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The Unit’s Michael Irby briefs Dann Dulin on his mission to promote diversity,
protect the next generation & keep AIDS in our daily conversation.
Anyone else have any questions for me? Then I guess you’ll have to find a few other Arabs to harass,” states a quivering, distressed in-character Michael Irby to the passengers aboard a transatlantic flight in the 2005 film, Flightplan. He had just been physically attacked by Jodi Foster, who accused him of kidnapping her daughter. He plays those tense characters so well! Irby approaches his craft with vigor and intensity, the same way he approaches his personal life.
He had a few days off from playing the hotheaded bachelor, Charles Grey, in CBS’s popular action-infused military drama, The Unit, and spent several days at Disneyland traipsing around the amusement park with his four-year-old son, Addison, and his wife, Susan, whom he married two years ago (though they’ve been together for eleven). Today, having recently returned to Los Angeles, Michael’s a tad tired, but when he found out he could do an interview about AIDS, he immediately agreed. “My idea is that you first take care of yourself, then your family, then your community, then the world. And right now I’m moving into the community [stage],” he says. “I’m on this journey and in some way I try to help save the world through my actions everyday, like doing this interview. I want to be involved.”
Through the years, Irby, thirty-four, has attended AIDS benefits, walked in the AIDS Walk, and he supports the (RED) campaign [A&U, March 2007] and other African-focused organizations. “My life is quite busy now, but I try to do my part,” explains Michael. Raised in the Palm Springs area, and a former soccer champ, Irby had no plans to be an actor. But at an L.A.-area college, he stumbled on a drama professor who urged him to build an acting career. He decided to give it a go and, at nineteen, he moved to New York. While working as a nanny and a soccer coach, he studied at the famed American Academy of Dramatic Arts, where he met his actress wife, Susan Mayus. Since then, he’s chalked up credits on stage in Terrance McNally’s Corpus Christi, on television in Law & Order, CSI: Miami, and Haunted, and on the big screen in Piñero with Benjamin Bratt, and in The Last Castle with Robert Redford. Possibly more than acting, Michael has a passion for cooking and poetry. In fact, he says when he rises in the morning he immediately delights in thinking about what to prepare for dinner. Very often, you might find him at a club, reciting his poetry in the evening.
Though he has portrayed many edgy characters, when Michael enters the room, he lights it up with his warm smile and friendly demeanor. At A&U photographer Tim Courtney’s studio in West Hollywood, Michael sits next to a window and rays of sun stream onto his attire of blue jeans, funky black tennis shoes, and a tight, plain gray T-shirt. He’s articulate, thoughtful, and shy, though he speaks his mind. He displays an interesting mix of boyish charm and maturity.
Irby’s world was first struck by the AIDS epidemic about ten years ago when he lost a close acting teacher, John DeCarlo, at the New York campus of the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. “He passed away in the summer following my second year,” Irby reminisces. “He became sick the previous summer and we knew he wasn’t going to be around forever. And so he started teaching in that sense, like, ‘I’m at the end here, so I’m going to give you guys little pieces of golden nuggets that you can take on for the rest of your life.’ He was a beautiful cat.” Michael looks fleetingly out the window onto La Cienega Boulevard. “When we returned in the fall, it was like—wow—it was all very quiet. There was a private service. Not many students knew. It was just like, Oh, wow, that’s AIDS. Okay.”
Michael shrugs. He recalls the tragic memory. “John was right here, he was beautiful, and now he’s gone. Growing up during the eighties it was like this. AIDS was like the fucking boogeyman. It’s like cancer is now. It just happens. People get it and you don’t know where or why. Ya jog everyday, ya eat healthy, you’re living right and all of a sudden it’s like—boom!” he exclaims, throwing his hands up. “As a straight man I thought it was far away from me, but [I realized] it could happen to anyone at any moment.”
Growing up in Palm Springs, which has a large gay community, helped Irby to believe that AIDS was strictly a gay disease. “The school system didn’t instruct otherwise,” he points out. “I graduated in 1990 and AIDS organizations were new. HIV was still so hush-hush. In America we try to keep everything a little bit removed. We still whisper about it, ‘Oh, he’s got AIDS,’ rather than, ‘Let’s talk about this.’ I mean, there’s millions of people dying in Africa and around the world. Then we have the Pope who just sits there and talks about safe sex like it has something to do with religion. The fact that we live in a world where we can’t distribute condoms to make an entire country safe just doesn’t make sense. We live in a world where we have all this information and we’re just not using it. It’s such a contradiction of everything. It trips me out.” His eyebrows furl and his deep penetrating brown eyes reveal that he’s visibly upset.
Does Michael believe that we can keep AIDS at the forefront of the public’s consciousness? “If you take it back where young men emulate people they watch. When Magic Johnson said he had AIDS, it was huge! Everybody was aware because Magic Johnson is untouchable and he got AIDS. That was the last media impact. There is so much less coverage now,” he notes. “And just the fact that Magic’s living and is doing so much today is a big story, but nobody is getting into how’s he living, what meds is he on, how he maintains his health, and so on. Magic Johnson is the face of hope.” He eases back in the chair, crosses his legs, and sets his hands comfortably alongside each thigh. “I feel we’ve come so far, but in many ways, we are right [back] where we started. We just need to keep moving. It’s sad to see that we haven’t evolved more as a human race. Still, out of the bad things of life comes growth. I feel change coming and I want to be a part of it.”
