I've wanted to write about Mark O'Brien all summer, ever since I fell for his turn as Jonathan Tucker's fuck-up of a brother, Jimmy Ryan, on the Showtime series City on a Hill, which just concluded its first season. As it so happens, the timing of that devastating episode coincided with the release of Fox Searchlight's horror-thriller Ready or Not, in which he plays a groom whose wealthy family subjects his new bride to a twisted ritual. The two characters couldn't be more different, but they serve to highlight O'Brien's range as an actor, and that's why he has earned Collider's Up-and-Comer of the Month honors for August.

Most of our Up-and-Comer of the Month subjects are a bit younger, and just starting their careers, but O'Brien is hardly a newcomer. The 35-year-old caught his big break a decade ago with the Canadian television series Republic of Doyle, where he met his future wife, actress Georgina Reilly, who also plays his ex on City on a Hill. That series led to roles in Amazon's The Last Tycoon and AMC's Halt and Catch Fire. That's when O'Brien's feature career began to take off, as he was tapped to work with filmmakers like Denis Villeneuve on Arrival, Jason Reitman on The Front Runner and Drew Goddard on Bad Times at the El Royale.

All of it has led to this significant moment in his ascent as an actor, and people are really starting to take notice. When Noah Baumbach was casting Scarlett Johansson's boyfriend in Netflix's upcoming divorce drama Marriage Story, he turned to O'Brien, who has a kind of childish innocence to him, even when he's doing horrible things onscreen. His character in City on a Hill is wiry and twitchy, and his performance reminded me of James Ransone's turn as Ziggy Sobotka on the second season of The Wire.

O'Brien is now balancing a burgeoning film and television career, but he still makes time to pursue passion projects such as indie films Goalie, which he executive produced, and the crime movie Hammer, in which he plays Will Patton's troubled son. He's also set to direct himself in a feature film in the coming months, so he's really firing on all cylinders lately. Thankfully, O'Brien made time in his increasingly busy schedule to chat with Collider, so... ready or not... here he comes. Enjoy!

What sparked your passion for acting, and why did you decide to get into this crazy business?

Mark O'Brien: Well, I never really became interested in acting until I was in my late teens. I started just making movies with my buddies, like home movies, for years. We did like 30-35 movies on a camcorder, editing on the weekends and stuff like that, and I wanted to be filmmaker. But then, I think from that, I started to realize that I just really liked acting. Then I just did improv in high school, and I did plays. It's funny, because I didn't know anyone in the business growing up at all. I just kind of came to it on my own. My family, we didn't really go to the theater, we weren't a big movie household, so it kind of came to me a bit later. And I don't know... it's a tough job to not like, but it's also an easy job to hate, so it's a really interesting vocation.

How'd you land the role of Jimmy Ryan in City on a Hill?

O'Brien: It was the weirdest timing. The show was supposed to shoot much earlier than it did, and by 'show,' I mean 'pilot.' It was back in 2017, and I was actually shooting something called The Front Runner, and I'd heard about City on a Hill. I hadn't read the script but I'd heard about it, and I was like, 'oh my god! A crime story set in Boston in the early 90s from Ben Affleck and Matt Damon? Can I do craft services? I mean, I'll do anything!' But I was unavailable to even audition, and I was also tied to another series that I was shooting called The Last Tycoon. And then that got canceled, but I was still unavailable due to the shoot for The Front Runner, so I was like, 'I don't think I'll be able to do it.'

And then they pushed it again, and I had previously met with the casting directing, Judy Henderson, who only recently had come on to the pilot at that point. And I'd just recently met her a few months previous, and it was very happenstance. And they already had their choices for Jimmy Ryan, from what I'd heard, and I said, 'oh, that's too bad.' But then she was like, 'oh, I like Mark! I met him a few months ago!' So they said I could send a tape, and I guess everybody liked it enough that they wanted me to meet with the director of the pilot, Michael Cuesta. They said I could Skype with him, but I said I wanted to see him in person, so I flew to New York on my own dime and put myself up, because I wanted the role so badly and had to meet him.

What did you model the accent after? Did you work with a dialect coach?

