oldhollywood:

Sissy Spacek & Martin Sheen on the set of Badlands (1973, dir. Terrence Malick)

Sheen: “One night I got a call saying that [Malick] decided to use me and would I be willing to do it. And I said, ‘Why sure, I’d be happy as Larry’. [The next morning], I was driving along Pacific Coast Highway and I was listening to a Dylan song called Desolation Row..and suddenly it dawned on me what had just happened - that I had the role of my life. And I began to weep uncontrollably with joy and I had to pull off the side of the road and just stop and reflect on what was happening. And it was one of the most profound moments of my life because it was the realization of a dream that I never thought would happen to me.”

Spacek:”It was a very passionate kind of working experience. No one was making any money and everyone was there because we were desperate to work on the film…It was probably the first film that I felt creatively engaged in. Terry would ask me questions about the character. I felt like I wasn’t just an actor for hire…After working with Terry, I was like, ‘The artist rules. Nothing else matters.’ My career would have been very different if I hadn’t had that experience.”

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