You know what would make Leonardo DiCaprio’s Oscar campaign go down a little bit easier? If he showed us his sense of humor. He shows us glimpses of his humor, like when he’s doing a cameo on Jonah Hill’s episode of Saturday Night Live, or when he… I don’t know, hangs out with his bros? But mostly Leo keeps his image tight in the public sphere, and this year in particular, he’s seeming a little bit too earnest and pinched. He wants that Oscar so much! I don’t blame him for following the program, but I wish the people advising him would plan out some very special “unrehearsed moments” for Leo to show his silly, lighter side.

Anyway, I was reminded of all of this because I just read Leo’s Wired interview. He doesn’t say anything controversial, he’s professional and he doesn’t complain. But show us some personality, damn it! In between discussions of the “visual, existential poetry” of Alejandro Innaritu’s direction, Leo chats about the bear mauling, his support for Bernie Sanders and how he’s almost died several times. You can read the full piece here. Some highlights:

The difficult moments on The Revenant: “Moments? Every single day of this movie was difficult. It was the most difficult film I’ve ever done. You’ll see, when you see the film—the endurance that we all had to have is very much up on the screen. The hardest thing for me was getting in and out of frozen rivers. Because I had elk skin on and a bear fur that weighed about 100 pounds when it got wet. And every day it was a challenge not to get hypothermia.”

Brushes with death: “My friends have named me the person they least want to do extreme adventures with, because I always seem to be very close to being part of a disaster. If a cat has nine lives, I think I’ve used a few. I mean, there was the shark incident …A great white jumped into my cage when I was diving in South Africa. Half its body was in the cage, and it was snapping at me…”

The time a plane engine blew up: “Then there was this Delta Airlines flight to Russia. I was in business class, and an engine blew up in front of my eyes. It was right after “Sully” Sullenberger landed in the Hudson. I was sitting there looking out at the wing, and the entire wing exploded in a fireball. I was the only one looking out at the moment this giant turbine exploded like a comet. It was crazy. They shut all the engines off for a couple of minutes, so you’re just sitting there gliding with absolutely no sound, and nobody in the plane was saying anything. It was a surreal experience. They started the engines back up, and we did an emergency landing at JFK.

How he handles his fame: “You know, the truth is, it’s very surreal. I don’t think anyone really gets used to being recognized around the world. It kind of feels like a videogame at times, especially with paparazzi and people following you and things of that nature. But it’s part of who I am now. It’s part of my life as long as I choose to do what I do as a profession, and I love what I do. I think I survive because I don’t limit myself. If there’s some experience I want to have or a place I want to go, I do it. I think that’s how I bring some semblance of normality to my life.”

Who we should be listening to about environmental issues: “Look, not to get political, but listening to Bernie Sanders at that first presidential debate was pretty inspiring—to hear what he said about the environment. Who knows which candidate is going to become our next president, but we need to create a dialogue about it. I mean, when they asked each of the candidates what the most important issue facing our planet is, Bernie Sanders simply said climate change. To me that’s inspiring.

[From Wired]

There’s also a story about how he was skydiving and the parachute was knotted up and he almost died. It sounds like Leo is something of a Calamity Jane, mostly when he’s on vacation, although after hearing all of the crap that went on during filming of The Revenant, maybe Leo is simply a real-life harbinger of doom/death/shenanigans. Still, the main point of this piece is that Leo is very many and he’s almost died many times and he suffers for his art and he’s not always going to be around, so why not give him the Oscar this time?

Photos courtesy of Dan Winters/Wired.