EXCLUSIVE: Actor Guy Pearce says he doesn't watch TV because it's 'too overwhelming'

Guy Pearce plays a writer who becomes the source of light to the main character in Mare Of Easttown. Photo: HBO Asia

Guy Pearce says he doesn’t watch television, just because he can’t really keep up with it.

“It’s too overwhelming, ” the 53-year-old actor notes of the current TV landscape during a virtual interview with international media including StarLifestyle.

But he knows it has changed tremendously, in that television has become the favoured medium for many actors of calibre to flex their acting muscle further, and where most good writers reside.

“When I was a kid, you would watch crappy television. And then occasionally, a good miniseries would come on, or a good film, ” the England-born Australian elaborates.

“Whereas now it feels like everything on television is really good. Every show now is better than the last show.

“It just feels like every show has a bigger budget than the last show, the quality of every TV show just gets better, and better, and better, all the time, which is fantastic.”

Pearce is currently acting in one of those high-quality TV shows – Mare Of Easttown.

In the seven-episode HBO series, Pearce stars as Richard, a writer who has just moved to Easttown, Pennsylvania, for a teaching gig.

Here, he meets Mare, the town’s police detective (played by Kate Winslet) who is also a local hero of sorts, a responsibility that she feels like a burden to carry.

As the story develops, and Mare’s life turns hectic when a dark event in her past comes back to haunt her, she begins to rely on Richard for emotional support.

“When Kate called me and asked me to do this, she said, ‘What’s really important is that Richard shows Kate, that there is a possibility for some light to get in the cracks.’

“And that’s pretty easy to understand, you know, particularly coming from someone like Kate Winslet, who’s sort of a beaming shaft of light in itself anyway, ” Pearce shares.

“By the time you get to our age, you have plenty of dark experiences to draw upon, ” continues Pearce, who experienced tragedy as early as eight years old, when his pilot father died in an aviation accident.

“Being able to go to dark places is not a real stretch. But, at the same time, to understand that finding the light at the end of the tunnel is also accessible.

“If you’re sensitive enough to be aware of the tumultuous nature of life, and if you’re stable enough, in your capacity, to be able to go from a dark place to a light place and to understand that, I think, as an actor, it’s a really wonderful tool, ” he adds.

Guy Pearce stars as Snow, a wrongly-convicted man who is offered his freedom if he can rescue the president’s daughter in science fiction thriller 'Lockout'.

Pearce has been acting from a young age. He was still a teenager when he made his TV debut on the popular Australian soap opera Neighbours, which he followed with another hit Aussie show, Home And Away.

In 1994, he gave us the drag queen Felicia (also a buff Adam when out of wigs and dresses) in the entertaining flick The Adventures Of Priscilla, Queen Of The Desert.

Then came along high-profile movies like the Oscar-winning L.A. Confidential in 1997, the Christopher Nolan classic Memento (2000), another Oscar-winning film, The King’s Speech (2010) to mention a few.

In between the big-budgeted flicks, Pearce also took on roles in indie projects and on stage.

When asked how he chooses a role, Pearce answers: “It’s really just about the same way that you respond to a book that you might read, you know. You read something and you go, ‘Wow, OK’. You have a reaction to it, and it stays with you.

“It’s about feeling like I can see myself in the role. And it’s a story that is moving, and, and affects me in a way. It’s about whether I feel it’s inspiring.”

He adds: “So, to me, it always has to be about just a gut reaction. Sometimes things fall into place more easily than other times, sometimes I have to do a bit more work on trying to understand the character.”

According to Pearce, working on Memento was definitely one of the big turning points in his career as an actor.

“It was a film that really broke lots of barriers, not just for me, but obviously, in the film industry. I mean, people talk about L.A. Confidential being sort of the last film of its kind. And people talk about Memento being the first film of its kind, ” he says about about the neo-noir psychological thriller written and directed by Nolan, where the story is revealed in reverse.

“So, it was kind of interesting to be in both of those, ” mentions Pearce.

Memento is the first movie of its kind says the actor.

While he’s delighted to work with great directors like Nolan, Kathryn Bigelow (on 2009’s The Hurt Locker) and Ridley Scott (Prometheus, 2012 and Alien: Covenant, 2017), he’s in awe of his fellow actors as well.

“The year that I did Prometheus, I worked with Tom Hardy, and Jessica Chastain in Lawless (2012). And then I went straight across to London to do Prometheus and saw Michael Fassbender in action.

“So, there I was, you know, looking at these actors who are 10 years younger than me who are just extraordinary.”

He states: “One of the best things about being an actor is working with really great actors, and getting your own personal show right there in front of you.”

No wonder Pearce doesn’t watch television. He’s too busy working with great directors and actors, continuously building up his impressive resume.

He’s already gotten himself the best seat in the house.

Mare Of Easttown airs every Monday at 10am on HBO GO and HBO (Astro Ch 411 HD). Repeats at 11pm.

Guy Pearce describes fellow actor Michael Fassbender as extraordinary.