The Accidental Actor: Jason Schwartzman

You can't help wanting to give Jason Schwartzman a big hug. Aside from being adorably sexy, this phenomenally talented 22-year-old is as lovable as a new puppy, intelligent, well-behaved, overwhelmingly entertaining and polite. After we finished our first interview, in which he walked me through his entire CD collection and apologetically refused to talk about his girlfriend, I wanted to write his mother a note to tell her what a good job she did raising him.

Despite being a poster boy for young Hollywood, in many ways he reeks of old Hollywood. Of course, there's his family: Jason Francesco Schwartzman is the son of actress Talia Shire and actor-producer Jack Schwartzman. His uncle is director Francis Ford Coppola; composer Carmine Coppola is his grandfather; and he's cousins with directors Sofia and Roman Coppola and Nicholas Cage. He's a card-carrying member of one of the most impressive cinematic families ever assembled. Between his roles in the films Rushmore and CQ and as the drummer for his Beach Boys-y rock band Phantom Planet, it's easy to see that acting is in his genes.

But his family is really only a footnote in the story of Jason's blossoming career. It was never taken for granted that he'd go into show business. "Creativity wasn't encouraged in our house," he recalls. "But it wasn't discouraged. No one ever said, 'You're going to be an actor!' I still don't even have a head shot. But trying to make my dad laugh at the dinner table or falling down and stuff like that.... They kept laughing, and nobody said, 'stop.'" He was a typical kid, playing baseball in the backyard and eating pizza with his friends. "I never wanted to be in show business."

One of his biggest influences is Peter Sellers. In fact, the CD case he showed me was filled with Sellers' comedy albums. Even so, his hypnotically entertaining stories are peppered with references to goofy contemporary works like What About Bob? and Ghostbusters. He's an incredibly hard worker who's more likely to be found at band practice than making the rounds at hipster Hollywood photo-op parties. He's everything you think charming, next-generation Hollywood royalty should be. He'll never make a decent E! True Hollywood Story.

It all began with Jason's first taste of auteurism. He signed up for a summer-school filmmaking class when he was 10. "We would just go there and get to make fun movies," he fondly recalls. "It was the first time that I ever was, like, 'I could love this.' But I still didn't think I could do it for a living." His masterpiece was a self-penned, epic action-drama entitled One Man, One Reality. "It had cocaine and guns and explosions," he explains with an irresistible mix of childish embarrassment and artistic pride. "It's kind of like Serpico, because some of the cops are on the take. [In the film] I'm having trouble at home with my wife and son -- my little brother played my son. The biggest line in the movie is in a scene where my wife and I are fighting, and my son walks in and says, 'Daddy, Daddy, what's happening? Why is Mommy mad at you?' And I say, with a gun in my hand, 'Because Daddy was a fool.'"

Is this kid a genius or what?

Still, he dismisses his early work in his humble way. "It wasn't a real film course. We'd just show up, and no one knew what they were doing." That summer he also starred in Back to the Future: Teen Wolf, an homage to Michael J. Fox that featured Jason in a wolf mask and intercut footage from the first film in the actual Back to the Future series.

Despite these cinematic triumphs, Jason's attention turned to music. He had asked for a drum set at the age of six, and at 10, his parents answered his prayers. His band Phantom Planet formed in 1994, and the quintet (which includes vocalist Alex Greenwald, who co-starred in Donnie Darko) spent the next four years working hard before putting out their debut album. As a result of the success of its follow-up, The Guest (Epic), a sunny collection of straight-ahead pop-rock songs, Jason is often unfairly lumped into the category of actors who have side band projects. He was definitely a musician first. "Not to say one is better than the other," he qualifies. "I love both. One's my little brother; one's my older brother. You can't live without them, and you can't say which you like more." He sums it up by saying, "I wouldn't say that I'm an actor with a band, nor would I say I'm a musician who's in movies." So let's just say that he's an old-school, multifaceted Hollywood entertainer, like Debbie Reynolds -- if Debbie Reynolds were a hot young boy who played rock 'n' roll.

