The Relic is your first leading role after a host of high-profile supporting parts. Was that part of the attraction?

That was the attraction. I had been offered leads in other movies that I didn’t think were any good, but after Natural Born Killers, Devil in a Blue Dress, Strange Days and Heat, I decided I needed to be alive at the end. I wanted to star in a big Hollywood picture and prove I could carry one. I call it being a two-hour actor instead of an hour actor.

The directors you’ve worked with so far would make up any actor’s wish list: Oliver Stone, Kathryn Bigelow, Michael Mann, Tony Scott …

I targetted those projects, told my representation these are the people I’m interested in working with. It’s a very short list: Stanley Kubrick’s on the list, Barry Levinson, Quentin. You get offered parts in movies … I don’t want to call them hacks, but they’ll direct anything. I don’t want to work with them. I don’t mean to sound arrogant. I wouldn’t audition for TV, I wouldn’t audition for commercials. I wanted to be in movies and I wanted to be in good ones. It used to drive my first agent nuts; he used to say, “Tom, you haven’t done anything – why are you turning down these auditions?”

Didn’t you audition for Reservoir Dogs?

It came down to me or Steve (Buscemi) for Mr Pink. I read, like, six or seven times. I really wanted to be in that movie. Blonde was cast with my buddy (Michael Madsen) and I wanted to play Pink anyway, but I didn’t win it. I wish I had been in it still; sometimes it bugs me.

Who would win a fight between you and Michael Madsen?

Michael’s a good friend of mine. I wouldn’t want to fight Michael, but I’d fill him if he insisted on it. He’d have to kill me to win, ‘cause I don’t get my arse kicked. I’m joking, I’m a big baby. I’m not tough at all. I’m afraid of the dark. I’m not kidding. And Michael’s not as tough as he seems, either – although Michael was in jail. I shot a couple of movies in jail, but I was never in jail.

You seem to relish playing the bad guy.

I enjoy being challenged. The hardest thing I ever did was rape the girl in (Natural Born Killers). I did not want to do that. It was very upsetting strangling her, even though it was fake; the idea that he was orgasming while he was doing it was sick-making. It wasn’t in me – the part – in a way. I had to go get it. It was in the street. I had to go find it and put it in me. I was making myself ill. I kind of cut myself off from society. I stayed in my room. I hung with (Strange Days co-star) Juliette (Lewis) and only her.

How did you find working with De Niro on Heat?

He was wonderful and surprisingly, unbelievably sweet. I learned how to behave. He was never late. He never bitched or complained. He never pulled any movie-star shit. And Al (Pacino). They were both just incredible, sweet people, they knew everybody’s name. None of this cool movie-star shit, like ... I'’ not going to name names, you know -–Stephen Dorff for instance. The colour of your sunglasses and if your jeans have proper holes, holes in the knees or something, is more important than the part. I don’t like that shit. I don’t hang around it. I’ve seen it. It makes me ill.

Your Other Heat co-star Val Kilmer has exactly that kind of reputation.

Its undeserved. Making movies is hard, making big movies ie especially hard because there’s so much at stake moneywise. I consider Val one of my closest friends. He never ever misbehaved on Heat and I was with him for the better part of seven months. Maybe it was because Bob was there the bulk of the time, or Al, and you don’t misbehave in front of gentlemen like that; young actors just don’t do it. You can tell the punk actors in clubs when Nicholsen walks in – they all straighten up, tuck in their shirts.

What made you want to be an actor?

I loved movies as a kid, they were a great escape, because I didn’t like my home. Things that were going around in my house weren’t fun. I was floundering from one job to the next, trying to stay in high school and not wanting to. Then I saw Taxi Driver, Close Encounters of The Third Kind and The Deer Hunter. And read a book about James Dean, and it just started taking shape in my mind; I’ll be an actor. I had to keep it a secret because I was from Detroit. I had connections at General Motors, I didn’t have connections at Paramount.

If you put Oliver Stony, Tony Scott and Kathryn Bigelow in a room and said only one of you can walk out alive …

Oliver. Tony’s tough, though, and Kathryn might kill them both. I don’t want to take anything from Tony, because Tony’s is a little fucking fireplug and Kathryn’s, like, six foot one, she’s got long legs, she might kick your teeth right out of your head. But Oliver was a Vietnam vet and he’s killed men before. He’s shot Viet Con. He did two tours. One wasn’t enough.

What’s the best rumour you’ve ever heard about yourself?

Best rumour? I can’t say. “He’s gonna be a huge star.” I’ve heard that rumour. I have. “He’s the young De Niro.”

There must be others.

“He’s gonna self-destruct. He’s a dope fiend and he’s just not gonna make it.” And that’s just not true any more. It used to be. That could have happened. (Laughs) I guess that really wasn’t a rumour, that was kind of the truth. I was self-destructing and I was abusing drugs. Now I’m not. I was addicted to narcotics and Bob De Niro helped me with my life, with my girlfriend and my parents, put me in a treatment centre. Bob intervened actively. I jokingly said maybe I engineered this whole fucking thing so I could tell all my friends Robert De Niro took me to rehab on a private jet and he looked at me like, “Man you’re fucked up. I thought you were fucked up before.” I was flying, I was high still, we were flying to rehab, I wasn’t there yet, they hadn’t taken all my shit from me.