Brian d'Arcy James Discusses Spotlight's Disturbing Story & Returning to Hamilton

Pick your Brian d’Arcy James: On Broadway, he serves up laughs and musical references in Something Rotten!, but on screen, he’s among the leading cast in the antithesis of musical comedy. In the recently released Spotlight, the Tony nominee plays Matt Carroll, the real-life reporter who helped uncover the Boston archdiocese sexual abuse scandal as part of the The Boston Globe's Pulitzer-winning Spotlight Team. In a recent chat with Broadway.com, d’Arcy James opened up about balancing Broadway with his burgeoning film career, confronting the gravity of the movie’s subject matter and yes, whether or not he’d return to Hamilton.

Congratulations on being part of such a momentous film! 
Thank you! It really is powerful, isn’t it?

This has to be huge for you. You’re part of the principal cast in a major motion picture; was there any initial pressure?
It is a big deal for me, but remarkably, I didn't feel the pressure. If I got the vote of confidence from [director and co-writer] Tom McCarthy just getting the job, that gave just a great deal of confidence in myself. That’s not to say I wasn't agog the first couple of days around the table thinking, “How the hell did I get here?!” But the work was inviting and exciting because the people are so remarkable.

You filmed this while doing the Something Rotten! workshop last fall. Nick Bottom is a considerably lighter character than Matt. Did you experience mood whiplash?
With each medium comes its own territory. It’s such a different pace and method of working when you're shooting a film, as opposed to going eight hours every day in a rehearsal room and just digging through the soil to get to creating a show. In a film you're doing it piecemeal, so you're latching on to the character as you go.

What about on set? How do you find the balance between respecting the significance of the material and making sure it's not entirely draining emotionally?
What I found so amazing about being on set was how fun it was. That doesn't seem like the right word to use, because the content you're absorbing is tragic and unfathomable. I do think that we all were looking for a chance to turn our heads away a little bit and give ourselves a chance to breath before heading back into diving into these awful stories.

Did being a father inform your choices in playing this character who is so deeply motivated by being a parent?
If anything, I had an immediate grasp on the motives of the character. Sometimes it's hard when you're playing a real person. You want to make sure you understand what they did and why. In this case, there was no second thought for me, as a father, of what that moment meant. When Matt has to hold on to the story and not tell his neighbors that there is an abusive priest living on their street, that is an interesting personal dilemma that allows the audience to see how the story is seeping into his personal life.

How does it feel to be part of such an important film—one that you have to talk about afterward?
To even get a movie, and then the film is really good, and then on top of that to have it have some kind of social impact is rare. And there’s the conversation that's happening right now in terms of critical acclaim. We'll see how things move forward, but—oh boy, talk about threading the needle! I feel really lucky with this.

Your co-star Michael Keaton came to Something Rotten! recently. What was it like having him there given his history with the St. James in Birdman?
I think it was a kick for him. He was walking through different points of the stage and describing some of the filmmaking techniques they used. It was interesting to hear him talk about particular beats from the movie that I could immediately recognize as he was explaining how they were shot. And what a strange confluence of events for me to be in the theater where he shot this movie only two years ago!

Would you ever return to Hamilton?
I would love any chance to go back to that show. I owe them such a debt of gratitude. It's not ideal when you assemble a cast and then six weeks into it one of them leaves. So if only to say I owe you for that, I would come back. But clearly it's not about that. It's about being selfish in wanting to be in the most extraordinary show! Just being a part of that equation is something I'm so proud of, and I feel so lucky.

Spotlight, which also stars Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber and John Slattery, is now playing in select theaters.