By his own reckoning, Frank Langella simply wasn't rigged to play normal people. Physiognomy, he says, is destiny: "My face doesn't suit that. It is best suited to the kind of roles I play."
Those would include Richard Nixon, Dracula, Sherlock Holmes, Clare Quilty in "Lolita." The man has been a major presence on and off Broadway for four decades and a notable figure in film. Other roles have included the evil White House chief of staff in "Dave," William Paley in "Good Night, and Good Luck," and Perry White in "Superman Returns."
Langella, 69, is at it again, this time as Leonard Schiller in "Starting Out in the Evening," a shoestring indie shot in 18 days for $500,000 that opens here Friday. It tells the story of a writer, now 74, who generated literary eclat early in his career but has been emotionally and professionally occluded for decades.
For the record, Langella's face is massive. He is an imposing man - tall and thick, with huge hands and thin gray hair cut stylishly short. His eyes are small and dark and acute. Menace can appear the way a cloud covers the sun. Even a twinkle comes with edge. What he's not apt to do is erupt into a warm, happy smile.
"They're all singular men - apart, distant, unattached - living isolated existences or existences that are ruled by a singularity of thought," he says about his characters. "Those are extraordinary roles to play because they're mirrors into the souls of tortured people, which fascinates me."
Schiller is one such person. The man's sepulchral existence on the Upper West Side of Manhattan is shattered when a pushy grad student invades his life to write a thesis about him. She awakens him and arouses him. He ends up throwing away the book he has labored on for years and, at this late date in his life, starts over.
"I've certainly allowed women to push their way into my house or my bed or down the aisle for all kinds of reasons," Langella says about the dynamic. "Sex early, then companionship when old with a vivacious young woman.
"This movie has for some reason touched people," he adds. "It has something to do with the universality of trying in all of us. I find it beautiful that at 74 Leonard said, 'Oh, I've learned something. I think I'll put this book away and I'll start again.' "
It's the effort from the heart that moves Langella. "I'd rather see Judy Garland go for a note and crack than any number of technically perfect women who sing today," he says. "I cry as the athlete races toward the finish line more than getting through the finish line. I find effort, the determination to excel, overwhelmingly moving. I don't much like cleverness for its own sake."
So why Leonard Schiller?
"I had a really solid feeling that I was going to have a difficult time with him and that he wasn't in my bag," he explains. "He's older than me, Jewish, terribly withdrawn, terribly polite in an Old World way. I love the Upper West Side of New York and I'm surrounded by Leonard Schillers everywhere I go. [Langella also lives there.] I kept walking up to old Jewish men and saying, 'Can I have your tie?' and 'Where'd you get that hat?' "
As a prince of darkness, Langella is an expert on bad guys. His cardinal rule: stand by your man.
"You can never, never, ever judge your guy," he says. "Someone said, 'What about Nixon?' and I say 'I don't care. He's my guy. He's my guy and I'll defend him to the death.' You leave all judgment and independent thought out. You try not to comment on him to your audience."
Fine, but what about Nixon? Langella received a Tony this year for his Broadway performance in "Frost/Nixon," which Ron Howard brings to the screen next year.
"I'm only going to answer one question about Mr. Nixon because I'll be doing that next year," he begins. "One thing I feel most strongly about my take on Nixon is that in the end one should feel a certain amount of compassion for him.
"I don't agree with anything he did politically. He just literally should have been impeached," he continues. "But I developed enormous compassion because of the demons that plagued him. My intent was not to resurrect him. He is in a place from which he will never recover. Never, never, never."
And Dracula? "I began to see him as a Gothic romantic figure of epic proportions, " he says. "A tragic soul who has this odd need. He needs blood to live. It's really that simple. Once you get that, it's no different from a man who needs insulin to live."
The bracing thing about Langella is his inability not to lay it on the line. Consider this: "An actor I'm very fond of told me it took him a year to get over Hamlet, and I said, 'You did it wrong. It should take you until dessert after the show that night,' " he says. "It's just nonsense. You're an artist, a skilled professional. It's your job to devastate the audience, not to devastate yourself. And as an old teacher of mine said, to act in spite of your neurosis, not because of it."
Or this: A fellow actor was behaving badly during a rehearsal for a Broadway play. "I took him outside and said, 'See, up above the title there, that's my name. And when your name is up there, you are responsible for everything. The day will come when you realize that's not about vanity or ego. It's about responsibility to the public, to honor the gift of having gotten there.' "
Langella holds up his end of the bargain and expects others to do the same. He's a grown-up who's probably not great with puppies and toddlers. I ask him when the last time was that he played a regular person in a movie. "The last time?" Pause. "It's entirely possible I never have."
More silence and then: "I don't think I've ever played a man who is just married with kids and lives next door. They're not interesting to play."
Langella has been in Boston filming a new movie called "The Box," described as a horror/thriller. He professes surprise that one would expect him to be a bad guy. "Bad guy? Not in my opinion, no," he says with an ominous laugh. "I'm a mysterious stranger. I'm not the villain here. I'm bringing you an opportunity."
There are two acting challenges Langella still craves. First, he wants, in his own words, to be in "a big, brassy Broadway musical." Second is a one-man show.
"I'm working on a particular kind of one-man show I've never seen anybody do," he says. "Within that one-man show, I want to play a great female role. I may do it in a dress. I want to play a woman.
"Why can't I do a major speech from 'Major Barbara'? Or something from 'Mrs. Warren's Profession'?" he asks of two plays by George Bernard Shaw. "Why not? It would be exciting to try. I don't want to have any limitations."
Except when it comes to his personal life, which he keeps hermetically sealed. "I made the conscious decision years ago to try and be an actor for the public and not a personality for them. I have a whole normal person's life, I suppose. But in my work, I'm not like you. I'm just not."
Sam Allis can be reached at allis@globe.com.
