Crave Online: Did you research sex addicts?

Sam Rockwell: We actually did. We both went to a few meetings. I went to five or six meetings.

Crave Online: Did you know Brad William Henke before?

Sam Rockwell: No.

Crave Online: How did you build the chemistry?

Sam Rockwell: I think Clark was really smart about the casting process and Mary Vernieu who cast Bad Santa, some Mike Judge movies, she's a great casting director. When you're casting a movie, an actor/director, Clark [Gregg]'s very smart about casting. Not unlike George Clooney is good. When an actor casts, he's looking at it from who do I want to act with? I want to act with somebody who has training, who has experience. You could tell, actors have a vocabulary with each other. Just like I would think writers do to, it's like you know this person's the real deal. It's no coincidence. Clark's looking for the best people for the job so he finds Brad, Kelly [MacDonald]. We're all really serious about acting I think. We've done the same kind of training so it's a work aesthetic I think too, with me and Brad.

Crave Online: How do you tackle the character?

Sam Rockwell: You do maybe a little research and watch a documentary. Then you read the book. Then I have my own references. Clark and I talked about Harold and Maude as a tone and The Fisher King was talked about. I think of other things. I go to my acting coach and we work on the material. You reference things like the mother and son, like The Glass Menagerie or Hamlet even. Then I'm always constantly referring to my 1970s cinematic encyclopedia which is movies like Five Easy Pieces or Harold and Maude where you have antiheroes, or Tom Jones with Albert Finney, Alfie. So you have these antiheroes, a Casanova or somebody. Five Easy Pieces is a real template for this guy I think.

Crave Online: Did any of that research include Colonial Williamsburg, where Victor works?

Sam Rockwell: You know something, we never had time to get into that. We saw some pictures I think.

Crave Online: You said in another interview that kissing scenes were harder than sex scenes. What did you mean?

Sam Rockwell: Oh yeah, I think that's true. Well, the sex scenes are fake. You aren't really having sex. When you're kissing, you're really kissing. So I think that kind of says it all. Sex scenes are just kind of silly. You've got these women coming in for a day. You just want to make them feel comfortable. It's a weird job so you try to tell a joke and keep it relaxed.

Crave Online: What about choking? Did you ever come close?

Sam Rockwell: No. It's like you hold your breath for a little bit and make your face red. It was just pretend.

Crave Online: So you were never in any danger.

Sam Rockwell: I don't think so. It's probably not the healthiest thing to stop yourself from breathing for a couple of seconds.

Crave Online: Did you know some theaters are refusing to show Choke because of the sexual content?

Sam Rockwell: That’s cool. I like that. That means we did something right. It's a romantic comedy. It's just a couple of breasteses. We showed the ass. I show my ass. That movie's so tame compared to the book.

Crave Online: Have you been in audiences and heard them gasp at the end of the movie?

Sam Rockwell: Yeah, I did. A couple I did. It was pretty wild. Chicago there were some college kids. They loved it. It was great. Really cool reactions.

Crave Online: Who are some actors you would like to work with?

Sam Rockwell: Yeah, Jeff Bridges, Meryl Streep, Morgan Freeman. I don't know, people like that.

Crave Online: What goes into your choices for roles?

Sam Rockwell: Oh, just if the character moves you. I think that's what it really comes down to. If you identify and you're moved by the character. If you think it's going to be fun to wake up at five in the morning and do that, then you take the job.

Crave Online: What are your Galaxy Quest memories?

Sam Rockwell: I love that movie. That's a great movie. Almost didn't do that movie actually. I was supposed to do an independent film, do a lead in an independent film and it didn't [go]. Galaxy Quest was just a great script. It was a fluke and then at the time it came out, we thought it was going to be like Ghostbusters and then it didn't do well at the box office but then it caught on later. It has a sort of cult following and we all thought it was the bees knees at the time, but then nobody saw the movie at the get go. It was really cool when it got a little bit of a following. I actually stole my whole performance from Bill Paxton in Aliens.

Crave Online: Did you tell him that?

Sam Rockwell: No, I've never met him but I would tell him that.

Crave Online: What comes to mind from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?

Sam Rockwell: Another sci-fi comedy and actually this Jared Hess movie, Gentleman Broncos, I play like a Buck Rodgers/Flash Gordon character. That's another f*ckin' sci-fi comedy.

Crave Online: Is it the same sense of humor as his other films?

Sam Rockwell: Yeah, I play sort of a Buck Rodgers/Flash Gordon character.

Crave Online: What about The Green Mile?

Sam Rockwell: I was sleeping in my trailer waiting for them to get done with the mice. They always had these mice. Before CGI, well, they had some CGI but we were always waiting for the mice. "Mice, you're taking up all the time."

Crave Online: Can you tell us any more about the Jared Hess film?

Sam Rockwell: It's really good. He's amazing. Jared's a genius. He's only 28-years-old. Mormon. Crazy. He's great.

Crave Online: What's next for you?

Sam Rockwell: I'm doing a basketball movie. I was supposed to do one of those Drunk Histories but I can't do it now. Drunk History, you ever seen that? That's it. Basketball movie. That's it. That's pretty much all I'm doing.

Crave Online: What's the basketball movie?

Sam Rockwell: I play a basketball coach to a girls high school basketball team and it's kind of your basic sort of Bad News Bears kind of movie but with a little more of a bite to it. It's dramatic. It's more like Half Nelson or Affliction but it also has this sort of sports formula throughline but there's some other stuff going on in there. So that's pretty much it. Hoosiers meets Half Nelson I guess is the best description.

Crave Online: What's your favorite character you've played?

Sam Rockwell: Well, Victor's one of them. There's a couple, yeah. I like the Green Mile guy. Snow Angels.

Crave Online: Were you disappointed Hitchhiker didn't do better?

Sam Rockwell: A little bit but what are you going to do? I like the movie.