The movie that launched Jason into the limelight was Wes Anderson's seminal 1998 film Rushmore, and the story behind it is classic Hollywood magic. Jason was invited to a party and screening of the silent film Napoleon, for which his grandfather Carmine had written a new score. The screening was at his Uncle Francis' vineyard in the Napa Valley, and Jason almost didn't go because he was working with his band. But in the end he was able to get away, and one of Rushmore's casting directors was there, complaining to Sofia Coppola about the trouble they were having casting the lead. "What kind of person are you looking for?" Sofia had asked. Upon hearing the description, she said, "That sounds like my cousin Jason!" The casting director messengered Jason a script the next day.

Sofia, for one, never doubted her cousin's ability. "We had done some one-act plays at my parents' in Napa," she recalls. "I directed one that Jason acted in, and he totally stole the show."

Flash forward to the audition: Jason, then 17-years-old, worked hard getting prepared, but having never gone on an audition, he didn't know quite what to expect. He went after school and met director Wes Anderson, who was wearing Converse shoes. Jason commented on them, and Wes complimented Jason on his New Balances. "After 15 minutes about shoes, I wasn't nervous anymore, and he said, 'We should read.' And I said, 'Read what?' And he said, 'The scene.'" Jason read, and Wes said it was great and told him to go take a walk around the block. Jason had come up with the idea to dress like the character he'd just read for, Max Fischer, and put together a geeky prep-school outfit. "I went outside, and it was like the final scene in Three Amigos! where everyone [auditioning for the part] is dressed like Martin Short. Everywhere I went around the block, there was Max Fischer. I saw Max Fischer at the Jamba Juice. There was another Max Fischer smoking a cigarette in the doorway. They were littering a large block." In the end, Jason was happy but unsure. "Because this was my first audition, I didn't know if it was a good one or a bad one. I felt good only because we got along as people. Everyone said, 'How did it go?' and I said, 'I don't know.'"

After Rushmore, Jason felt a sort of postpartum anticlimax. "It was hard to explain to people," he says. "It was like having a really incredible dream and people don't get it. So I went home, completed high school, and we finished our record." So much for the new movie star. Then his cousin Roman Coppola called and asked him to play Felix de Marco, the obnoxious director of a vampire musical in his ultra-stylish homage to '60s spy movies CQ. Roman actually asked Jason to come early and choreograph the vampire dance sequence. "We were shooting in Luxembourg, and all the models were Russian. They weren't even real dancers," Jason recalls. "My whole thing is, I can't do all the crazy stuff, but I can do Madonna's 'Vogue' and showgirl stuff. I have the hands of a dancer. It's all from the wrists up for me... I'm that kind of guy. So I'm asking them, 'Can you twist your wrists like this and pop?' Basically, it was the biggest mess up in the history of my short choreographing life."

Roman Coppola has a higher opinion of his cousin's work. "After I wrote the script, I made a wish-list cast, and Jason was at the top of the list for that character. Growing up around him and knowing him so well, it was a no-brainer. He's so dynamic and funny."

A role in Slackers soon followed, a goofball college comedy directed by the fabulous Dewey Nicks and co-starring James King. Jason knew Dewey had good taste, and by that time he was ready for more movie work. "When I read the script, I decided it was like a big, wet chunk of clay. It wasn't like when I read Rushmore, and it was all there. This one you had to put together like Mr. Potato Head." Slackers really let Jason show off his zany side.

Dewey predicts big things for his young star. "He'll be really famous. To me he's an artist/filmmaker. I don't know if the need to be a movie star is as important to him as communicating his creativity to people."

Jason just returned from a tour with Phantom Planet, during which they played such places as Indonesia, Germany and New Zealand. Now they are ready to tour the U.S. His new film Simone, about a computer-generated movie star and co-starring Al Pacino, is out now. Spun, the Jonas Akerlund film in which he plays a speed freak and co-stars Mickey Rourke, will be released later this year. It's a big year for both Jason the international rock star in the making and Jason the movie star.

As we chat over the phone, my sides aching from his hilariously poignant stories, I wonder how the impending stardom feels to him. Overwhelming? Exhilarating? Ego-boosting? "Wait a minute," he says. "My mom is handing me a note." What could it be? Telling him not to say too much? To be sure to plug his latest project? To say his mother taught him everything he knows? "Go pick your brother up at the airport," he reads aloud. "OK, I have to go." Obviously, the stardom has gone straight to his head.

Styled by Christine Baker. Hair by Fred Van De Bunt for Nubest & Co. Salon, Manhasset, NY at Art Department. Makeup by Hiromi Kobari for Shiseido. Photography assistants: Gail Fisher & Marcus Wilhelm