SINCE THE 1970s, ERIC ROBERTS HAS BEEN ACTING… AND ACTING… AND ACTING, BUILDING UP A SEEMINGLY INFINITE IMDB PAGE IN WHICH CHRISTOPHER NOLAN AND PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON FILMS NESTLE BETWEEN NO-BUDGET ODDITIES. DURING AN EMOTIONAL DAY IN LOS ANGELES, HE REVEALS WHY HE JUST CAN’T STOP

WORDS AL HORNER

PORTRAITS SHAYAN ASGHARNIA

The hardest-working man in Hollywood is enjoying a day off. Well, his version of a day off. Which, when you’re Eric Roberts, the actor with the most film and TV credits in American motion-picture history, means a workout at the crack of dawn, a plate of egg whites for breakfast, a couple of scripts to read and a minor emergency to handle involving one of his and his wife Eliza’s two adorable pet cats (a mix-up with medicines; don’t worry, nothing serious). All of this before we come knocking at the door of his San Fernando Valley home, for an early-morning audience with the star of 697 films and TV shows, and counting.

“Woah, 697! That many, huh? I lost count at about 70,” laughs the actor you’ve watched in The Dark Knight, Doctor Who, Inherent Vice, Runaway Train, Star 80, The Pope Of Greenwich Village, The Expendables and Righteous Gemstones, to name a fraction. “You want to know why I make so many movies, man?” He leans forward, sporting an enlightened smile. “Because I can, man. It’s that simple. I love it and I live for it. I want to act every single day of my life. So, my dude, that’s what I do.”

He’s not kidding. Since the mid ’00s, Roberts has been known to shoot “100 movies a year”, as he puts it (not much of an exaggeration: in 2017, he shot 74). He estimates he spends around nine months each year on movie sets, and the remaining time prepping his next parts. Occasionally, he’ll shoot three different scenes on three different movies on three different sets in one day (no wonder his days off are rarer than rainfall in the Mojave Desert). His IMDb page, as a result, is a lucky-dip bag of different projects spanning collaborations with some of the most revered filmmakers in Hollywood past and present — Paul Thomas Anderson, Bob Fosse,

Going gangster in The Dark Knight (2008);

On fire (almost literally) in The Expendables (2010);

Making an early impact in 1978’s King Of The Gypsies.

Christopher Nolan — and ultra, ultra low-budget independent oddities. Case in point? By the year’s end, Roberts will appear in both Babylon — the $110 million prestige spectacle from La La Land and Whiplash hitmaker Damien Chazelle — and, on the other end of the cinematic spectrum, a film titled From Dusk Till Bong, whose IMDb description is: “It follows Tony and Spat. They have to smoke lots of weed before a vampire pizza party goes all wrong. Screaming Jay pigeons [sic] has to rip out vampires eyes [sic] to travel to another dimension to save his love and fight the lizard people.” Its YouTube trailer has 782 views. “It’s an adventure, man! My wife tells me that we get up to 30 offers a day from all over the world — some financed, some not. We’re having so much fun. Saying yes as much as I can has allowed me to travel the planet three times over,” says the 66-year-old, who’s aware this is a chapter in his career that many didn’t see coming. In 1978, Roberts — brother to Julia, and (later) dad to Emma — announced himself as an edgy, electrifying new talent in Frank Pierson’s drama King Of The Gypsies. It landed him a Golden Globe nomination, with even greater awards buzz to come: a remarkable performance in Bob Fosse's Star 80 in 1983 won him another Golden Globe nod, before his turn two years later in Runaway Train, as prison escapee Buck McGeehy, saw him all of a sudden in contention for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar. A career as a smouldering A-list leading man beckoned. So it seemed.