Guy Pearce Got Maori Tattoos for ‘The Convert’

LOS ANGELES, July 12 (UPI) — Guy Pearce shares that his latest film, The Convert, which hits theaters and video-on-demand this Friday, left a lasting impression on him. The actor got Maori tattoos from the film’s Maori tattoo specialist.

At 56, Pearce portrays a soldier-turned-preacher attempting to maintain peace between the Maori and British settlers in 1830s New Zealand. The actor, whose father was from New Zealand, dedicated the tattoos to commemorate his late father and his 7-year-old son.

“There’s a feather on my left arm for my father and a mountain on my right arm for my son,” Pearce revealed in a recent Zoom interview with UPI.

The body art didn’t stop there. Pearce had additional tattoos done after completing The Convert, representing his mother and sister on his shoulders.

“I’m telling my family story purely with traditional Maori art,” Pearce mentioned.

Before filming The Convert, Pearce admitted that Maori history was a new experience for him. Director Lee Tamahori, who co-wrote the script with Michael Bennett and Shane Danielsen, is a New Zealand director known for his 1994 film, Once Were Warriors, which focused on a modern-day Maori family.

“You really realize that whether something’s set in the 1800s or set now, we’re the same people,” Pearce said. “We’re just in different environments and different political times, etc.”

The actor highlighted that the kind of violence depicted in The Convert still happens worldwide. Tamahori’s team recreated battles between Maori tribes and between Maori warriors and British soldiers using 19th-century weapons.

“It’s always kind of amazing to go, ‘Wow, people really held these guns, people stood this close, people actually shot somebody,'” Pearce reflected. “But, of course, that’s still happening in modern day, as well.”

Pearce spoke a few lines of Maori in the film but did not become fluent in the language. He credited his co-star, Jacqueline McKenzie, for handling more of the Maori dialogue.

“I was so impressed with how much language she was able to speak,” Pearce said. “I struggle with just the small amount that I had to do, to be honest.”

Pearce might revisit his past work in a sequel to the 1994 comedy The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. In April, Variety reported that director Stephan Elliott was working on a sequel. Pearce expressed enthusiasm about reuniting with Elliott and co-stars Hugo Weaving and Terrence Stamp, three decades after the first film where they played a trans woman and two drag queens traveling across the Outback.

“We’re at a very early stage,” Pearce mentioned. “As long as it’s a good script and as long as there’s value in doing it and it isn’t going to tarnish the original at all, I think it will be quite fun.”

The original film was later adapted into a stage musical. Pearce still meets Priscilla fans who share personal stories about how the film helped them come out to their families or embrace their identities.

Initially, Pearce saw Priscilla as a beacon of hope for the LGBTQ+ community during the ’80s AIDS crisis and rising homophobia.

“For Priscilla to be there at that moment and be a little stepping stone for people, straight people as well, to start looking at the world differently, was just really special,” Pearce said, noting that it was “just a fluke that I got to be part of it.”

Both Stamp and Weaving are also straight, and Pearce acknowledged the backlash they faced for not casting LGBTQ+ actors in LGBTQ+ roles. He anticipates possibly facing more criticism today but stated that the roles would not be recast.

“There was a bit of backlash about three straight guys playing three queens last time,” Pearce said. “Let’s see what it’s like this time.”

Following the success of Priscilla, Pearce moved to Hollywood for the 1997 cop drama, L.A. Confidential, which he credited director Curtis Hanson for teaching him film acting.

“Curtis Hanson taught me how to act on film, no question about it,” Pearce said, appreciating the “subtlety of film acting.”

Pearce played a by-the-books cop exposing police corruption in 1950s Los Angeles.

“I’ve only got to look at that film, of course, and I get to see what I learned,” Pearce said. “There it is captured forever, and of course as we know, it’s an exquisite piece of work.”

The film’s success led Pearce to significant roles in movies like Ravenous, The Time Machine, The Count of Monte Cristo and Christopher Nolan’s Memento. The mystery-thriller Memento, told in reverse chronology, still sparks debate and analysis, Pearce noted.

“The interesting thing with Memento is that it literally is a film that is dissected by film students constantly,” Pearce observed.

Despite an illustrious career including films like The Hurt Locker, The King’s Speech, Prometheus, Iron Man 3 and The Convert, Pearce still sees L.A. Confidential as a pivotal experience. He remains saddened by Hanson’s passing in 2016.

“Curtis Hanson also was very much like a mentor father figure for me,” Pearce said. “I’ll never be able to express how important and special that was for me.”

Source: UPI