Among Hollywood A-listers who will give you a lively, entertaining interview, Robert Downey Jr. ranks right up there. He’s a playful ranconteur, who tends not to speak in pre-chewed soundbites, and gives his honest answer about most things. And particularly when doing the tedium of the endless press junket for a blockbuster like "Avengers: Age Of Ultron," it’s appreciated both by journalists and those reading, listening or watching his latest media appearance. But as you already know, things went really badly when RDJ recently chatted with Channel 4‘s Krishnan Guru-Murthy. When the interview started broaching the actor’s drug past, time spent in jail, and relationship with his father, Robert Downey Jr. tolerated the open line of inquiry as much as possible, before becoming clearly frustrated, and walking out. Now, he explains his strong feels about what the talk he had with the "bottom-feeding muckraker."
RDJ recently stopped by Howard Stern, and of course, when the topic of his much publicized walkout was broached, the actor made it clear why he bailed on the Channel 4 talk. "I’m one of those guys who I’m always assuming the social decorum is in play, and that we’re promoting a superhero movie, a lot of kids are going to see it, and that just has nothing to do with your creepy dark agenda," he said.
He adds that he hated "feeling all of the sudden ashamed and obligated to accommodate your weirdo s–t" and also "the assumption is that there’s a button that because you’ve sat down there you’re going to be scrutinized like you’re a kiddy fiddler who’s running for mayor."
Meanwhile, Stern also asked RDJ about his brief stint as the co-star of Alfonso Cuaron‘s "Gravity." The actor admits the tech-heavy process of the movie just wasn’t something he was able to roll with. "What I can tell you is that I went to do a test with a new sort of multi-spherical camera thing they were [using] for how they were going to do all the CGI," he explained. "And I’m one of those guys who can be comfortably uncomfortable pretty easily, and maybe I was just on my cycle or something, but I went in the morning to do that, and we did it for about twenty minutes, and I said ‘This is crazy. How much longer?’ And they said, ‘It’s like another two to four hours,’ and I said, ‘No, it isn’t!’ "
"You’ve got to have boundaries. You’ve got to leave before you flip out," he added.
READ MORE: Robert Downey Jr.’s Career In 7 Films
And that pretty much backs up what Cuaron has previously said about RDJ’s exit from his movie. "It became very clear that, as we started to nail the technology, or narrow the technology, that was going to be a big obstacle for his performance. I think Robert is fantastic if you give him the freedom to completely breathe and improvise and change stuff. [But] we tried one of these technologies and it was not compatible," the director said in 2014. "And, after that, we [had a] week that we pretended as if nothing was happening and then we talked and said, ‘This is not going to work. This is tough.’"
Check out the full interview with Howard Stern below and if you haven’t seen it yet, the full interview walkout clip.
Gerard, RBJ said all that stuff and the only thing you heard was \’kiddy fiddler\’. Your a weird guy.
"scrutinized like you\’re a kiddy fiddler" says the man who played Chaplin
Gerard, RBJ said all that stuff and the only thing you heard was \’kiddy fiddler\’. Your a weird guy.