Billy Zane Has Opened Up About Playing Real-Life Cult Leader Larry Ray, And Said That Actors Deserve “Emotional Support Pay” For Taking On Grueling Roles

Stanley Tucci, for example, earned an Oscar nomination for his role in The Lovely Bones, where he played killer George Harvey. Despite this industry acknowledgment, Stanley has insisted that he wouldn't take a character like that on again.

Speaking to Entertainment Tonight at the time, he said: “I would not play George Harvey again in The Lovely Bones, which was horrible. It’s a wonderful movie, but it was a tough experience. Simply because of the role.”

Meanwhile, Kate Winslet won an Oscar for her portrayal of a former Nazi camp worker in The Reader, and she told HuffPost that she struggled to come to terms with her character long after filming had wrapped. 

"We wrapped on July 12, and I sort of walked away like some car crash victim who somehow hadn't been hurt on the outside, but I felt like I couldn't speak [about it]. It was truly overwhelming,” she explained. “I really went somewhere. I was in some kind of a trance. And I'm still coming to terms with all of it. I'm so blown away by the movie."

And Sophie Turner told the Cut that she believes she’ll “exhibit some symptoms of trauma” after filming incredibly harrowing scenes as a child actor on Game of Thrones, which she said she didn’t really “comprehend” at the time.

Meanwhile, Zendaya previously articulated why these performances can be so damaging for actors as she reflected on her role as Rue in Euphoria. 

In an interview with Elle Australia, she explained: “Your body is a person; it doesn't know that what you're doing is not real. My brain can say: 'OK, I'm pretending,' but when I'm doing it, my body and my heart don't know that it's not real.”

For context, Larry Ray is currently serving 60 years in prison after he moved into his daughter’s dorm at Sarah Lawrence College in 2010 and psychologically, physically, and sexually abused her roommates and other acquaintances for almost a decade.

Larry was found guilty of forcing his victims into sex work, threatening them, and recording coerced and false confessions where his victims would admit to crimes that they never committed. 

In 2022, he was convicted of 15 criminal counts, including charges of sex trafficking, extortion, and racketeering conspiracy. 

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, the actor apparently laughed as he said: “Actors should get emotional support pay.”

“The secondary experience encroaches on the primary. It really does,” Billy went on. “You’re recreating much weird trauma. We're putting coursing adrenaline through our bodies and depleting serotonin and dopamine and freaking ourselves out, and the body registers it.”

In an attempt to counter-balance the difficult subject matter, Billy added that the cast and crew created a working environment where they could laugh and check in with each other between takes.

“I’ve played nefarious characters in the past and then shied from it for a while,” he said. “I couldn't resist this one because of just the curious nature of it. And I hadn't gone there in a while like this.”

Billy added that being a dad to two young girls — 13-year-old Ava and 10-year-old Gia — made the experience of playing Larry even more “terrifying” and “stressful” for him, with the star jokingly telling the publication that he no longer wants his kids to go to college.

When asked if the character made him worry about his daughters more, Billy quipped: “It was terrifying. It was completely stressful. I'm like: ‘Don't go to college. There's nothing there for you. Join the family business!’”