Brad Pitt is one of W Magazine’s Best Performances covers. Pitt has had a “big year” in that he was sort of the lead in two ensemble movies, to mixed results. He was in Bullet Train, which by all accounts broke even financially and not much more. He was also co-lead (along with Margot Robbie) in Babylon, which has flopped so hard at the box office. Babylon came out around Christmas and it is one of the biggest bombs of the past year. No one wanted to see that sh-t. And Pitt got away with barely promoting it too, which is why it’s weird to see him on the cover of W Magazine. I guess W agreed to just ask him dumb questions, judging from the interview:

How he got cast in ‘Babylon’: “I’d been following Damien since Whiplash. The script came, and it was 180 pages. I said, “This thing is a masterwork. But what’s going to get cut?” Because it’s really hard just to get 120 pages in there. And he said, “Nothing. I’m going to pace it a minute a page. I’m gonna have it moving.” We talked about GoodFellas and Casino and some of the other Scorsese pics. And sure enough, he did it.

The melancholy man: “Sadly enough, that melancholy [in his Babylon character] may be my natural mode of being. Some congenital melancholy. But no, I think there’s a weariness that takes over with the character as he moves on. There’s a world-weariness that I can certainly relate to a little bit. At this time, more of us are trying to tear each other down than help each other up. I get a little weary.

Whether he did dance training for Babylon: “No, you know Damien’s films; there’s a rhythm—a syncopation—to the scenes. The way he puts it together and doles out the information. There’s always this kind of movement that I think comes from his early days as a jazz drummer. I find that I’m looking for that in life, you know? We all need to find the music in the day.

His sex scene in Thelma & Louise. “Yeah, that was my entry into the big leagues, I guess. Geena [Davis] was so sweet and kind and delicate. That love scene, I think, went on for two days of shooting. She took care of me. [When I read the script] I just thought, I’m the guy for this. But they went through a couple of other actors. I didn’t get the part at first, and then it came back around and I didn’t get it again, and I went, “Huh. All right. Moving on.” And then it came back around again. I feel like it was three times.

Whether he’s ever been starstruck: “In the early days, sure. I remember moving out here [to Los Angeles], and the first week I went to a Fishbone concert in the valley. I saw John Cusack, and that was the first I had ever seen a man or woman who actually worked in film. It was really strange, being in the same room with someone who you watched on the screen.

His pet peeve: “You know what my pet peeve—my Larry David moment—is? It’s when people are in the passing lane and they’re going as slow as everyone in the regular lanes. They block the whole thing, and you can’t get around. I gotta move. And when I feel trapped, I go all Larry David on ’em. I try to be nicer these days. [Laughs] I might flick a bright. See if that gets anything. I might, like, move over into the rearview mirror a couple of times, see if that does anything.

[From W magazine]

Yeah, I actually agree with him about the pet peeve. That’s one of my big ones – people who get in the passing lane and then go the same speed as the cars in the slow lanes. People are such bad drivers, my god. I never flash my brights though, because I’m a woman behind the wheel. I passed someone the other day and the guy behind the wheel laid down on his horn and he was screaming at me. He shouldn’t have been f–king around and it wasn’t my fault, but I still had to sit in a parking lot for a second to get my heart rate to go down.

This video is so annoying. At least his face work isn’t as obvious in this lighting.

Cover courtesy of W magazine.