Lane Garrison – Camp X-Ray

Q) Please tell us the premise for Camp X-Ray and about your character.

A) It takes place Guantanamo Bay and “Camp X-Ray” was the term Marines called the portion of Guantanamo Bay. People may not be aware that I believe around 180 detainees are still being held down there and in limbo. The story takes place after 9/11 and we’re sort of sweeping up terrorists around the world. We pick up a man who is named Ali who is played by a phenomenal actor named Peyman Moaadi. It’s kind of ambiguous if he is innocent or guilty. We meet up with him eight years after he has been detained. You see the humanity from both sides of the fence, from the guard’s perspective and from the detainee’s perspective. We try to tell this intimate story and try to humanize the story of what is going on down there because there are still 180 men that are just in limbo. They haven’t had the ability to have a trial in the court of law. You don’t know if they are guilty or innocent. And because they are in Guantanamo Bay, no country will take them in. We find ourselves sort of caught in this really dark and twisted world. I probably represent the darker side because I play a young prison guard who is sort of desensitized because of his environment. I’ve sort of seen it all and my philosophy is, “You’re all guilty of 9/11 so you should all rot here.” He’s sort of void of all emotion until Private Cole (Kristen Stewart) and she  starts to chip away at my armor. She sort of peaks my interest about humanity and makes me question some of the things I’m doing. This is Kristen’s, hands down, best performance of any of her films. People are going to be blown away by her performance and will be in tears by the end of the film. She is reaching the next level. She’s such a hard worker and I have such good things to say about her. This is a movie we shot in twenty-four days on a shoe string budget and we all poured our hearts into it.

Q) What drew you to the role and what of your life did you bring to the character?

A) For me, it was cathartic because, obviously, I made some mistakes after “Prison Break” and found myself drinking and driving, which caused an accident. I made bad decisions and was in a bad place. I went to eight prisons throughout California and met about 10,000 inmates from all walks of life, some innocent and some guilty. I also met a lot of guards. I met a lot of good guards and a lot of bad guards. This role was cathartic because I finally understood where the bad guards were coming from. It’s from working in that environment and how you would become desensitized so much so that you would want to inflict pain on other individuals and get a kick out of it. For me, I knew what these men were like from the other side of the fence. I was basically Peyman Moaadi’s character for two years. So, I understand who those guys were. I knew when I read that script that there was just this connection to my soul and I wanted to be a part of this. I was supposed to play this role. For me to step into those shoes, it really was a healing process. It allowed me to free up some anger I had towards guards and towards the system and sort of let go. I think that I really believe life and my past experiences came into this role. I’m probably most proud of the work I’ve done in this film.

Q) Was there anything else you added to the role that wasn’t originally scripted for you?

A) Peter had never said where this guy was from. I grew up in Texas and I sort of come from this macho mentality. Everything is bigger there and this Texas pride. There is this sort of arrogance. I sort of incorporated that and made him a good ol’ boy from the South. I made him a guy that was sort of misdirected when he first entered the Army. So, I took some of my past and some of the people I grew up with and put that into the character because I thought audiences would connect with him more. I also gained about twenty pounds for the role. I beefed up for it. I wanted him to look as hard as Guantanamo Bay.

Q) What was it like working with writer/director Peter Sattler?

A) He is a film maker we are going to be following for the next thirty years. He knows his stuff and he is a really talented storyteller. We opened the film at Sundance this year and by the end of the movie the entire audience was in tears. The audiences were just giving standing ovation after standing ovation when we screened it. It was so powerful that it has caused a lot of buzz and conversations. I hope the movie sheds some light for everybody into what is going on.

Q) What kind of guidance did Peter give you and notes to creating this role?

A) Peter is one of those directors that you can bounce ideas off of him and he is so driven in his vision. Kristen and I would always come up with ideas and he’d say, “Yeah…no, I think it is this.” He was very definitive with his choices, which I respect and we battled it out creatively. He is just so locked into the script he wrote that he knew every nuance and moment. It’s great to work with a director like that because you trust him. Once you got that, it was sort of a free fall. We let this happen the way Peter envisioned it and it was like, “Now we have the characters down, let’s go!”

Q) Was the chemistry and connection you have with Kristen Stewart for the film something that came naturally or did you spend time building it?

A) We have this love/hate thing going on because we had such great chemistry on and off screen. It was weird because in a lot of the scenes I’m so arrogant and such a bastard that she’d always give me this look like she wanted to just punch me in the scene. She hated me with disdain and once we had finished filming we would always go out. We built a driving range and Kristen is a phenomenal athlete. We were either playing basketball or driving golf balls out of this prison to cut loose. The weight and the gravity of each scene was so heavy and so dense with material that once they yelled, “Cut!” we went back to this friendly behavior. I felt it was healthy so it wouldn’t be a miserable set since it was so intense. There is a scene where I am headed towards sexually assaulting her and I start making out with her and I get really aggressive where I am trying to get more from her. We worked that out and we both said, “Let’s just let go.” I think she trusted me and I trusted her. That’s always an awkward situation where you are really getting intimate with someone, but a hundred people are watching you do it. I think my biggest stress in that scene was that I made sure to eat like a hundred breath mints. We would do a take and I’d run and use mouthwash and I’d use breath mints. When you see the scene in the film it’s great and really intense. It’s honestly one of my favorite scenes in the whole movie. The scene really sheds light on the aggressive nature towards women in the military because they are a minority. You are locked into this environment so you really see how difficult it is on all aspects of life for women in the military.

Q) What did you take away or learn the most from working on the movie?

A) I said this at Sundance and it made national news (and I meant it), given my past and with everything that has happened I truly believed before beginning this film just like my character did. I believed that everyone down in Guantanamo Bay was guilty of 9/11 and they should rot down there. I really believed that. This film sort of changed my view of that. It made me think that every man, guilty or innocent, deserved their day in court. Maybe there were one or two people that were innocent and accidentally picked up on the battlefield. They deserve to be heard and they have families, too. There are a lot of men down there that are in limbo. So, it really changed my view that maybe someone might be going through this that might be innocent and deserves their day in court.

Q) You are a part of social media. Are you looking forward to the instant fan feedback you’ll receive when the film premieres?

A) I feel like it is great because it is a quicker way to spread the word. I think that the response, for the most part, is going to be really positive. Kristen has got such a huge following and fanbase that I feel it is going to get out there fast and it will be like a wildfire. I’m excited about it and I’m excited about watching it through social media. Already within the first four days of releasing the trailer we had crossed four million views on YouTube. We could never have done that before.

Q) What would you like to say to your fans and supporters?

A) I want to thank all the fans for the support over the years. They really helped me get through the hard times and helped me pick myself up and get back out there. I feel like I’ve been given a second chance and I want to make the most of it. Also, I want to tell the fans I am going to get better at social media. I’m just getting started on Twitter and Instagram. I’ve been lax on that, but I will make sure that I keep them up to speed more.