One major change in Irby‘s life came when his son, Addison, was born. Michael is currently focused on paving a healthy environment for him. “My wife and I are open with him. We don’t hide anything at all and I think he’s a better person because of it. I want to raise a conscious, responsible man,” he says, very concisely and deliberately. “Whatever he decides to do in his life I just want him to be able to think about the other person before he thinks about himself a little bit. It’s about having an open line of communication about sex, drugs, all of it. I’m no saint and I’ll let him know that. I’m a real man who has faults as well as good things.” Irby freely admits that he hasn’t always had safe sex. “No, I can’t say that 100 percent I’ve worn a condom. Now maybe if I had learned more about AIDS in school, but it didn’t happen like that. I wasn’t very promiscuous as a kid. I was always pretty much with one person.” His first HIV test was administered when he and Susan decided to conceive. “I got really nervous about it,” he confides. “But it was fine.” He returns to the subject at hand, protecting his son. “I want to teach my boy to be more sensitive to the world. My generation wasn’t learning about that.” Irby certainly knows about insensitivity. Being of Latino/African-American descent, he was bullied about his ethnicities. “My lips were too big, my nose was too broad, my hair was too curly. I always felt like I was on the outside,” he says, indicating the importance of instilling in Addison a strong sense of self-worth.
“I also want him to understand that sex is something that you just don’t give away. It’s sacred. My first experience wasn’t sacred. I want to bestow in him that gift of sharing yourself with somebody,” he stresses, uncrossing his legs and putting his hands behind his head, almost slouching. Michael’s advice to Addison when he decides to have sex is plain and simple. “I will tell him to use condoms,” says Michael forcefully. “I’m not a religious person. Have safe sex. And talk about it with her. Maybe she won’t be in the same mindset as him. He needs to discuss all this with the person he’s going to have sex with.”
Momentarily, I recall his eerie performance in Flightplan and juxtapose that image with the reality sitting before me. It undoubtedly proves that he’s a good actor, as he’s not much like the character he portrayed in the movie. Talking with Michael, I realize how honest and non-defensive this man is, and what a super role model he makes as a parent. He seems to have a firm foundation that is grounded in self-knowledge. He’s worked at it, and he wants to set an example for Addison to maintain the same kind of courage and vitality—to be a well-rounded human being.
“Men and women don’t know what role they’re supposed to be playing because the lines have become blurred,” he continues. “Once we grow beyond our current patriarchal society, I think we'll see less war and less destructiveness in a society where we can all support each other. And I think that’s where we’re headed. Screw tolerance,” Michael says with feistiness. “Let’s embrace our differences. We’re all here to help each other. We can start by
talking daily about important issues such as AIDS.”
MICHAEL’S MISSION
Where is your favorite place to disappear to?
The ocean. I love large bodies of water. I don’t care if it’s still, running, or crashing. I need to feel small, I guess. I just like that vast space.
If I came to dinner tonight, what would you cook?
Let’s see. What’s in the refrigerator? [He thinks.] Steak, spinach, asparagus, and brussel sprouts. My wife never liked brussel sprouts. Now she loves the way I make them. Oh, and we’d have some nice wine.
Not to put you on the spot, but can you recite one of your poems?
How many more fucked up lives do we got to see
to understand we’re living on the land of hypocrisy
where headlines still read man destroys the man
for the color of their skin Jah for a plot of land
it’s all about the greenback on the motherfuckin’ slave back
the monetary benefit tell me brothers and sisters don’t you get so sick of it
seein mad fools rushing to the top of the stairs
only to figure out there ain’t a goddamn thing there
the only thing waiting for you at the top
is a bigger drop yo so please don’t stop no
I know you got wings and I hope that you can fly
there ain’t no day like the present so don’t wait until you die...
Who’s your all-time-favorite actor?
I’m digging Sean Penn right now. I love Benicio. I love earlier Pacino—Scarface, Dog Day Afternoon, and Serpico. [There’s a short silence.] John Leguizamo is an interesting cat.
Who’s your all-time favorite actress?
I’m diggin’ Judi Dench right now. I don’t like to immortalize anyone because it’s kind of less obtainable for me.
Name a couple of your favorite movies.
I can’t think of any right off the top of my head. I didn’t watch movies growing up. I was more into sports.
What kind of underwear are you wearing: briefs, boxers, or thong?
None.
Is there anything you don’t like about fame?
I’m pretty private at the end of the day. I like my anonymity. It’s the hardest thing to go somewhere and people know me and I don’t know them. I like to talk and relate. I don’t want you to think that you know who I am, when you only know what you see up on the screen. That’s what I lived with most of my life because of my ethnicity. I was always getting checked out and it had to do with negativity. So when I’m getting checked out now, my first instinct is like, “What?!”—and then I realize, “Oh, you’re watching the show, or you’ve seen me perform.” It’s like, “Oh, it ain’t me, you thinkin’ you know Michael Irby. My bad. My bad.” It’s got nothing to do with me. I didn’t become an actor to obtain fame. Fame is weird for me.
Out of the many people you have met, is there one in particular who stands out the most?
Joe Mantello [who directed him in Corpus Christi]. He changed my acting. He said, “Just say it.” He harnessed my acting and that was good for me. [He pauses.] Jodi Foster was really interesting to watch.
Who would you like to work with that you haven’t yet?
Speilberg. He just gets in there and lets you do it; a great director. I would have loved to be in any of Robert Altman’s films. He was a visionary.
IRBY’S INTIMATES
Michael gives a brief reaction to these fellow comrades
David Mamet: Interesting.
Robert Redford: Legend.
Jodi Foster: Powerful.
Dennis Haysbert: Teddy bear.
Benjamin Bratt: Brother.
Terrance McNally: Distant.
Michael C. Hall: Who knows?!
Josh Lucas: Simpatico. [He’s the godfather of his son.]
Rita Moreno: Beautiful
Name one word to describe yourself:
I have no idea! [He thinks a couple of seconds.] Dude.
Dann Dulin interviewed Bobby Shriver for the March issue.
May 2007
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