By:debbie lynn elias
Already feted with virtually every award possible around the globe as Best Supporting Actor for his indelible transformation and performance as “Rayon” in Dallas Buyers Club, and still with the Oscars and Film Independent Spirit Awards to be held, Jared Leto has been welcomed back into the acting world with open arms. Concentrating on his music the past six years, Leto knew it had to be “something extraordinary” to bring him back in front of the camera and as much as his return has been embraced by all, it is Leto himself who has opened the hearts of the world with the passion and depth of performance that is the transgender “Rayon”.
Leto knew from Day One that he needed to play Rayon. Seeing her as a transgender person as opposed to a transvestite, “I thought, ‘What an opportunity here to bring to life a really special person’.” For Leto, that meant complete immersion into the character and the role for the duration of the shoot. “The severity of the transformation was so extreme, I had to hold onto as much as I could. Maybe a better actor would have been able to let go of the voice, the dialect, the behavior, the movement, the circumstances, and the emotional condition and been able to recall that at a moment’s notice when the director yelled, ‘Action!’, but that doesn’t really work for me. I had to stay as close as possible just so I could do a good job. That was the motivation so I could contribute in the best way possible.”
“Everything had its purpose – from waxing my eyebrows to losing 30 to 40 pounds. It all played a part”, including costume. Crediting “contribution and collaboration” and a “really inspired team of make-up artists and wardrobe people”, the first thing necessary was focusing on 1985, not only as to fashion, but the culture, shopping, stores and regional considerations of access and availability of merchandise. “It was probably a struggle to find a size 12 heel in Dallas, so a lot of thrift store shopping for her. But you start to find things that make you feel a little more connected to the character. It’s hard not to get personal about these things. . .I liked getting rid of the wig and just wearing the scarf. So I pushed for that a little bit. I think she was in the place where she was trying to figure out who she was.”
Beyond the physical transformation of becoming Rayon, was finding her inner voice and spoken voice. Relying on skills as a singer as one of his tools in finding Rayon, “The voice was key. I was born in Louisiana, next door to where Rayon lived, but not too far. So that melody is pretty familiar. I had the dialect and then I also had this [vocal] register. I had toyed with the idea of keeping her voice down low, like maybe she hadn’t found her voice yet, but ultimately, it was a trial and error process.”
Particularly challenging for Leto was an “intense and vulnerable scene” where Rayon goes to meet with her estranged well-to-do banker father played by James DuMont. “[I]t was the first time I was out of [costume]. I didn’t have my armor on – my make-up, my eyelashes, my wig. It felt like in that scene I was dressing up in drag. It wasn’t me. It didn’t feel like me. I knew it was a really important scene. I remember I did the first take and I just bombed. It was terrible. I had that rush of panic. . .There are only usually two or three takes on a movie like this. I did Take Two and something happened. The director [Jean-Marc Vallee] came over, took off his headphones, tears running down his face. I was like, ‘What? What’s wrong?’ He said, ‘You did it. You did something beautiful.’”
Crediting Vallee as “leading the charge”, Leto relied on Vallee’s vision for Dallas Buyers Club to help him stay focused and “in the place I needed to be. He was very decisive, very confident, and he knew the story he wanted to tell. . .I looked at it like it was a great opportunity to contribute to a really special story. I’m very proud to have been a part of it.”
Opining that film as a whole can alter one’s perspective, Leto thoughtfully notes “It’s done that for me. It’s showed me parts of the world or people that I’ve never seen before. It’s a lofty goal but I think it’s wonderful how stories can change us.” Dallas Buyers Club and Jared Leto have certainly done that.
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