O'Brien: I find with accents, I normally just listen. I watch movies set there, and people who I know who are from there. I watched a lot of Damon and Affleck things, and movies like The Friends of Eddie Coyle, Mystic River, The Departed and Gone Baby Gone, and then you go on YouTube and just listen to people. I've worked with dialect coaches before, but I find, and this is just personal for me and I'm sure it's different every time and it depends on who you'e working with, but sometimes you can get into a rhythm that's not natural to you, so it's sometimes tricky. So for me, I just kind of trust in myself, and I'm pretty good at knowing when I suck at it or when I'm decent at it, and it just kind of clicked at one point. I think it was just kind of understood at one point. I kind of speak a little bit higher-pitched on the show, which I didn't realize until literally two weeks ago when a friend told me that. He said, 'your voice is higher pitched,' and I said, 'I hadn't noticed.' So it kind of just came out, and the way I pictured him came through vocally in that sort of way, I guess.

I found your accent very convincing. I'm from the suburbs and don't have much of an accent, but even in the suburbs there's always 1 or 2 kids who really have the accent because their parents did, and you remind me of one of my brother's friends. 

O'Brien: Thanks very much. You know what's really funny? You're one of many people who have now said I remind them of their brother's friend, whoever. So I guess everybody's brother had a friend like Jimmy Ryan.

Did you do any research yourself about what the city of Boston was like back then?

O'Brien: You know what? It'll sound like I'm lazy, but unless it actually completely informs the character, I sometimes don't like to get too much into researching time periods too much, because it just takes away from what I'm focused on. I'm the type of actor who... I read the script a lot, and I go through it, and then I like to be able to throw it all away when I get to set and not have to even think about anything other than what's around me, and hopefully it's already in my bones -- the character and what they want and what the movie's about. So I find that I don't benefit from too much information. Because I've done that in the past, to my own detriment, and I find that when there's too much stuff, I can get overwhelmed. And meanwhile, I'm just doing a scene where the character wants a slice of pizza, so I don't really need to know who is Mayor. You know what I mean? For me, I just find it overwhelming sometimes, unless it's the kind of character who would be privy to a lot of certain facts. Otherwise, I don't find it particularly helpful for me.

It's just interesting to hear about your process. I can relate, as I used to take notes during a movie when I had to review it, but eventually I found myself focused on taking the notes rather than just immersing myself in the film, and it wasn't helpful, so I stopped.

O'Brien: Exactly! That's a great analogy. It's kind of like, when I watch something, I let it just sit with me. And my wife is like, 'he did it! He's the bad guy! And I bet they're really brother and sister!' And she loves guessing [what's going to happen], and I don't even think about it until a movie is over. I just like to kind of be in it.

What was it like working with the Radio Silence guys on Ready or Not?

O'Brien: It was day-in and day-out hell. Ha! No, they are the best. I was literally texting with Matt Bettinelli the other day, and he mentioned something and he was like, 'yeah, and then you'll be in our next film,' and I was like,'I'm taking this as legal, written contract that I now have a screenshot of.' That's how badly I want to work with him and Tyler [Gillett] and Chad [Villella] again. They are just very prepared. The first time I met with them was on a Skype, and we were immediately on the same page, we had the same sense of humor, and you can just tell. It's not like I'm a gnarly, grizzled veteran in this business, but at the same time, you can tell within five minutes when you're talking to someone who knows what they're doing, I think. They just kind of get it, and they're also just wonderful guys. I'm 35, so I'm not exactly a senior citizen yet, but every day of my life counts, and I want to work with people I like being around.

What was your take after reading the script, because there's some interesting nuance to its depiction of class.

O'Brien: What I loved about that script is... you know what I honestly look for? Tony Gilroy, a great writer who wrote The Bourne Identity and one of my favorite movies, Michael Clayton, said 'make it so you want to turn the page.' And I know he's not the first person to say that, but that's what it comes down to. Do I want to turn the page? Do I care about what happens? And with this, I really did. I read it in one sitting, which, I'm going to be be honest, I don't always do. I just really wanted to know what was happening.

And what I loved about it was... you mentioned the socio-political commentary, and I liked how subtle it was. They don't need to hit you over the head with it, because that's not genre. We're not making a political analysis here. That's not what the movie is. It's buried there, and it's actually surrounding the characters at all times. The setting itself is doing that. So I thought it was really smart that they didn't lean into it too much. It's already very palpable. And I never felt it was overwhelming when I read the script, I just wanted to turn the page, and at the end I just thought it was a very interesting take on class and family dynamics.

If you had to make a deal with the devil, what would you ask him for?

