‘Awards Chatter’ Live Pod: Sam Rockwell on That ‘White Lotus’ Monologue, ‘Three Billboards’ Award Season and Upcoming Martin McDonagh Reunion ‘Wild Horse Nine’
Sam Rockwell, the Academy, Golden Globe, SAG, Critics Choice, BAFTA and Spirit award-winning and Emmy- and Tony award-nominated character actor who has been giving outstanding performances for more than 30 years, was honored last week at the inaugural Newport Beach TV Fest with the Supporting Performance of the Year Award. The prize was given in recognition of Rockwell’s showstopping portrayal of Frank, an American sex addict living in Thailand who reconnects with his old friend Rick (Walton Goggins), on the third installment of HBO’s The White Lotus.
In the middle of a ceremony at Newport Beach’s Lido Theatre that began with a clip of Rockwell’s hilariously unforgettable White Lotus monologue and that ended with the festival’s director presenting him with his award, the 56-year-old sat down in front of an audience of some 300 fest attendees to record an episode of THR’s Awards Chatter podcast with yours truly — his second, following one in 2018 — which you can hear below.
Rockwell has been described by the New York Times as a “one-man gallery of rogues, crooks and oddballs,” by Roger Ebert as “a latter-day version of Christopher Walken,” by Martin McDonagh as “the greatest actor of his generation” and by George Clooney as “easily one of the best actors I’ve ever seen.”
Over the course of this episode, he reflected on early milestones in his career, including 1996’s Box of Moonlight, 2002’s Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, 2008’s Choke, 2009’s Moon and 2010’s Conviction; his numerous stage and screen collaborations with McDonagh, the most famous being the 2017 film Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, for which he won many of the aforementioned awards, as well as the forthcoming Wild Horse Nine; and how he learned his White Lotus monologue with the assistance of Leslie Bibb, his life partner since 2007 and his co-star in The White Lotus.
