DATELINE HOLLYWOOD

DOWN
but
NEVER OUT

Robert Downey Jr. doesn’t conform to any stereotypes

Richard Aldhous asks him how he defied all the odds

Compiled by hub.branded

For even the most gilded of actors, in an age where image is king, a tarnished reputation means a quick exit from Hollywood’s hallowed halls. The stakes are high in Tinseltown and since the cinemagoing public votes with their feet, no one wants to take a risk on a fallen star…

Except where Robert Downey Jr. is concer­ned.

Downey doesn’t conform to any of the clean-­living Hollywood stereotypes we’re supposed to draw in, embrace and celebrate. Here is a man who has achieved the impossible, making the quantum leap from the barren wasteland of drug addiction and stints behind bars to the giddy heights of being the highest paid actor in the world.

Since going clean, he’s starred in 11 movies that have grossed over US$ 500 million at the box office – with six of them (from The Avengers movies through Iron Man 3 to Captain America: Civil War) raking in over a billion dollars.

Here’s an actor still rocking the superhero concept at the age of 54 where so many of his contemporaries are young, fresh, hopelessly clean and can maintain a six-pack by simply looking at a protein shake.

“It does become a bit more difficult for me,” admits Robert. “At the age I’m at, you have to work so much harder for the things that came very easily in those youthful days,” he adds.

Downey continues: “I’ve long accepted that’s the case and actually with every passing day, it intrigues and entertains me to see how much extra effort I need to put in simply to get back to ‘normal’.”

Even when most studios refused to touch him because of his errant track record, there were still one or two prepared to put their professional reputations and income on the line in order to give him a high profile role that would put him back in the spotlight.

Downey knows he owes so much to Jon Fav­reau, the director who took a chance on him. He is the man who covered the high-risk star’s insurance bonds from his own fees. “There’s no denying that Iron Man has put me in a position to do many other things,” Robert says, looking relaxed and healthy in a gym kit at his sprawling Los Angeles estate.

“Iron Man was my route back into the whole thing, and I was inspired to do it because I could see how this sort of project totally reinvigorated the careers of Keanu Reeves and Johnny Depp,” he says, referring to their respective Matrix and Pirates of the Caribbean film franchises.

“I wanted my son to see his dad in that kind of a movie. And I wanted it to be the kind of movie that you can take your kid to, and explore the comic book hero genre with a mix of escapism and intelligence,” Downey explains.

The evolution of the Iron Man character ac­ross so many prequels, sequels and spin-offs has given the superhero genre permission and validation to expand into the colossus it is today.

It has not only kept the actor current, topical and extremely wealthy, but ensured that he has been able to remain free of all past problems as well as temptations. Happily settled with his wife of 15 years, producer Susan Levin and their two children, he is ready to count his blessings.

And it would be a masterful understatement to suggest that he had led a troubled life on the way here, following a path of self-destruction that could so easily have ended with a very different and tragic outcome.

The late Robert Downey Sr. was an actor and filmmaker who enlisted his son in his productions. Downey Jr. made his big screen debut at the age of five in Proud.