Bradley Cooper is stripping down to his skivvies for his latest role.
The Pennsylvania-raised actor, 37, is currently starring in a revised version of The Elephant Man at the Williamstown Theatre in Massachusetts. Cooper plays Joseph Merrick, a man who suffers from extreme deformities during the Victorian era. With the help of hired actress Mrs. Kendall (Easy A‘s Patricia Clarkson, 52), Cooper’s character goes from being the town freak show to “the toast of London high society.”
The Elephant Man holds a special place in Cooper’s heart, as it was one of his late father’s favorite films. “My father was a huge cinephile. I remember watching Raging Bull with him on cable when I was 10, and when I was 12, him showing me The Elephant Man and Apocalypse Now — all these crazy movies,” he told Marie Claire in April 2011.
“We use to play this game, ‘Would you put him in the movie?’ We’d pretend we were putting together this great film and decide whether an actor was worthy to be in it. It was this adorable father/son thing,” Cooper recalled. “I would live with movies for weeks, pretending I was whoever was in it. As a kid, I just knew I wanted to be up in that world.”
The Elephant Man — which also stars Jurassic Park III’s Alessandro Nivola, 40 — is scheduled to run until August 5.