O'Brien: Oh, immediate teleportation! I hate flying. I hate airports. I hate having to go from one place to the next, even if it's in a chair. So that, for sure. Well not for sure, but if I had to. I mean, if he's listening, this is not a verbal contract by any means.

Did your family put your wife Georgina through any initiation ritual?

O'Brien: You know what's really funny is, when Georgina and I were getting married, my family did exactly what happens in the script, believe it or not. No, they did not at all. They were just so easy going about it. They were just like, 'she's great! Why is she with you?' I think everyone just wanted to hurry up the process so that it would be legal. My family has very thick accents accents because I'm from Newfoundland in Canada, so I think the hardest initiation into the family, it wasn't so much my three sisters, it was my parents and literally understanding what they're saying, and just trying to, like, break down the words coming out of their mouths. That was new to her so it took a while, but now she can do a Newfoundland accent better than I can.

What's it like acting opposite her on City on a Hill? Is it hard having to constantly disappoint her onscreen?

O'Brien: Well, it's funny, we did a movie together last year as well called Goalie, which was a hockey movie where we played a couple again, and I disappointed her many times over and over. But here's how I look at it - if I disappoint her on screen, that means that we know that that was fake, but at the same time, I've kind of led her into a disappointment later in real life, so she's already kind of rehearsed in being disappointed by me, so I look at it like that. But no, I love working with her. She's my best friend, so every day we get to work together is great. We've seen each other do so many roles, and we've taped each other doing so many auditions, that it's really comfortable.

It was actually really cool, there was a cool story from Episode 8 where her and I actually break up, and she leaves so we don't see her again. The director of that episode is a great director named Clark Johnson, and we had to do a scene where we make out and then we fight, and he actually, basically, let us block that scene. He said, 'listen, you guys are married. I'm not going to tell you how to do this. That's for you guys to do, so you find it and we'll find it together, and then I'll just photograph it. I'd never seen someone do that before, and I've worked with couples before, and I've worked with Georgina before, and I just thought that was a really veteran, pro move by him. And it was.

You mentioned Goalie, and my Dad still plays hockey at 65, so hockey has always been big in my family. Hockey players are known for being superstitious, and the family in Ready or Not is superstitious, so are you superstitious at all?

O'Brien: That's a good question. I am very regimented, and I'm very much into routine, and I play hockey -- I play left wing, and I still play today -- and I put on my equipment the exact same way, every single time. I kind of get ready for hockey, and then I come down from hockey and the sweating and the showering, the exact same way every time. I think when you play sports, you kind of learn regimen and discipline and routine. so I think I definitely am, yeah.

Do you think you're superstitious at all as an actor?

O'Brien: I have one superstition as an actor, yeah -- I never, ever note my scripts. I never highlight my script or write notes in my script. I never like to touch the script. I have no idea why. I have no explanation for it. Maybe I'm just a psychopath. But I never touch the scripts.

Is there an actor whose career you’d like to emulate?

O'Brien: Edward Norton. I think he's incredible. That's a lofty, lofty ambition, but I just think he makes great choices, and he takes his time, and all of his performances are really considered and risky and thoughtful. I'm a massive fan of his.

What has been the biggest pinch-me moment of your career so far?

O'Brien: OK, I might've told this story before, but at the same time, this wasn't even a pinch-me moment, this was a beating a shit out of myself moment because it was so crazy. So I was filming the movie Arrival, and at the time I was filming that, I found out there was an opportunity to do this tape, because I had a theater background. It was more like local theater, but I did a lot of it. So I do the tape even though I still don't really know the details, almost like when you audition for a studio movie and you don't really know what's going on, and the powers that be see it, and then I had to go from Montreal where we were shooting Arrival straight to LA. My schedule with Arrival was so tight that the only way to audition was on a Saturday, and the only place I could do it was at someone's house.

So I pull up and go straight to Al Pacino's house, and it's me and Al Pacino and David Mamet, and we're meeting for Mamet's play China Doll, which was a two-handed on Broadway. So it's me and David and Al and the casting director Sharon Bialy, and we sat in Al Pacino's house and read through the script. I read the whole script off-book, and I remember talking with David, and he was a sweetheart. I thought he was going to be this tough guy, and he is tough, but he's also very kind and complimentary. And then Al comes out and he's like 'hey, how's it going?' and he's totally Al Pacino, and I'm like, 'that's him!' and then he sits down and he's kind of this sweet guy. So I'm telling him I have weekends off and I can come in for rehearsals, and he's like, 'That's good, weekends off.' It was so surreal, and then we read through it, and I remember Al saying, 'oh yeah, I loved your tape.'

