JOSH BROLIN

The actor on dry skin, the American dream, and the famous Brolin behind

Proust Questionnaire

What is your idea of perfect happiness? Being with my wife and my kids in Italy, in a small village on a side street, with laundry hanging from building to building above us and from some random window, the sounds of a teenager practicing arias from Puccinis Turandot. What do you dislike most about your appearance? All the Brolins have the bums of small mount ains.

Which words or phrases do you most overuse? Bitchin' and sesquipedalianism. When and where were you happiest? Every time I've been able to witness one of my children being born. Which talent would you most like to have? Virtuoso violinist. What is the trait you most deplore in others? A lack of humility. What is it that you most dislike? Dandruff. What is your favorite journey? Anything that stokes the fire inside me, from dilapidated motels to a resort in the middle of a Middle Eastern desert to an Airbnb in the highlands of Scotland. Experience/learn; experience/learn. Repeat until the end. What do you consider the most overrated virtue? I don't consider any virtue overrated. On what occasion do you lie? When someone else will get hurt if I don't. Which living person do you most despise? Anybody who is actively trying to shift a democracy into a void-of-a-constitution plutocracy. What is your greatest fear? Something awful happening to our children. What is your greatest regret? The time I wasted trying to prove I was somebody. Which living person do you most admire? Oprah, Anthony Zerbe, Michelle Obama. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself? My need to overprotect. I have scenarios zoetroping through my mind that I wish weren't so paranoid. What is your favorite occupation? Linguist. What is your most marked characteristic? My level of care. What is your current state of mind? Curious about how to go further. How to stop looking at the painting and start swimming in the painting. What do you consider your greatest achievement? My malleability. If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what do you think it would be? I'd come back in a past era as a foreigner, to experience what it felt like to want to become an American and pursue the American dream. What is your most treasured possession? My first edition Let Us Now Praise Famous Men by James Agee, signed by Hunter S. Thompson. And every piece of art my children have made for me. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? The pursuit of power at any cost. What do you most value in your friends? Emotional bravery. What is your motto? Why not now? Who are your favorite writers? Melville, Didion, Gogol, Steinbeck, Rilke, James Agee, Norman Mailer, Yrsa Daley-Ward, and Daniel Kraus. Who is your favorite hero of fiction? Santiago from The Alchemist and Stephen Dedalus from Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Who are your heroes in real life? Anybody with the bravery to be themselves. What are your favorite names? Kathryn, Trevor, Eden, Westlyn, and Chapel. How would you like to die? Giggling with my family. If you could choose what to come back as, what would it be? A smile. If you could change one thing about your family, what would it be? I have no interest in changing my family. I adore my family just as they are (almost all of the time).