He’s come a long way since his Fresh Prince days, but Will Smith is channelling his inner bad boy for new movie Focus. The much-loved actor talks shoplifting, chemistry and being authentic
Will Smith is in confessional mode, revealing he stole from a shop in Las Vegas. But before you think one of Hollywood’s most affable actors has lost his moral code, it was in readiness for his role as a con artist in new film Focus.
Part of the preparation was being partnered up with Apollo Robbins, one of the world’s leading experts on deception.
“He said, ‘I’m going to need you to walk into that store and I want you to steal something and come out. We’ll give it back, but I just need you to see what it feels like’,” recalls Smith who, understandably, had his reservations.
“I was like, ‘Dude, look at me. Everybody knows who I am’. But it was really interesting. It’s such a terrifying feeling, and that thrill, it makes it beautiful and exciting.”
Since bursting onto the small screen as The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air in the early Nineties, Smith’s earned a reputation as one of the most likeable men in Hollywood.
For that very reason, the film’s writers and directors John Requa and Glenn Ficarra (who helmed Crazy, Stupid, Love starring Ryan Gosling), thought Smith would be the perfect choice to play a man who can draw anybody in, but it’s simply a facade for the cool calculation that lies beneath.
“I thought the screenplay was a brilliant combination of comedy, drama, psychology and intrigue. It demanded a wide spectrum of behaviour, and I was inspired by the challenge of it,” says the West Philadelphia-born actor.
“And it just hit me at a great point in my life, where it fitted with the material I was looking for and the things I wanted to do,” adds the 46-year-old.
He describes his character Nicky as “one of the smartest, most dysfunctional people you’ll ever meet”.
“He understands human nature and human behaviour. There are very few people with that level of depth and comprehension, but he got his heart broken when he was little and he’s not yet learned to use his powers for good.”
Smith had been looking for something that was “parallel” to what was going on in his life, and, he says, “vulnerability and authenticity” were at the forefront.
“I thought Focus was such a genius way to talk about the absolute necessity for authenticity and openness to create an environment for love. For this character to have that struggle was perfect for me.”
Nicky becomes romantically involved with novice con artist Jess (Margot Robbie), but as he’s teaching her the tricks of the trade, she gets too close for comfort and he abruptly breaks it off.
Three years later, Jess is an accomplished femme fatale who shows up in the middle of the high stakes race car circuit, throwing Nicky’s meticulously planned scheme, and his feelings, through a loop.
The pair make brilliant sparring partners on screen, and Smith recalls how they clicked from the get-go – despite him mistaking her dishevelled appearance (due to a long-haul flight and lost luggage) for a lack of interest in the project.
“My first thought was, ‘Oh, she doesn’t want this job’, but then we started talking and working, and all of a sudden, we clicked.”
Chemistry isn’t something that can be faked, he adds.
“You either have chemistry with people or you don’t, and you can have the best actors and directors and screenplay in the world, but if your leads don’t have chemistry, it can kill everything.”
To showcase the finest details of Nicky and his team’s thievery, every move, however subtle, needed to be caught on film, which is why Robbins, known as ‘The Gentleman Thief’, was brought on board. He taught the cast tricks of the trade and demonstrated that, rather than divert someone’s eyes, you need to divert their focus.
“We’re going to get all deep, but what I learned with Apollo is that everybody’s running a con,” explains Smith.
“When you wake up in the morning, you choose the things – the clothes you wear and how you do your hair – that present the image that you think is going to get you the things that you want.
“Until you can take that mask off and bare yourself, warts and all, you can’t have the love that was the reason you put the mask on in the first place, and there’s really no way around that existential loneliness.”
A running theme throughout Smith’s work is the father-son relationship, and Focus is no different, as Nicky grapples with his childhood experiences.
“I don’t look for that, but I tend to be attracted to projects that have a father and son component,” says Smith, who’s father to Trey, 22, from his first marriage, and Jaden, 16, and Willow, 14, with his wife of almost 18 years, Jada Pinkett-Smith.
One of his outstanding examples was 2006’s The Pursuit Of Happyness, which saw a young Jaden star as his on-screen son. The role earned him a second Academy Award nomination (his first was for his portrayal of legendary boxer Muhammad Ali in 2001’s Ali).
“It’s a really huge honour to be nominated for an Academy Award, but for me, it doesn’t go beyond fun. For me, the beautiful time is those couple of weeks before the Academy Awards, when there are the best parties on Earth. It’s actually anti-climactic when you get to the awards – it’s almost like the fun is over.”
Smith’s always preferred to look at the box office takings, instead.
“When people go to work, and work hard, and they have their money on a Friday night and decide what they’re going to spend their money on, for me that’s a greater vote of confidence than any award.”
That’s why the failure of 2013’s After Earth, which he produced and starred in alongside Jaden again, hit him so hard.
“It was emotionally devastating. [Before that] I was like, ‘I smash at the box office. I’m number one’, and then for that to happen, to realise that, ‘Oh shoot, I can lose’, was really emotionally difficult for me. I had to back up for a second.”
He insists Focus is the first film he’s made that he’s approached simply with the aim of having fun.
“I don’t care if it’s number one or if it’s 10, I cannot allow myself to be defined by the success or failure of my movie,” he states.
“It was hugely liberating for me and I’m going to shift from the goal orientation, which made me crazy for a couple of years, to path orientation and being in the moment.
“Things are really good,” adds Smith. “I’m loving my life and I’m excited to see where the great river takes me.”
EXTRA TIME – WHO IS APOLLO ROBBINS?
Known as ‘The Gentleman Thief’, Robbins first made headlines when he pick-pocketed the Secret Service while entertaining the former US President Jimmy Carter.
He’s picked the pockets of more than 250,000 men and women.
Wired magazine declared ‘he could steal the wallet of a man who knew he was going to have his pocket picked’.
In 2006, he and his partner Ava Do co-founded Red Handed Media, which soon became a go-to expert for the science community, law enforcement and government agencies studying human behaviour.
He has collaborated with neuroscientists to study the blind spots in the human brain. He says: “Since we truly can’t focus on more than one thing at a time, our brain creates short cuts to be more efficient. Unfortunately, these sometimes give us the illusion we’re multitasking.”