Michael Peña on War on Everyone

Feature by Joseph Walsh | 03 Oct 2016

Cops, chemistry and comedy: Michael Peña talks War on Everyone

Although he has a slew of big Hollywood titles to his name, Michael Peña is an actor who remains on the periphery of most people’s awareness. After End of Watch in 2012, where Peña starred alongside Jake Gyllenhaal, his position shifted slightly, and with a secondary role in last year’s Ant-Man from Marvel his stature is growing role by role.

In his latest outing he stars alongside Alexander Skarsgård in War on EveryoneJohn Michael McDonagh’s existential buddy-cop-movie-with-a-twist. It's a role that puts him on an equal footing with his co-star as they play a pair of cops who exploit, extort and swindle their way through their daily job. That means taking cocaine in toilets with perps, and generally making a buck wherever and however they can. But the fun eventually runs out thanks to a deranged gangster.

Like McDonagh’s previous movies The Guard and Calvary, War on Everyone has a singular sense of humour that never pulls its punches. Peña is well-known for his comic ability, and here he gets to let rip, proving a well-fitting match for McDonagh’s droll and absurdist sense of humour.

On the phone from LA, the 40-year-old actor tells us what he looks for in a role. 

“It has to entertain me, it has to make me see things in a different way, or be great dialogue, or have great set pieces, or different gags, or [offer the opportunity] to work with someone,” he explains. There is no arguing that, despite his initial pigeon-holing, Peña has landed a diverse range of roles, from his appearance in David O. Russell’s American Hustle as a fake Sheik, to his turn in Paul Haggis’s Oscar-winning drama, Crash.

He also talks about his most recent projects after wrapping on War on Everyone. "I worked with Helen Mirren recently on Collateral Beauty, and she impressed the crap out of me." He recalls his recent collaboration with Jessica Chastain on The Martian, quipping, “it was a pleasure to see her walk… I mean work.” His comic touch is a large part of his appeal, often giving rise to generous and warm onscreen performances. Even as a misanthrope in War on Everyone, his charm shines through.

As an actor he wants to collaborate and play with his role, and it was no different working with Skarsgård: “Before Alex, there was another actor attached to the project. That person dropped out, and we were kind of in a pickle,” he explains. “Alexander read the script on a plane and accepted the role, and I think he met John five days before we began shooting.” After they met, the duo went straight at it. Peña explains: “I like it when actors are free and willing to play, not stagnant or standoffish.”

Peña is an actor’s actor, and likes to rehearse as much as he can, carrying his copy of Sanford Meisner on Acting everywhere he goes. “What everyone tells you is that acting is about listening, and if you listen to people it gives you your ideas, and I write those down, almost like little written improvs, and different themes emerge.”

He is infectiously excitable and passionate when talking about his craft. “With a movie like War on Everyone, you need to make it seem like it is all off-the-cuff and natural, and you accept little mistakes. On the day, depending on how the other actor delivers the line, you see whether it ignites those ideas or not, or maybe the room gives you an idea.”

In previous roles, such as Louis in Ant-Man, in which he plays a small time thief alongside Paul Rudd (and for which he'll be back for the second instalment, which begins filming next year although Peña is yet to read the script or see a schedule), he has based the character on a person he knew. In War on Everyone, however, the characters exist in their own, slightly out-of-kilter reality, meaning he had to look in another direction for inspiration.

“This is a standalone type of movie, where the script is everything,” he explains. “I think I read the script ten times before we went into production, and wanted to focus on that. I didn’t want to do any form of shtick, and I didn’t want it to be like anything I had done in a previous role. It was its own thing.” Instead, he spent time with McDonagh and his wife, observing how McDonagh speaks and thinks. “On the page it is brilliant, but it was talking to him and seeing how he uses language that showed how it would breathe and work for me. He doesn’t overplay anything.”

What is clear from talking to Peña is the level of enjoyment he got from working with McDonagh, whom he refers to as a “beast” of a director. Would he work with him again? “I know he is working on a few projects, and I keep bugging him to ask if there are any parts for me. He is a director who knows what he wants.”


War on Everyone is released 7 Oct by Icon