Jeff Daniels loves to take on roles where he believes he might "fail".
The 63-year-old actor stars as John O’Neill in the Hulu drama miniseries ‘The Looming Tower’, and has admitted he took on the role because doesn’t want to be limited as a Hollywood star, and instead wants as much "range" as possible.
When asked how he came to land the role, Jeff said: "They sent it to me like three months before it started. I look for things that I haven’t done before, where I might fail. I’ve been doing this for 40 years and I just don’t wanna be the actor who becomes a brand: I want the range. This O’Neill was something I hadn’t done before, didn’t know how to do, would have to figure out how to do, which, after 40 years will keep me interested."
‘The Looming Tower’ is based on the novel of same name by Lawrence Wright and centres around the rising threat of terrorism in the 1990s which lead to the tragic 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers in New York City in 2001.
John O’Neill was chief of the New York FBI’s Counterterrorism Center known as "I-49", and was convinced the United States had been targeted for attack by terrorist organisations.
When asked why the story is interesting given that the outcome in already known, Jeff said at the Berlin International Film Festival last week: "Because then we didn’t know. We didn’t know how close we were to maybe stopping it from happening. That we were that close to maybe preventing it from happening at all … that might pull you in.
"You don’t know the story. And by the way, it actually happened: it’s based on real events, real people. So, you think you know, but you don’t. I thought I knew. Didn’t."
‘The Looming Tower’ will air on Hulu in America on Wednesday (28.02.18), and will be available on Prime Video weekly from Thursday (01.03.18).
Jeff Daniels like risky roles
