MCN

The Marton Csokas Network

FILMOGRAPHY


Romulus, My Father (2007) ..... Hora
"There are certainly similarities to the stories that my father and friends of the family told me. They shared the shock of the new, coming from an old established culture and what it was to arrive in a very foreign land. My father was the only person left in his family, and off he went from 12 years old. The story of Romulus is not dissimilar to that."

"He's the light in the darkness, which is why I loved playing Hora. He's full of sun and life. I could do with a lot more of Hora in my life."


For his performance of Hora, Marton received:
Film Critics Circle of Australia (FCCA) Award ~ 2008 ~ Best Supporting Actor for "ROMULUS, MY FATHER"
Australian Film Institute Awards ~ 2007 ~ Best Supporting Actor for "ROMULUS, MY FATHER"



Aeon Flux (2005) ..... Trevor Goodchild
"As for Trevor Goodchild, it wasn’t in the screenplay. There are hints of what he was, and I was happy with that and I expressed those things at the first meeting and Karyn was in agreement with it, hence the darker hair and all that kind of thing. The sexual deviance - I’d be lying if I said I didn’t miss that; but we do have hints of it but in a more psychological way and therefore more human way, arguably. Or certainly to the extent that the animated series takes that sexuality.”

"Trevor Goodchild is very different from the animated series. He is a somewhat mysterious character — we think he is one thing and then discover that he’s another, as human beings can sometimes be, they are not always what they first appear to be. The animated character is a lot more vindictive and masochistic. Trevor Goodchild in the film is more romantic, a lot more romantic. He provides a way through for the character of Aeon Flux."




The Great Raid (2005) ..... Captain Redding
"In 'The Great Raid,' what interested me most, there was love again, but in a different form, this time about male friendship. I thought it interesting that within a war film, that male camaraderie and friendship and love was investigated. Joseph Fiennes is the major and we have an antagonistic relationship, but they're deeply connected and that allows the others around them to survive the war camp. It's not often in a Hollywood film you'd get to explore those relationships."

"I really enjoyed playing that character because he’s somewhat of a rebel, an antagonistic force, but within the prisoner of war camp. It’s that force that kept him alive and I believe he was a driving force to keeping other people alive as well. Rather than be submissive, he was quite anarchic in order to maintain his self-determinism. That was his way of dealing with it. I enjoyed playing the role for this reason — he didn’t bow down to the status quo, he held his own opinions. Arguably, you could say his self-possession killed him, but ultimately you could also say that it kept him alive and also maintained other people’s enthusiasm to survive in the conflict as a prisoner of war."




Kingdom of Heaven (2005) ..... Guy de Lusignan
“Guy is an interesting character. To me, he exemplifies the law of cause and effect and the law of karma more than any other character. He’s in an arranged marriage. He’s a military man and very powerfully ambitious. It’s as if he’s born under an unlucky star and gets continually frustrated. He will take an action, and because of the position he holds in the court, the repercussions are often quite serious. And then he tries and gets himself out of that circumstance. It’s an interesting role. It’s a combination of the fop and the more primal warrior.”

"But that's the art to these big ones," he continues, when the kid in the apron is out of earshot, "finding out when you can push a seemingly broad character's depth. I really explored this with Guy in Kingdom of Heaven. Ridley [Scott] recognized this, told me Guy could see everything but wanted it right back.

So I moved between a seemingly numb, violent crusader and a very vulnerable, emotional character. Guy wants so much to be loved and looked upon as the leader and when this doesn't happen, his emotional response is anger and savage violence. Basically, there is an explanation for every action he makes - some are more extreme than others. I loved the role of Guy because of his flamboyance, that he bounced between two extremes of human emotion quite regularly: the civil and the primal. Through that, I found the essence of what made his character so human."




Asylum 2005 ..... Edgar Stark
"Edgar was described in Patrick McGrath's novel as a big bear, so I bulked up a bit and kept that mindset. But in Marber's script there is a line about how Edgar, like all artists, had the inner fragility of a child. This was incredibly important to me, that while his character was so malicious and violent on the outside, he was just a very frightened little boy."

"What’s nice about this film is that Edgar wants to redeem himself because of the love he has for Stella and Stella has for him, but it’s a doomed love affair, of course, too many laws have been broken. He escapes but in a way he escapes to more of a hell because he can’t exist in everyday life, he can’t exist in a mundane society on a practical level nor on a psychological level."




The Bourne Supremacy (2004) ..... Jarda
I enjoy playing the villain," Csokas says. "Some of the best roles are the bad guys. It depends on the film how I play them. "In The Bourne Supremacy I tried to play him as a friend to Matt Damon's character so I tried to play that aspect of sympathy and like-mindedness."




Evilenko (2004) ..... Vadim Timurouvic Lesiev
"I was deeply touched by the humanity of the script (based on David Grieco's novel of the same name). Working with Malcolm has been an extraordinary experience. He is a very experienced actor... He is able to feel the mood of the whole movie. He was always joking to keep us alert, "alive". He makes things easier. He plays his role, and then it's as if he just closes everything in a bag. It is a quality I envy very much. I'd like to be able to behave like this one day."




The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) ..... Celeborn
"I didn't have a helluva lot to do in either of the Rings movies that I'm in. That was my first big film, so I was pretty awestruck and just wanted to get to the end of the day every day and get over my nerves," he laughs.




