Like any actor, Michael Peña wants to work with the great filmmakers of our time. What makes him unique is that it’s clear the great directors also want to work with him as in just the past four years he was in the Oscar-winning Best Pictures Crash and Million Dollar Baby, the Oscar-nominated Babel, and with Oscar-winning director Oliver Stone in World Trade Center. His latest role is with Oscar-winning director and legendary actor Robert Redford in Lions for Lambs. While it’s clear that the onslaught of interviews through mutliple cities has been slightly exhausting, it’s also clear that Peña clearly believes in the projects he chooses and his enthusiasm for Lambs could not be any more genuine.

HipHopDX: I was in college when the war started and since I went to a really liberal college, we all knew to protest on the day the war started. But it’s been almost five years since then and I was wondering what you thought has changed in terms of student response.
Michael Peña: In history, I think there’s different cases and different things to note about our present time situation. It seems like the war is out there. It’s far, far away. It doesn’t really seem to be affecting anyone unless you know somebody that’s fighting over there. And not that I want it at all, but back in the Vietnam War, there was a draft, which made people have to step up and say “We don’t want this war,” and in this one, there isn’t any. There isn’t that for “pro” or “against”. It’s a calm. But who’s to say to go for or to go against?

DX: Well there are recent polls that state that Americans are really war-weary. They feel that since the intelligence was bad but even those who are against the war don’t want to leave Iraq in shambles.
MP: I really don’t know the answer because I’m an artist. The thing that I want to do is make good movies for people so that I can in turn make the audience or the people at large ask questions. Ask those particular questions. And this film doesn’t point one way or the other. Some liberals are like “This is a very liberal movie,” and some conservatives are like, “This is a very conservative movie,” It’s interesting for that reaction. I was really surprised by that reaction but Redford wanted it that way. There were some people who said “Aw, it’s gonna be a Redford movie with his views,” but it’s not. First we wanted to make an entertaining movie because if not, nobody’s going to see it. And just an honest movie with valid points of view that make you think. Like with Tom Cruise’s character, you think “Wow, maybe that’s a good answer or maybe not,”

DX: You’ve been in films that are very contemporary and I was just wondered how those experiences shaped your ideology?
MP: I’m definitely trying to learn more about politics but it seems like the more I try to learn about, the less I know. Literally, I think I’m an artist, man. I just gotta do my movies. I’m not gonna try to be a politician but I want to be informed about it. It’s tough to get informed because I don’t know which outlet to really believe. Like if you have one incident, you have four different opinions and how do you get the true facts? So just doing research is tough.

DX: And it seems like Lions for Lambs wants to start a discussion rather than add to the noise of opinion.
MP: Right, like Crash did for racism. If it would have told you what to think about racism, I don’t think people would have liked it.

DX: Although I don’t think a lot of Americans need to be told, “Don’t be racist.”
MP: But that’s your point of view!

DX: It is my point of view!
MP: Because there are other people like in the sixties where that was the way of life. And you say, “No one should be told,” but there are some people who really wanted segregation to remain.

DX: I agree. I just think the current situation is that in the sixties, racism was overt and I think Crash was trying to say that today we do it in a much more subversive fashion.
MP: But then it had people talking. Not necessarily subversive. Sometimes it was overt.

DX: Right but it’s not like there are picketing lines. There’s still discimination.
MP: But there are still country clubs that don’t allow Jewish or black or hispanic or anything like that.

DX: Well I’m just thinking of when former press secretary Tony Snow said that racism isn’t really a problem anymore.
MP: From my point of view, it’s actually dying down a lot. I go golfing a lot and I go golfing in the south and to this day no one’s ever messed with me or said anything. And I’m a Mexican-American and it’s been smooth sailing, at least for me. And it was before Crash and before I was noticible. To me, it’s been dying down a little bit. Does it still exist? Yeah, I think so. And does it need to be handled? Yeah, and I think awareness and changing is…I think we’re a lot better off than we were thirty years ago. Continued on page 2 »