, I got a part for you in something we’re putting together. And I just thought of you, and that’s it.’ It’s, like, ‘Okay, cool.’
“I’m not into acting at all,” James explained. “I mean, I act enough on the stage, like projecting. For us on stage, projecting big, it’s almost more like Broadway. When you’re in a movie, you do just a little thing and that’s, ‘Whoa,’ that’s enough. I like big projecting. So for me to be invited to be part of a film where I don’t have to go and audition or something, ‘cause that doesn’t interest me, really. I’ve done that before, and it’s not my bag, really.
But he invited me along. There was a couple of other things that I had done before. [Director] Joe Berlinger asked me to do something similar in the Ted Bundy [film ‘Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil And Vile’] that he put together. It was, like, ‘I got this part. You’d be perfect for it. Come on, let’s do it.’ And that’s kind of similar to what, I guess, Peter Dinklage or the director had in mind. Like, ‘Hey, this is a part. You don’t have to do anything, you don’t have to train, you don’t have to do nothing. Just be you.’ It’s, like, ‘All right, I can do that.’”Waiting times, the great problem of acting.
Waiting times
What he doesn’t like is the long wait times. “I’m sitting next to Ray [his assistant] and he’s like, ‘You’re shooting today. ’ And then at the end of the day, ‘Oh, we couldn’t be with you today. ’ And I said to Roy, ‘Next time someone asks me to do something like this, remind me to say no’. That’s how it was at the time.” For the vocalist, music is different because there isn’t as much waiting.
This is the second time that James Hetflield has worked on a film. He already did so in ‘Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile’ (2019), where he appeared as a police officer.