Celebrity Anecdotes

Lorne Michaels, Producer (SNL)
"He brings all his other castings and roles to his comedy. You see that face, and you associate it with lots of other things. So when he's playing light, he's that much more powerful. . . . He's very funny. He's a truly gifted comedian. He's just a natural. He speaks in a voice that could only be him. His sense of timing is so unique. So much comedy is about timing, and he's just endlessly surprising."

Spike Jonze, Director
"There's something about him. Sometimes he's very hard to read. He's got such his own style about him. . . . When you watch him it's like watching no one else. He's got a very sharp sense of humor. Everything he did was funny."

Benicio Del Toro, Actor
The best advise Benicio has ever been given regarding acting came from Christopher Walken: "When you're in a scene and you don't know what you're gonna do, don't do anything."

Georgianne Walken, Casting Director
"It's very interesting being married to a man who is constantly playing a different person. You're always living
with a different person. He never tells me what part he's playing when he's getting ready. It just descends on me
one day. Very interesting."

Rob Lowe, Actor
[Speaking of Walken's black Cadillac] "It looks like a hearse, man, but he loves that car. In Williamstown, we'd be taking a break outside and he'd be sitting in that car with the windows rolled up. Just sitting there. He'd go sit in that car and stare straight ahead. That did a lot to dispel the rumors that he was not of this world. I'm a huge fan. Chris is unbelievably funny. You either get him or you never get him, and if you don't get him, you go, 'Oh, Chris Walken— isn't he a weirdo?'"

Sean Penn, Actor
"Some people got poetry in their blood and some don't. Chris's is difficult to track. It's hard to figure out whether it's angelic or satanic. But it is certainly poetic."

Tim Burton, Director
"You look at him and you know there's a lot going on-- yet you have no idea what."

Brendan Fraser, Actor
[when asked about his first impression of Walken] "He seemed very cryptic, but beneath it, he had a wry sense of humor. At the reading when I met him, he was eating a bowl of jalapeño peppers as if they were lozenges! [Laughs] And I
thought, 'That's my dad!' I loved him from The Dead Zone, That was a favorite film of mine. He's an entertainer of the highest order. He had a ritual­ he'd suck lemons before he had to speak a mouthful of dialogue. So there were little chewed-up lemon wedges hidden all over the set, in his pockets, in his bathroom. And he ate a lot of garlic, too. I think he's based on his taste senses."

Timothy Greenfield-Sanders, Photographer
[Journal entry] MARCH 13, 1995 Christopher Walken arrives for portraits with jet black hair. He is quite thin and rather easy going. On set Walken is flawless, every frame special. We talk about Jen Nathan and her London Sunday Times interview with him. He confirms the story about driving as a teenager for his father's bakery business. To this day he drives very slowly, still imagining birthday cakes piled high next to him on the front seat, terrified that a quick stop or a careless right turn could ruin them... Later, I want to ask him for more details about my favorite scene between him and Hopper in True Romance. But I don't.

Lawrence Fishburne, Actor
[speaking of an improvised scene in King Of New York] "Just before the take, Christopher comes back to where we were all waiting and he says, 'Okay guys, this is what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna go bop bop bop...whooooap, and then we'll all start dancing.' And I was like, 'okay,' and then he was gone, and then it was rolling, and then it was action, and then we were like, in the scene, and he did this thing, and we all, like, did it with him, and it was just... it was...amazing!"

Sissy Spacek, Actress
"I love working with Chris. [in Blast From The Past] I've known him since he was a wee tot. We met years ago in New York when we were both serious actors, and this is what it's come to."

Hugh Wilson, Director
"...every time Chris Walken says a line, he blows jazz. He comes up with rhythms you never dreamed of and it's just tremendous to watch."

Christina Applegate, Actress
"I think Christopher Walken is the sexiest man alive, he's a babe. Willem Dafoe, too. No offense to these younger actor guys. They don't have that thing yet. A chemical gets released in the lower back that makes the thing. It makes all the difference in the world"

Victor Argo, Actor
"I flew to New York from Los Angeles on a Saturday to audition with Walken. He didn't show up. So I called my friend Harvey Keitel who knew Chris and I said 'Hey Harvey, what kind of schmuck is this guy,' and Harvey said something must have happened because he's a terrific guy. And I said 'Bullshit, he's an asshole.' Well, the next day they called me up and I went over, and I'm still a little pissed but I figure it's a good part and you can't afford to turn down work. And Chris walks through the door and says, 'Vic Argo! What do you have to read him for, just give him the part!' So- what do I think of Chris Walken? I think he's a terrific guy."

Hans Nelman, Photographer
"I had 15 minutes assigned when I met Christopher Walken at the Public Theater where he was studying for a role.
We really didn't have a chance to talk. I shot as many pictures as I could with my Hasselblad, as fast as possible. Walken was very intense, very intuitive. When our brief time was over, Chris noticed my large-format Sinar camera set up in a corner. He walked off of the set and he said 'What's that?' I told him it was my 8 x 10-inch camera, but we didn't have
any more time [to use it]. He said 'let's take some pictures.' He just sat down, looked right at the lens with those
Christopher Walken eyes."

James Lipton, Host of The Actors Studio
"One night, he [Christopher Walken] and George Plimpton and I went to Madison Square Garden to see the fights. And, finally, we left the Garden and there were the three of us, Chris, Plimpton and I on 8th Avenue and 31st Street and all of the sudden we were surrounded by a tight, unbroken ring of young black men, and the three of us looked at each other and thought, 'well...what's this?' And they just stood there staring at us... and then the leader of them stepped forward, put his belly against Chris', and said, 'Man, you are the coolest white man in America.' And, I said to Chris, 'That is the best compliment you will get as long as you live.'"

Alicia Silverstone, Actress
"I don't know why everybody thinks he's so crazy. I think he seems so adorable. I think maybe I was his mom in
a past life or something."
"He's supercharming and funny. He touches something in me and I just want to give him a big hug. He's just a big
squishy bear. "

Andreas Katsulas, Actor
"I was riding in a car with Christopher and some other people, going to our location. [while filming Communion] It was a fairly long drive, through beautiful countryside, and it started to get too quiet, so Christopher started singing 'Mac The Knife' in Yiddish!"

Bridget Fonda, Actress
"... well he's frightening in a lot of films, but when you meet him he's so charming! He's very impish...and tall!"
"I find him attractive!"

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