And then I didn't get the part, and it was probably the lowest I've ever felt directly after -- it was down to three guys and I didn't get it -- and then the show didn't do so well on Broadway, so it was kind of an example of how crazy this business is. You find out you're going to Al Pacino's house to audition for him and then you don't get it, but then Arrival became a big success and did a lot for me. So it was just up-and-down, but sitting in Al's house with him and David Mamet... I'm pretty sure it didn't happen. When you fact check this, let me know, because I'm pretty sure I dreamed it.

You mentioned making short films as a young man, and I noticed those credits on your resume. Do you have any aspirations to write, direct, produce?

O'Brien: Oh, absolutely. I can't get into the nitty gritty, but I'm about to direct my first feature in about two months, that I wrote as well, and will star in. And I've written about 8-10 scripts in the past three years. Some have been optioned and are in different stages of development, and I'm working with some really cool people, so it's kind of all just starting to come together now. I like it just as much as acting. I just love creating and I'm a movie fiend, so it's very exciting.

Seen anything good this summer? The Tarantino movie, perhaps?

O'Brien: I mean, the Tarantino movie was just such a breath of fresh air. You know what I love about it so much? I rewatched Pulp Fiction a couple months ago for the first time in 2-3 years, and every shot is iconic. It was just so refreshing, and then when I saw Once Upon a Time, it felt like I was seeing Star Wars in '77. I was at the ArcLight and everyone was talking about it outside the theater and there was a bubbling vibe in the air and it was so rare, and so cool to have everyone talking about an original piece of material. I absolutely adored every minute of it. I thought it was just incredible.

I haven't seen a lot this year, but I thought Midsommar was, certainly, pretty audacious. I enjoyed it, but there hasn't been a lot this year that I've been blown away by. Last year there were some good movies. I really liked Mandy, the Panos Cosmatos movie. I like to see movies that have some guts, because I feel like that's kind of missing in movies these days. But there's a lot of cool stuff coming out later this year like The Irishman, and Little Women looks great, I think.

What's next for you? Can you say anything about your role in Noah Baumbach's Marriage Story?

O'Brien: Yeah, in Marriage Story I play Scarlett Johansson's boyfriend, and it was really cool to work with Noah Baumbach. I'm a huge fan of his, and he's a great guy, and we shot here in LA, and it was a pretty smooth process. He's an interesting filmmaker, but I didn't realize that he does a lot of takes. He does like 30-35 takes, which I thought was a really cool exercise as an actor, and something I've always kind of wanted to try, because you hear about [David] Fincher and some of these guys doing that, and I didn't know Noah Baumbach did that until I was doing it. And it was cool, it was a really interesting experience.

I also made a cool independent movie last year called Hammer with Will Patton, where we play father and son. I made it with an old friend of mine named Christian Sparkes, who's a great up-and-coming director. I don't know where it's going to premiere or where it's going to play, but I've seen the film and I thought it was fantastic. And I'm going to star in my own film in the next few months, and then there are a couple other things percolating and you never know what's going to happen. But for the first time in my career, I'm kind of taking it slow, because I really want to be available for something that's going to be really great.

Where would you like to see the character of Jimmy Ryan go in the second season of City on a Hill?

O'Brien: Jimmy rats out his brother and gets off scot-free because he has immunity, so what I think would be interesting is, Jimmy is a character who has been fighting with himself, and fighting with what's right and wrong within himself the whole season, because he's been an informant, and I think that that kind of kills him, because he does love his brother. And at the end of the season, we see that it just becomes about self-preservation for Jimmy. 'This is the only way I'm able to survive, my brother's going to go down anyway...'

So now that he's crossed this line and he's done something that I think he never thought he would go, I think his morals go out the window, and I think it'd be interesting to see him rise through the ranks of crime without any kind of remorse, because there's no soul left at this point, in a way. So I think that that would be interesting. I don't want to speak for the writers, but that's the first thing I pictured when I read Episode 10. I was like, 'oh, where does he go from there? I guess, who gives a shit? You know what I mean? At this point, who cares anymore? I've already done the thing I never thought I would do.' So, I think what that would do to someone is probably destroy any kind of remorse they would have, making them more sociopathic, I guess.