Alec Baldwin is an ordinary guy. Well, that’s what he said in a recent Reddit AMA, anyway. The actor took the chance to open up about what his average day was like, holding the public’s interest and why he chooses not to do many films any more.
“My average day is pretty ordinary,” he says. “I wake up, and I walk my dogs. I do the morning shift with my dogs. We have a dog walker in the afternoon, but in the morning, I’m out there in the snow, the rain, the freezing cold, I gotta walk my dogs. Then I feed my dogs. I walk and feed the dogs. My wife takes care of my kid while I walk and feed the dogs.
“Then the rest of the day is trying to remind people why they would come see me in some project,” he explains. “You are always trying to fan the flames of your career. It’s very competitive out there. Like I’m going to do a TV show for HBO, or I’m gonna try, we sold a pilot to them, and to compete in the TV market, where there’s such a fracturing of the market, with netflix and cable and streaming – getting an audience to watch your show is really tough.
“I do a lot of writing for the show. Developing the TV show, prepping for the podcast, reading scripts for things I might do but I don’t do that many films any more because I want to stay home with my family. I really don’t want to leave my wife and my kid. Like if I get offered a film, and I can’t bring along my wife and kid, then I probably won’t do the film.
“When I come home, my wife and I have dinner and we go to bed very early. My daughter gets us up VERY early – kicking us in the face, saying If I’m up, you’re up! She wants her cereal, she wants her pancakes, and she speaks spanish by the way – she wants her huevos, she wants her leche, she is the boss. So my wife and I, we go to bed very early – like at 10, I go to bed at 11. Early to bed, early to rise on the farm!”
Working as a comedic actor means Baldwin has worked hard at perfecting the art of conveying meaning through facial expressions alone. This is something he certainly excelled at in 30 Rock, though he claims that the writing was really the main cause of the show’s success.
“I think when you’re a professional actor, you never exhaust your expression library. That’s almost impossible. That’s the difference between an amateur actor, and a professional actor, is that I have an inexhaustible store of expressions in my library. But to answer your question with what I think you’re asking… 30 Rock was so well written that it was pretty obvious every day what we needed to do to make that material sing, and so I’ve said this before, the writing was what really made the show so great.”
Baldwin is rightfully a proud member of the Saturday Night Live five timers club; celebrities who have hosted the show five times or more, but Baldwin has actually far surpassed that number, having hosted SNL a record sixteen times, which is also testament to his gift for comedy.
“I think if you come on the show, and you demonstrate to them that you want to – you’ve thought about them, you want to be another member of the cast – and get along with everyone and try to do a funny show, they’re very keen on having you come back,” he said, explaining how he manages to keep it fresh. “Which is what I try to do. I just try to make it like I’m one of them.”
While probably best known for his work on TV and in film, Baldwin has also shown great stage prowess over the years, and he was asked which role he would play if he could choose.
“If I could choose any onstage role? God, I would probably… well, sing, I can’t sing. I wish I could sing. And I would sing some huge lead in a Broadway musical, like Guys and Dolls or something. That would be my dream.”
