Lee Pace’s Naughty Streak

It’s one thing to discuss a movie with an actor who stars in it; it’s another to do it immediately after watching that movie with them in a theater. I think about the strangeness of the situation — and the million girls and gays who would kill to be in it — while Lee Pace waits for me to get out of the bathroom.

Today’s screening of the Edgar Wright action-thriller The Running Man is the first time Pace has seen the final cut, and he’s happy with the results. “From that first conversation to reading the script and now watching the movie, it’s the same exact movie, and it feels weird to say this, but it’s not always that way,” he says as we head out of the building and into Times Square. Along the way, we bump into his friend and co-star Colman Domingo, who was also at our screening; Pace introduces me to him, as if I had not been secretly creeping on their earlier interaction from a few seats away. “Are you wearing Valentino?” Pace quipped, in reference to Domingo’s fabulous red-carpet looks of late. Such ribbing is basically Pace’s love language, as I will discover over our next hour together.

The Running Man is the fourth Stephen King novel to get a screen adaptation in 2025, and it doesn’t feel terribly far off from our current national hellscape. Glen Powell stars as Ben Richards, a working-class family man so desperate to save his sick daughter and wife from destitution that he signs up for the titular competition: a reality show of sorts where contestants must survive 30 days of being hunted by professional killers, including Pace’s bloodthirsty masked villain, Evan McCone. It’s a little bit Hunger Games, a little bit Squid Game: Despite the many obstacles and interferences from the show’s producer Dan Killian (Josh Brolin), Ben becomes a fan-favorite and a beacon of hope for a broken society — which puts an even bigger target upon his back.

“Maybe I’m running around the city in a mask, leading a very exciting life that no one knows anything about. You should see the things that I do when I’m in my mask.”

“[King] had a sensitivity to something that was happening when he wrote this in the early ’80s: a hostility that has increased over the past 40 years, that we’re living in right now,” Pace says, his voice low and slow, like he’s drawing you in for a secret. But really, the shoot was a blast. “It was such fun to work with Glen on this. It was great to see someone take a leadership role on set in an actor way and deliver not just a really thought-out, nuanced performance, but also do the stunts, have an idea of what the whole movie needs to feel like, and also just be a really pleasant, supportive, collaborative person. He’s such a dreamy guy.”

Today, Pace is dressed in a black leather jacket, jeans, and a black baseball cap. Despite his 6-foot-5 height and a remarkable build that gets even the most chaste internet user hot under the collar, no one takes a second glance at him. As we zig through the early lunch crowd and head inside a coffee shop, we make small talk about the Broadway shows we’ve recently seen. He’s delighted to learn of the just-opened Chess revival (starring Lea Michele, Aaron Tveit, and Nicholas Christopher); the show was one of the first musicals he saw growing up in Houston, and he had the original cast recording on repeat when he was young.

Theater is in his bones. Now 46, Pace moved to New York at 17 to attend Juilliard, which furthered a lifelong love of Shakespeare — “This is going to sound so pretentious, and I’m not afraid of that” — and set him up for a Hollywood career full of twists and turns, from cult favorites (like 2006’s The Fall and AMC’s Halt and Catch Fire) to quirky mainstream hits (ABC’s Pushing Daisies) to genre blockbusters (The Hobbit movies, the Marvel Cinematic Universe).

“The more that I’ve been stopped on the street by someone who’s like, ‘I saw you in The Fall’ — or when someone who talks about The Hobbit having helped them through their illness — the more you think what a privilege it is to be able to bring enjoyment and entertainment to people.”

“Life is more surreal than genre. You wouldn’t believe some of the sh*t that happens just in daily life.”

He’s been on a hot streak lately: The 2022 horror-comedy Bodies, Bodies, Bodies, in which he played Rachel Sennott’s older boyfriend, introduced his smoldering on-screen presence to Gen Z, while his Apple TV+ clone drama, Foundation, just got renewed for a fourth season. For someone who logs a lot of hours making genre entertainment, Pace doesn’t find it any stranger than the real-life stuff.

