All Photos: Alan Mercer Lighting: Eric V.
I have been a fan of Steven Bauer’s work since I saw his dynamic performance in ‘Scarface.’ I wasn’t alone in my admiration for his work. He quickly scored many parts including starring roles in 'Thief of Hearts,’ 'Running Scared,’ ‘Gleaming The Cube’ and 'The Sword of Gideon.’ He has been in almost 150 movies and television projects including “Primal Fear,’ 'Traffic’ and the current 'For The Love of Money’ that opened last week in New York and Los Angeles. He has twelve more movies coming out in the next couple of years. Yes, Steven Bauer is on the rise in his career. He recently appeared on the show 'Breaking Bad’ playing Mexican drug lord Don Eladio and just last week his new series ‘Ray Donovan’ was picked up by Showtime. Steven plays Avi, Liev Schreiber's Israeli partner.
Steven Bauer was born Esteban Ernesto Echevarría Samson in Havana, Cuba. His father was a pilot who worked for Cubana Airlines. Steven's maternal grandfather was a Jewish refugee from Germany, and his maternal grandmother was a Cuban of partial Italian ancestry. His stage surname comes from his maternal great-grandmother. Steven's parents fled from Cuba to Miami, Florida on July 4, 1960, following Fidel Castro's revolution.
He graduated from Miami Coral Park High School in 1974. Originally intending to become a musician, Bauer turned to acting while attending Miami Dade Community College, but then transferred to the University of Miami where he studied in its Department of Theater Arts and performed at its Jerry Herman Ring Theatre.
Steven's first substantial role was in the PBS Bilingual sitcom ¿Qué Pasa, USA?, playing the teenage son of a Cuban exile family in Miami, from 1977 to 1979. He also appeared in the 1980 TV mini-series ‘From Here To Eternity.’ He was credited in these and a few other early projects as Rocky Echevarría. In 1981, Bauer starred in the television movie ‘She's in the Army Now,’ where he met his first wife, actress Melanie Griffith. They both moved to New York City. Both Steven and Melanie studied under famed acting teacher Stella Adler, and he appeared in several off-Broadway productions. During this time he briefly adopted the stage name Rocky Echevarria, before settling on “Steven Bauer”.
Steven was given the substantial role of Manny Ribera, the counterpart to the part played by George Raft in the original 1932 version, in the 1983 movie ‘Scarface’ even though, like Raft, he was a relatively unknown actor at the time. The producers of ‘Scarface’ were convinced that he was right for the role based on his strong audition, as well as his authentic Cuban background. His performance drew a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
Steven has always been a musician at heart. ‘Underground Junction featuring Steven Bauer’ is the name of the band he has been working with for a couple of years now. They have played at several clubs and music venues and have released an EP of 5 songs available on i-Tunes and amazon. The music is a perfect blend of Rock n’ Roll, Folk and Latin and adds up to an organic and authentic sound. All 5 cuts are fantastic and I can hardly wait until they release more music!
AM: Steven, you have ‘returned’ to music haven’t you?
SB: Yes, it’s a return to making time for music. I always did it on the side. Now I’ve taken some concentrated time to develop a sound and a band. We’ve written half an album of songs and we have the five songs on I-tunes.
AM: I didn’t know that. Is it under your name?
SB: The band is called Underground Junction featuring Steven Bauer. Now I’ve been working a lot of acting jobs this year so I’ve had to put off the music a little bit again.
AM: Have you been playing live?
SB: Yes, we’ve played in Miami, Long Island, New Jersey, Los Angeles and Texas. We have a producer and manager on the East Coast who really wants to work with us. They want to get our sound out on the internet. We are not 25 years old so we’re not going to be pop stars, but there is an audience who will buy our records. If they put us together with other groups we can sell out concerts on tour. That’s what we’re looking to do this summer.
AM: It must be very fulfilling for you to make this music.
SB: It is very fulfilling. It’s what I do naturally.
AM: I heard you were originally pursuing music and then acting just blew up for you.
SB: Acting happened! I love the cinema and the theater. Also I come from a musical family.
AM: Did you study music growing up?
SB: I come form a classical music background but I grew up with the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. I’m “them” in my soul, as well as Beethoven. I have a soul that needs to create music.
AM: Did you miss not making music while you’ve been so busy acting?
SB: I did miss it a lot. I missed it because I didn’t have the discipline in my life in order to be able to organize my time so that I could do everything. I was in relationships that were chaotic. That takes up all your time, as anybody can tell you. If you’re in a relationship that’s not smooth, it requires almost all your attention and you can’t save it anyway.
AM: Yes, it’s like you are growing up together.
SB: You don’t really have time for your endeavors because you are spending too much time trying to make something work that probably isn’t going to work.
AM: I love the music videos you have on youtube. I love your raw edged, organic sound!
SB: Oh great!!! It’s happening now. Thank you, I think that sound is appealing to a wide base of people. It’s raw and rootsy. There’s a lot of place in the country where this is the type of music they play in the clubs. I’m also very excited that my son’s band is taking off at the same time.
AM: What is the name of his group?