Timeline (2003) ..... Sir William De Kere/William Decker
Once again, the authenticity of the battle would help to inspire the cast involved in the scene. Says Marton Csokas, who portrayed a 14th century Englishman, "To be in the presence of all these people with all the weaponry, the fire, the catapults, the arrows soaring overhead, it was inspiring and exciting and at the same time quite scary."




Kangaroo Jack (2003) ..... Mr. Smith
"At that point in my career I would take what roles were presented to me and make them work," he explains. "A lot of actors experience that type of thing in the beginning. Sometimes I ended up with really great material or directors and other times I was just working to pay the rent."

Would that explain Kangaroo Jack? Csokas stifles laughter."Yeah, you bet. At least a funny story comes with that one: "I was in Australia doing Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and they were casting for Kangaroo Jack over the next couple weeks - or at least attempting to cast for it. All the other actors and I were sitting around backstage before the show talking about it and all of them said they didn't want to audition, they'd never audition for such a role, they had more respect for themselves than that. I was the only one who admitted that I was going to an audition and everyone kind of booed and made fun of me. But a few days later when I showed up to read, there were three or four of the exact same people from my cast sitting in the waiting room, practicing lines."




Garage Days (2002) ..... Shad Kern
"We did about five takes(the dance over the end credits) but it was the fourth one they chose - it was the one. Paul Mercurio choreographed that which is probably even more terrifying than anything else considering his reputation for being a good dancer. That was enjoyable. That whole film was enjoyable. Things were thrown around. We workshoped the script for about three weeks. A lot of stupidity and frivolity on the set. Alex was good to work with. You could conduct a conversation with him and exchange ideas, which is useful to say the least. I enjoyed seeing the film. I saw it yesterday and I thought it had a great irreverence, a sense of irony, and kept changing the viewpoint via the cinematography and the soundtrack, which was quite rich."




xXx (2002) ..... Yorgi
"Being Russian, he's probably fought in various wars and seen a lot of his friends be killed and wonders why, and he is trying to manipulate the larger picture for the good of the world. And, like some people, the good of the world becomes the good of the individual. His pursuits are admirable, in my opinion, but the means by which he seeks to save the world arguably amoral."

In the film's production notes, (director) Rob Cohen says of their meeting: "At first I was a little taken aback, because although Marton was indeed tall, dark and handsome, he was also so shy and mild-mannered that I wondered if he could play a dangerous villain like Yorgi. "When he started to read a scene from the script in character, he was suddenly seven feet tall! After Marton left the office I turned to [casting director Ronna Kress] and said, 'Let's get him. Let's not even look any further. I don't care who else is out there, this guy's amazing'."




Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) ..... Geonosian Archduke Poggle the Lesser
"That was a really interesting exercise for me in terms of publicity casting and actually doing it and landing with absolutely zilch other than a credit for Star Wars and a letter from the casting director and George Lucas saying at the last moment they had decided to give him a computer-generated visage as well as voice. And it's amusing standing back and watching all that happen."




Xena: Warrior Princess - A Friend in Need (The Director's Cut) (2002) ..... Borias




The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) ..... Celeborn
"I worked on it around about ten days. I played a small part. When I arrived on location, I was completely amazed by the scale. The amount of money and energy spent on such a production! I became extremely nervous. The enormity of it weighed on me."




Xena, Warrior Princess (TV series, 10 episodes 1997-2001) ..... Borias/Belach/Khrafstar
"It was like setting off on an adventure every day. I did several episodes as Xena's lover, and I got to ride horses in a swashbuckling style," he says. "It was a long time ago, shot in New Zealand and fun." Csokas actually played three different roles on the two shows - Tarlus, Borias and Khrafstar (Xena's "The Deliverer" and "The Bitter Suite") - and appeared on Cleopatra 2525 too (as Krider in "No Thanks for the Memories"). And his favorite? "Oh, Borias, absolutely! What a great character!"




Rain (2001) ..... Cady
"From a practical perspective, 'Rain' enabled me to be seen," Csokas said. "But my character Cady in 'Rain,' he drifts, he's an inter-island adventurer with no real roots. He can be all things to all people."




 

Cleopatra 2525
(TV series, 1 episode 2001) ..... Krider



The Farm
(TV miniseries, 2001) ..... Adrian Beckett



The Lost World
(TV series, 1 episode 2000) ..... Kenner



The Monkey's Mask
(2000) ..... Nick Maitland



Beastmaster
(TV series, 3 episodes 2000) ..... Qord



The Three Stooges
(TV movie, 2000) ..... Ted Healy



Farscape
(TV series, 1 episode 2000) ..... Br'Nee



Accidents
(2000) ..... Chug



Water Rats
(TV series, 1 episode 1999) ..... Robert Tremain



Wildside
(TV series, 1 episode 1999) ..... Larry Lodans



All Saints
(TV Series, 1 episode 1999) ..... Brother Thomas



Halifax f.p: Swimming with Sharks
(TV series, 1 episode 1999) ..... John Garth



Hurrah
(1998) ..... Raoul



Broken English
(1996) ..... Darko



Hercules: The Legendary Journeys
(TV series, 1 episode 1996) ..... Tarlus



Chicken
(1996) .....



Twilight of the Gods
(1995) ..... Soldier



Shortland Street
(TV series, unknown episodes 1994-1996) ..... Dr. Leonard Rossi-Dodds



A Game with No Rules
(1994) ..... Kane Harris



Jack Brown Genius
(1994) ..... Dennis



The Ray Bradbury Theater
(TV series, 1 episode 1992) ..... Sid