“There have been times I’ve done not-genre things where I find those characters as surreal, if not more,” he says. “I mean, life is more surreal than genre. You wouldn’t believe some of the sh*t that happens just in daily life.”

Just not in his. Pace, who mostly keeps his personal life, including his marriage to Thom Browne exec Matthew Foley, out of the press, swears: “I’m extremely boring.”

In conversation, this is hardly the case. Pace is a little mischievous, even playfully defiant — like when I try to ask him about the upcoming Practical Magic sequel he’s filmed alongside original stars Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman, Dianne Wiest, and Stockard Channing. “I can’t answer any questions about Practical Magic 2,” he says, trying to look at me sternly from behind his wire-rimmed glasses before breaking into a laugh.

Or when we first sit down, at a corner table so cozy our knees are basically knocking, and Pace absolutely roasts my handwriting. “Well, I just looked at your notes. Stephen King? Read? Written in an ironic scribble. They say penmanship really gives it all away,” he says dryly. (“I only use Apple Notes so that I can remain unknowable,” he adds.) He answers the question he presumes my notes were getting at: “I’m a fan of Stephen King. I do read things. I have read things before,” he says. “I remember being on a family camping trip and not leaving the RV to read The Stand. I could not be pulled away from that book. I loved it so much.”

How did he like playing a villain? “I’m bad at heart, so it allows me the opportunity to show my true self. Evil in every way,” he says “The fun thing about a mask is that you can really get into the things you want to do. Maybe I’m running around the city in a mask, leading a very exciting life that no one knows anything about. So if you see someone in the city acting filthy, acting very, very naughty, you can pretty much assume it’s me. You should see the things that I do when I’m in my mask.” He flashes a grin that can only be described as naughty.

“You get older and you know things that you didn’t know before, and then you forget them, and then you learn new things and realize you’re an idiot the whole time. We’re all idiots.”

The occasional shirtless Instagram pictures suggest Pace enjoys stoking internet thirst, but in conversation, he seems unaware of, or at least indifferent to, strangers lusting after him. If you ask his fans, he’s in the pantheon of celebrity daddies, alongside actors like Domingo. “I agree about Colman, for sure. I mean, you’ve just spent some time with him. He’s incredibly magnetic, busy, and, I mean, gosh, what a great person to find at a party. He’s definitely daddy,” Pace says. But what does he think of that label? “Well, I’d rather that than the opposite — mommy.” Does he have feelings about people calling him that? “I don’t think they do it to my face.”

I suggest that might change once audiences get a load of the masked Evan McCone. “I guess I’m just about to find out,” he says. “You never stop growing and getting new experiences in life. Now I’m about to see what masked leather fetish holds for me.”

As our time winds down, there’s still a part of the cookie we’ve been sharing — the portion I assumed was his and vice versa. “I’ve been gazing at that cookie, being like, ‘She’s not going to eat it. Who’s this mad woman, not eating her half of the cookie?’” he says, reaching for it. “I’ll take the win. I’ll take it.”

We come back around to his time at Juillard: What would 17-year-old Lee make of his career now? He isn’t sure how to answer. “I’ve been lucky to keep playing roles for 25 years now, and honestly, I’m grateful for the work,” he says. “You just get older and you know things that you didn’t know before, and then you forget them, and then you learn new things and realize you’re an idiot the whole time. We’re all idiots.” He giggles: “Did you try to write that down with your scribble because you won’t remember it?”

He has to go get a Citi Bike to head downtown to meet his stylist, Michael Fisher, to figure out his looks for The Running Man press tour. (TBD on whether masks will be involved.) Before he goes, he taps on my phone, which has been recording our conversation, for one final mic drop: “Life’s not a sensible business. With that, I have to go before I say all my secrets.” As he leaves, he blows me a kiss through the window.