Single, so what?
True Detective 2 star Colin Farrell says that he's happy being a single dad to his two boys
Maybe because he's lived his life in the headlines and considers it an open book, Colin Farrell doesn't seem to dislike interviews.
He takes questions cheerfully, addresses the interviewer as "love", and doesn't dodge any subject.
The 39-year-old Irish movie star - who's had a reputation as a playboy, once dating a string of famous women - has now ventured into television.
He plays troubled detective Ray Velcoro, a compromised cop whose apparent sole purpose is to seek revenge on his ex-wife's rapist in the show True Detective 2.
That a child was born nine months after the event, and a DNA test never done, complicates matters.
Velcoro gets help from a crook (Vince Vaughn) to whom he has to sell his loyalty, then is caught in a web when the latter's partner is brutally killed and it's his job to investigate the crime.
True Detective 2 airs on HBO (StarHub TV Ch 601) on Mondays at 9pm.
Describe Ray for us.
The first time you meet Ray is the best version of Ray you ever see. And then it goes to hell in a hand basket very fast.
He's somebody that only knows personal expression through violence.
Ray's wounds are so deep and are born of one particular act of such extreme violence that he's cursed by his own past and can't help but keep dragging the pain and the darkness and the violence into every present moment. It's how lost he is.
You've played cops so many times in your career. What's the appeal?
(Tongue firmly in cheek) I just love guns and badges. I literally said "no more cops" before this. I've been saying that for about six years. No more cops. That's it. I'm hanging up the badge. No more guns.
Since True Detective 2 was shot in Los Angeles, you didn't have to go on location. How did you manage with two kids - 12-year-old James and six-year-old Henry from two previous relationships - at home?
Usually I'm away shooting and I miss my family badly and do Facetime and Skype or whatever.
But you also get the luxury, although it's adorned with longing and an absence, of focusing purely on the job.
Working in LA, I was a bit nervous about it. I was kind of like, two boys, two different schools, nannies, how am I going to... My mother was very helpful, my sisters were very helpful.
What happened was because I was in the city that I live in and where my kids are, I ended up having to draw a line in the sand that meant when I was at work I was at work, and when I was home I was home.
It actually did me solid, I think, and then when I wasn't working I was fine. There was a dividing line that was easy to maintain.
After your hell-raising past, are you more law-abiding now?
An upstanding member of society, yes, concerned with rules and prevention. Yes, indeed. Although I did go seven miles over the speed limit coming here today, I will admit.
Any marriage plans yet?
There is nobody that I have in mind to walk down the aisle with. I'm in no rush. I'm lucky enough to have a very full life between my boys and the friendships I have and work and stuff so, you know.
I've been single for a long time now. I'm not maudlin or depressed or lonely.
I'm very, very, very lucky to have a lot of love in my life that comes in the form of - and I understand it's not the kind of love that one shares with a significant other - but it's a kind of love, so it goes a long way toward not having me agitated by the presence of my solitary existence.
Have you been looking?
I just haven't met anyone. I don't go out that much, you know what I mean? I am not in bars and clubs and I don't meet an enormous amount of people.
I just find myself single. There's no reason or no intention behind it and I am not fighting it or trying to stay away from it, nor am I running towards it so I'm kind of okay with it.
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