SB: It’s my son Alexander and his band is called The Moonshines. We’re going to try to do some combination tours where we open for each other and then combine the bands. We’ve done this already where I come on stage with him. It’s harder to get him to come on stage with me. He’s very shy, but I can be a guest vocalist in his band. He’s got a great soulful voice. He’s very romantic and Bohemian. He’s a dedicated musician who is a great guitarist and an amazing songwriter.
AM: Well music is in your blood, but you really hit big as an actor right away.
SB: I do have a tremendous love for theater, cinema, storytelling and history, all those things combined, and literature. My Grandmother was a literature person. She taught history and mythology so I grew up with a lot of imagination and I wanted to live in those worlds. My world was very mundane. With my parents coming from Cuba we didn’t have much so I lived in a world of movies and ancient literature. I discovered that through theater and film, eventually, I could transform my life and live in those worlds. I could be Ulysses and Ben Hur and all those characters.
AM: How long has it been since you were on a stage for a play?
SB: I did the lead in the play 'Bent’ in the late 80's for three months. For years I tried to get the rights to the play to make it into a movie. Richard Gere owned the rights and he wouldn’t give them up because he didn;t think it would make a good movie. Eventually he did sell the rights and a Polish director made a very dark film with Clive Owen.
AM: Do you want to get back to acting on stage again?
SB: Yes, I really want to. I’d love to do a play here in Los Angeles and then tour with it. I don’t have a New York agent at the moment but I have been up for some Broadway musicals. The producers know I can sing. There just hasn’t been the right show yet. I’m either too young and dashing or too tall. My youngest son Dylan is dying to see me on Broadway! He’s a big Broadway fan.
AM: I think you can easily do Broadway.
SB: I think I will too. I think I have more of an opportunity now that I’m in my fifties.
AM: You’re currently on a career ascendence.
SB: I really am!
AM: You deserve it so much!
SB: Thank you I try not to spend a lot of time in regret for years and opportunities missed.
AM: You have also avoided the type casting many actors have to live and work with. In your vast amount of work you are not playing the same character over and over.
SB: I have to fight that a lot Alan. If there’s a film coming up and the roles are good guys and bad guys, the first thing they think of is me playing a bad guy. I’m so not that. I’m always told it’s my looks. Why do I look like a bad guy?
AM: It’s a preconceived notion if you ask me.
SB: Type casting still very much exists. I have to fight it all the time. Not only fight it, I have to disappoint people all the time. They will tell me this is a really great role for you and I’ll ask what it is, and they’ll tell me it’s a psychotic murderer. It’s a really great part and I have to say, “I just don’t want to do it.” I don’t want to go into that world. Then they tell me it will be fun and I say, “Why? I don’t like being there.” I’m a method actor. I don’t like going there. I don’t want any darkness. I want to play a school teacher, who’s not molesting the kids!
AM: You want to play someone a little more normal. This is why I say you are not so typecast. You could have a resume filled with dark characters.
SB: I could of course. I could have done that and done that and done that. Some people look at me like I’m crazy. I have to stick to my guns. I have to push it or else I don’t get the really special roles. I’m also creating new roles for myself by developing and producing new projects.
AM: I saw a list of all the new films you’re involved with now and it’s a lot.
SB: It is, I’ve actually got my hands in a lot of things now. As a producer I’m hoping to bring a couple of really special movies to the screen.
AM: You are one of the few actors who has worked with Pamela Anderson. What was she like to work with?
SB: I have worked with her twice. It was really fun! She was gracious enough to invite me on her show ‘VIP’ and I got to do it. She was in charge and it was great. The first time around she was a young girl and she as leaving 'Baywatch’ to be in 'Snapdragon.’ She actually played twins in the movie, one is a killer and the other is not. I’m the police psychologist who is treating her and falling in love with her. Of course that was so easy because she was very beautiful, vulnerable and willing to learn. I think our acting scenes are good together. We had a really good chemistry. Years later I thought she had forgotten me.
AM: I don’t think people forget you! You are so famous for your role of Manny Ribera in ‘Scarface.' What’s it like to carry around an iconic character from an iconic movie for this many years?
SB: It’s really great. I feel very blessed about this. I sometimes tend to think about the things I haven’t done instead of what I was lucky enough to get.
AM: That is the actors curse.
SB: I always try to look at the glass half full as opposed to half empty. Look what I have in my pocket. How many people have that? This is everyday of my life. This is some sunshine and positive energy everyday. At some point every single day of my life, somebody will say something about movie and it’s always positive.
AM: That role puts you in the same cinematic league as Bogart and Cagney, much less Pacino!
SB: Thank God it’s getting it’s due now.
AM: It wasn’t a hit when it was released was it?
SB: No, it really wasn’t. It was kind of dissed.
AM: It was a bit much for many people at that time.
SB: It really was a too much. Now people can watch it objectively and see what a good film it is. It holds up scene after scene.
AM: How did you survive the insecurities of working with all these giants like Brian De Palma and Al Pacino?
SB: I was thrust into it and empowered by the people who chose me. The producer Martin Bregman and Brian De Palma told me this was my role long before I auditioned. They saw me and said I was perfect as long as I could act. All they had to do was get Al Pacino to buy the idea of me in the part. Then I met Al and he had been prepped to receive me. The thing that threw him was my name was English. I had no nerves because I was one of them from the very beginning. Al made me feel like I was right there with him. There was never pressure on me. All I had to do was be.
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