"We shot The Daytrippers in 18 days. It creates a nice energy. People are doing [films like that] for reasons other than money or fame, and that tends to bring about more creative work."
Not that the Yale Drama School grad is drawing any comparisons, but the underwater alien thriller Sphere, in which he plays a scientist exploring paranormal oceanic activity, had a seemingly never-ending production schedule. So, is that big studio film--due in February--less creative than his indie work? He's not saying.
What he will say is it's nothing like his other alien-sci-fi flick, the current Phantoms. "Sphere is a psychological thriller. Phantoms is more of a kids-in-danger movie: Two girls drive into a town and find everybody killed." Everybody, that is, except the rest of the hot young cast--Rose McGowan, Joanna Going and fellow Sizzler Ben Affleck.
But to the 30-year-old New York native, sci-fi (which he compares to playing "cowboys and Indians") is just rent money. In Jakob the Liar, coming at Christmas, he plays a boxer eager to start a resistance in a WWII Jewish ghetto (opposite Robin Williams). He's also working on a smaller independent film, Over the Moon, and he appears in David Schwimmer's long-awaited directorial debut, Since You've Been Gone.
But what does he really want to do? "I'd like to go back to the stage. I wanted to get to a point where I could make some money, so I wouldn't have to suffer to go back."
Indeed. Suffering seems to be something Schreiber's put behind him.
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