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 Since
1996, Scottish actor Ewan McGregor has been drawing critical acclaim
for his unique and diverse performances on the silver screen. From Danny
Boyle’s Trainspotting, the movie that first garnered the actor some
attention here in the States, to Baz Luhrmann’s extravagant music Moulin
Rouge! in 2001, McGregor’s quickly become one of those rare Hollywood A-listers
that keeps both the public and the critics happy. However, similar to
Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribbean, but it wasn’t until McGregor
followed in his uncle’s footsteps and took on roles in the Star Wars
franchise (McGregor’s uncle, Dennis Lawson, played Wedge Antilles in the
original trilogy) that the actor become a commercial success. And just
like every Star Wars star before him, McGregor’s been working hard since
landing the role of young Obi-Wan Kenobi to prove that he’s still that
same brilliant actor critics loved in such lesser-known films as Shallow
Grave, Brassed Off and Velvet Goldmine. With Marc Forster’s mind-bending
thriller Stay, McGregor shows off his wide acting range once again in
the role of New York psychiatrist Sam Foster. The movie focuses on Sam’s
urgent attempt to stop a secretive and unusual young patient (played by
The Notebook’s Ryan Gosling) he inherited when the young man’s regular
psychiatrist mysteriously takes ill from carrying out a planned suicide
on the eve of his 21st birthday. As Sam is drawn deeper into the web of
the young man’s life— and then into the labyrinth of his
subconscious—soon his own tightly-held grip on the rational world begins
to melt away. Faced with increasingly surreal encounters, Sam can no
longer figure out what is real and what is happening only in his mind,
nor where he begins and his newfound patient ends.
Despite starring in a variety of roles that featured the
award-winning actor playing everything from a junkie to a Jedi Master,
the role of Sam Foster is nothing like McGregor has ever encountered
before. “I thought it was a remarkable script, but then Marc Forster
took it to another level yet, creating this very intricate experience of
a dream come to life,” McGregor states. “It’s all very subtle and
subliminal, and also spooky. On the one hand you have this very familiar
world of New York that the story’s set in, but then there’s this sense
of un-reality that grows and grows throughout the film and takes you
somewhere else.” Similar to his role in the Star Wars franchise,
McGregor spent a lot of time during Stay’s pre-production analyzing his
character so that he could bring him to life.
 While
during Episode III McGregor openly admits to steeping himself in the
performances of Sir Alec Guinness, who originated the role of Obi-Wan
Kenobi in 1977’s A New Hope (“It was my last shot at making it match up
with his work,” McGregor says. “For three weeks I had his scenes from
the first three movies playing nonstop in my dressing room as
inspiration”), with Stay McGregor has kept his focus narrowly honed in
on what his character was going through minute by minute at even the
most basic emotional levels. “One of the things I focused on is the role
reversal that goes on between Sam and Henry,” he explains. “Sam in a
sense becomes the patient, and Henry (Gosling) almost becomes the
doctor. Sam’s vulnerability is really revealed as he begins to see that
his desperate need to help other people is also a need to help himself
get over the mistakes he has made in the past. He actually begins to see
that Henry isn’t the only one looking for redemption.”
McGregor’s willingness to take risks and completely unravel
onscreen impressed Stay’s director, who recently working alongside
Johnny Depp in the Academy Award-nominated film Finding Neverland. “Ewan
plays Sam as a man to whom rationality means everything,” notes Forster.
“It’s the basis of how Sam operates, but then through Ewan’s performance
you slowly see the deterioration of Sam and all that he believes in as
he starts to become the thing that frightens him the most: delusional.”
Nowhere does Sam’s vulnerability come more to the fore than in the
scenes between Sam and his former-patient-turned-artist-girlfriend who
he now hopes to marry, Lila, played by The Ring’s Naomi Watts. For the
34-year-old actor, these scenes became touchstones of reality in a story
that veers into mind-blowing directions. “Naomi and I both wanted the
relationship between Sam and Lila to be very authentic,” McGregor notes.
“It’s not the kind of thing where violins are always playing in the
background. There is a real tension and real love between them.”
 Coming
off of the sci-fi dud The Island and the Disney bomb Valiant,
McGregor is hoping Stay will re-establish himself as both a box office
and critical heavyweight. Although the animated film Robots fared well
at the box office earning over $128 million and Revenge of the Sith was
a huge success, neither film will likely garner the actor with any
Academy Award nominations (although McGregor is well-deserving of one
thanks to the final scene in Episode III between Obi-Wan and Anakin).
The dark, emotional journey McGregor goes on in Stay could receive some
attention from the Academy, though, although McGregor admits that the
final Star Wars was one of his most satisfying experiences as an actor.
“Obi-Wan has much more to do in this film,” he says about Episode III,
“and George (Lucas) has written a story that takes the character where I
always hoped he would go. Obi-Wan really loves Anakin, and he
experiences a profound disappointment and sadness watching Anakin turn
to the dark side. That was very interesting to play.” And while fans
won’t see McGregor in any James Bond movies in the near future (blonde
English actor Daniel Craig recently beat out McGregor, Hugh Jackman and
Clive Owen for the coveted role of James Bond in 2006’s Casino Royale),
the actor is keeping himself busy both onstage and on the silver screen.
Currently McGregor is showing off his pipes once again, starring in the
lead role of Sky Masterson in the Donmar Warehouse production of Guys
and Dolls in London’s West End, and can next be seen in Scenes of a
Sexual Nature alongside Aeon Flux co-star Sophie Okonedo. In the
meantime, though, fans of McGregor’s stateside will either have to bring
the sexy Scot home with them in the DVD form of Star Wars: Episode III—
Revenge of the Sith— or simply snag up a copy of Stay.
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