Prodigal Son Playwright John Patrick Shanley & Star Timothee Chalamet on the Pain, Poetry & Pride of Revisiting 15

“Do you remember 15?” Timothée Chalamet asks at the beginning and end of John Patrick Shanley’s irresistible memory play Prodigal Son. “For me, it was a special, beautiful room in hell.” For Manhattan Theatre Club audiences, Chalamet’s breakout performance is one of the season’s most exciting surprises, as the 20-year-old channels a troubled teen given one last chance at academic success at a New Hampshire prep school. The role of Jim Quinn is based on Shanley himself, circa 1965, and Chalamet perfectly captures the Oscar and Tony-winning writer/director’s lanky gait, Bronx-bred outspokenness and sly charm. Offstage, the two are simpatico, with the young actor—already a TV and film vet in Homeland, Interstellar, Love the Coopers and more—eagerly hanging on Shanley’s every word.

Q: Timothée, how strange is it to portray your playwright and director in Prodigal Son?

TIMOTHÉE: If I hadn’t auditioned three times, I would have been terrified that I wasn’t doing John or the story justice. Auditions are usually the worst thing in the world, but in this case, it provided a blanket of security because I knew I did something right.

Q: John, did you realize right away that Timothée would be able to play this huge part?

TIMOTHÉE It wasn’t right away!

JOHN: No, I took my time. What I needed was somebody who you would believe could write a poem—and would hit you. I could find guys who [looked like they] could write a poem or hit you; to find both was harder. I saw some talented young men, but Timothée had that unquantifiable extra element you need to create magic. I thought, “I need to hire this guy.”

TIMOTHÉE: This is so fun for me! I haven’t heard any of this.

JOHN: He didn’t get endless praise during rehearsal.

Q: Did it help that you are both native New Yorkers?

JOHN: Oh, yeah.

TIMOTHÉE: I’m so happy you said that. I have friends from outside New York who get on me for how prideful I am, but there’s something about growing up in the city that ages you, in a good way. It opens your eyes to things you wouldn’t otherwise be privy to.

Q: John, is your Bronx neighborhood better now than in 1965?

JOHN: It’s worse! I’m from East Tremont. They kill people up there.

TIMOTHÉE: I lived in the Bronx last year on the Grand Concourse—not related to this play—and it helped me understand the character.

Q: What’s special about Jim? What do you love about the character?

TIMOTHÉE: Oh man, everything. This is the first role I’ve read where I went, “This is me.” This is everything I’ve been through, except for the violent streak—I don’t have that as much. But all the issues and dilemmas he faces in the play is stuff I’ve just crossed the bridge on or am still going through.

JOHN: For most people, the most painful and interesting time of their lives is when they’re a teenager. That’s when we put it all together, or everything falls apart—usually both—and then we bury it. [But in] film and TV and theater, teenagers are depicted in very two-dimensional ways. If you have a mother and a father and a kid onstage, the kid is the most complicated person.

Q: Let’s talk about high school. John’s life was turned around at Thomas More, the boarding school in the play, and Timothée went to LaGuardia, the famous performing arts school.

JOHN: When I went to that school, I had no clue how to behave properly. I had been in street fights from the time I was six, which was not my natural inclination; I was physically attacked several times a week. Then I got [to New Hampshire] and people started paying attention to me for the first time—and that made me even crazier!

TIMOTHÉE John has gifts intellectually that I will never have, but if I can make the leap, his [experience at] Thomas More is what LaGuardia was to me. I had an acting teacher [Harry Shifman] who fought for me to be accepted when I wasn’t because of poor grades and poor behavior in middle school. Without him, I am 1000 percent confident I wouldn’t be acting. LaGuardia was my Thomas More in that I was surrounded by kids like me who were outgoing and obnoxious and needed a ton of attention.

Q: Before Prodigal Son, you played the Vice President’s bad boy son in Homeland. Is it fun to be cast as the “here comes trouble” guy?

TIMOTHÉE: It was weird on Homeland because I was 16, so I didn’t have the breadth of life experience I have now at 20. I’m kidding! But it was weird to be making out with a girl on camera when I had made out with only one girl prior to that—or to be viewed as a prick when I had not done prickish things in real life. You think, “Why do people see me this way?” At this point, I realize it’s just a character and doesn’t mean anything about who I really am.

Q: Are you a good liar?

TIMOTHÉE: Who’s going to read this?

JOHN: That’s a good answer. I would leave it at that. I was never a good liar. And people can see that [Jim] is lying.

TIMOTHÉE: Those moments in the play are not so much about lying, they’re about, “Back off!” I’m just trying to get everybody out of my business and create some space for myself.
Q: Do you agree with the line in the play about 15 being “a special, beautiful room in hell”?

TIMOTHÉE: Fourteen was the worst year of my life. Sixteen was the worst year of my life. Seventeen, 18 and 19 were pretty bad, too, but 15 was excellent for me. I know what the “special, beautiful room in hell” means. It just speaks to John’s genius in seeing the world through the eyes of this age.

JOHN: Seventeen was good for me but 15? No.

Q: John grew up in a chaotic family. Did you have support from your parents, Timothée?

TIMOTHÉE: Oh yeah, I’ve been very lucky. One article [about the play] started by saying that I had a “challenging upbringing in Hell’s Kitchen,” and my mom was incensed. She said, “What are you talking about? You had babysitters!” But we all have our issues. Whatever genetic loading I had put me through trials and tribulations I almost didn’t make it to the other side of, but I’m here now. I wouldn’t be able to do a play like this without having gone through that.