Nicolas Cage says CNN clickbaited him with the whole "don't call me an actor" thing
Nicolas Cage isn't sure why CNN picked up him saying he favored the term thespian over actor for news: "I’m sure they have more important things to report on.”
Remember back in the event horizon that was 2021, when Nicolas Cage saying he preferred to be called a “thespian” than an “actor” somehow managed to become a news item amid the general deterioration of society? Well, he does: and according to Cage, the headlines—namely, one Cage recalls from CNN—were an absolute case of clickbait.
“What I was saying was, of course you can call me an actor,” Cage shared during Thursday night’s episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (per IndieWire). “By the way, I never said, ‘Don’t call me an actor. Call me a thespian.’ That’s what clickbait universe was putting out there and somehow got picked up by CNN. I’m not sure how it got picked up by CNN—I’m sure they have more important things to report on.”
To be fair to CNN, the outlet wasn’t the only one to snap up the bait: The Guardian, New York Post, and U.K. newspaper The Telegraph were among the other publications that ran with the “don’t call me an actor” headline. But Cage’s original comments, from a December 2021 interview with Variety, weren’t quite as cut and dry. “For me it always implies, ‘Oh, he’s a great actor, therefore he’s a great liar,’” Cage said of the term ‘actor’ at the time. “So with the risk of sounding like a pretentious asshole, I like the word ‘thespian’ because thespian means you’re going into your heart, or you’re going into your imagination, or your memories or your dreams, and you’re bringing something back to communicate with the audience.”
Well over a year later, the Renfield star has a more in-depth explanation that doesn’t involve refusal to call himself an actor, but also, unfortunately, doesn’t necessarily conquer the pretentious allegations.
“I see acting as storytelling and what it is is trying to get to the truth of a character and the first actor in Europe was someone called Thespus and what happened there in Greece was that he broke free from the chorus and started narrating and started telling a story truthfully,” Cage shares. “So to me, acting is trying to find the truth of a story.”
He concludes: “Now what’s interesting, literally the word ‘actor’ in Greek means ‘hypocrite’. Well, I don’t want to be thought of as a hypocrite. I’m sorry if that sounds pretentious.” Fair enough!