Nicolas Cage ready to quit movies, wants to pivot to television
Nicolas Cage was inspired to pursue television projects after watching Breaking Bad for the first time last year
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Nicolas Cage is about ready to pack it up on film and pivot to television. “I feel I’ve pretty much said what I’ve had to say with cinema,” he reveals in a new interview with Uproxx. “I think I have to do maybe three or four more movies before I can get there, and then hopefully switch formats and go into some other way of expressing my acting.”
In fact, he’d be happy to go out on the “high note” of Dream Scenario, but he’s contractually obligated on those last three or four flicks. After that, he wants to explore what else there is to offer for an actor out there. This is mostly because Cage’s son just showed him Breaking Bad “like last year” and it made him “very interested in immersion streaming with episodic television.” He says, “I have seen things that can be done now with characters and the time they’re given to express themselves. I saw Bryan Cranston stare at a suitcase for an hour on one episode of Breaking Bad. We don’t have time to do that in a feature film, so maybe television is the next best step for me. We’ll see.”
Cage feels he’s “explored the margins of film performance” and “done every genre,” to the point that “the only thing I haven’t really done is Broadway and I haven’t done a television show.” As a self-described student, he ponders, “where do I go that would challenge me and stretch me and make me grow in some way? Where would I go where I would learn? How do I pour yeast on my education as an actor?” He reflects, “I don’t know if I have anything else to learn in cinema. I might have something to learn in television.”
There are other benefits to becoming a TV actor. For one thing, Cage wonders if he might be less meme’d if people can spend more time with him embodying one role. “But more importantly, I want to spend some quality time with my family,” he says. “And I’m going to be 60 next month and my dad died at 75. So it’s like, if I’m lucky, I have more years than he did, but I don’t know. And so what am I going to do with my next 15 years? Well, what’s important? What’s important is my children and I have a baby daughter. And if I can find an episodic show to do that stays in one place where I don’t have to keep leaving, we can all be together.”
As much as Cage reiterates he’s ready to say “Adios” to cinema, he’s not closing the door entirely. Instead, “it’s going to be a very severe and stringent selection process” for his film projects. “I’m saying if something came along that I thought had some pop to it, some spark to it, that maybe could be fun for folks to revisit, like a Face/Off 2 or Ghost Rider, that’s another conversation,” he explains. “But I mean, that’s not going out and finding a brand new bit of material and trying something else. I’m still developing my ideas about all this. Who knows what will really happen?”
32 Comments
I wonder why Tom Hanks hasn’t done a show since Bosom Buddies.
““I think I have to do maybe three or four more movies before I can get there, and then hopefully switch formats and go into some other way of expressing my acting.””
Pretty sure he has acted in 34 movies in between giving this interview and the publication of the interview.
Great, now all I can think about is Nic Cage as Walter White.
I was exhausted after having a kid at 35, I can’t imagine how it is to have a new baby at age 60.
good for him. the decade+ of bill-paying DTV work is behind him and he can just collect a studio paycheck when the right thing comes along, or develop his own streaming project.dream scenario is also quite good! check it out.
Sure, good for him and whatnot, but has nobody told him the gold rush is over? Forget Breaking Bad, best he can hope for is a Tulsa King.
Pivoting is good.
Just ask basketball Hall of Fame post player Jack Sikma.
It’ll make your boss think you are some sort of guru when you do it in Excel!
One word:FargoWe already know from Con Air that his regional accent work is second to none.
That accent in Con Air was soaked in molasses and char-grilled over a mesquite fire.
As if Renfield wasn’t proof enough.
Noah Hawley (and the TV viewing audience at large) should BE so lucky
Yes, his regional accent work is second to “no regional accent work”.
I have to do maybe three or four more movies before I can get thereSo is he gonna quit in 2-2.5 weeks?No dig on his choices and they are always fun as hell….The dude has a prodigious output
If Breaking Bad is his ideal, he’s going to be disappointed doing TV. There’s good shows on, but nothing is Breaking Bad.
Please god put him in a Star Trek show.
Nic Cage is…….Harry Mudd.
He’s already got the on-screen persona of a classic GLB.
I’m blanking on what GLB stands for or how it relates to Star Trek.
God-Like Being, like Q, Trelane, or Charlie Evans.
s4 of The White Lotus looking rad
The Wicker Man Trilogy : The SeriesDisney+ Ghost RiderNational Treasure : Benjamin Franklin Gates ReturnBad Lieutenant : Port of New York and New Jersey
Returning To Las VegasCaptain Corelli’s Other MandolinThe Weatherer Man
Yeah, do Broadway then. The loudness and wild gesticulating should have always made the stage your natural home.
I would definitely watch Nic Cage stare at a suitcase for an hour.
Wait he’s JUST heard about the golden age of TV? My god, no one show him Mad Men or Sopranos
“Raising Arizona: The Next Generation” TV series.
You’ll need the Coens for that, and it’s possible they’ve moved past what made the movie so special. But if someone is up for the level of work (because it would be a lot), and if they could bring the outrageous stories, I’d watch
I love that he’s waking up to the narrative riches of peak TV past streaming’s peak. Not a criticism. I like the idea of performers who aren’t really steeped in the zeitgeist. Wait til someone shows him Chat GPT in 2030.
Not sure he understands how much more work TV is but I’m here for it. As far as broadway, what would I like to see him as…Ricky Roma in Glengarry…Willy Loman…
Get this man on a Star Trek, STAT.