Dylan Sprouse on How Thriller ‘Tyger Tyger’ Offers a Different Picture of Drug Addiction

Dylan Sprouse has a criteria for choosing projects and roles, and the character-driven film Tyger Tyger from first-time feature director and writer Kerry Mondragon ticked every box.

At first glance, the film explores drug addiction, but as Sprouse explains to The Hollywood Reporter, it goes much deeper into experiential addiction — how an addiction to love and life itself makes this particular character, the one Sprouse inhabits, an addict.

The story, in which Mondragon shaped using his own personal experience with drugs, sees Sprouse kidnapped by a young woman (Sam Quartin) and whisked away to distribute medication to those on the fringes of society. The movie was shot pre-pandemic in California’s Slab City and Bombay Beach, with non-actors among the cast.

“I wrote the film after getting clean — around the time when life was becoming richer and everything I used to chase became meaningless,” said Mondragon, in a statement to THR. “I wanted to tell a story of someone in between both life and death — that waiting and liminal state, when you dream of a place that is free from society. The script came quickly, in the two weeks following my immersion into Slab City and its itinerant encampments by the Salton Sea. It was filled with a restless, youthful and rebellious spirit that I related to—something that went against the grain, a punk rock or anti statement.”

Tyger Tyger, which also features Eden Brolin, daughter of Josh Brolin; and Max Madsen, son of Michael Madsen, releases in select theaters, drive-ins and digital/VOD on Feb. 26.

Sprouse, who was last seen in After We Collided on Netflix, talks about his process for examining scripts, why the role was appealing and how important it is for him to have a memorable experience on the projects he chooses to take. He also recalls a story from the set involving a missing Nintendo Switch and a “radical” young boy.

I imagine a lot of scripts and projects in different styles come your way, but what caught your attention about this story and the vision that [director] Kerry Mondragon had to execute it?

First I should preface that I do have a taste for experimental films and I definitely have a taste for indie projects. I read a lot of those, and I particularly like them. At first glance, I noticed that it was a very visually written script, as in so far as it is almost written like a storyboard in some scenes, and that intrigued me because I’m a visual learner. And finally, it was a story about addiction, but it wasn’t grey or glum, which I often find is the case. A lot of these kind of movies can end up seeming like an anti-drug commercial. And while it definitely deals with a lot of aspects like that, it also deals with the other very honest side of drugs, which is that it makes some things better. And it makes you love deeply. [The film] tackles the other side of the coin, and I thought that felt refreshing when I read it.

Do you tend to have criteria when you choose projects, or do you go with your gut?

I definitely have a criteria. I do two script passes, which sounds kind of funny, like I’ll actually just use the search function through the script and I’ll type the character’s name that they’re interested in me for and I’ll read their dialogue and their interaction with other characters with no prior information as to what they’re doing in the script. I’ll do that first because you can usually tell if a character has depth in that alone; if they have a backstory, if they’re a well thought out character. And then, if that’s complete and it does seem like that, then I’ll read the full script right after that. But even though that’s kind of spoiler-y, it does help quite a bit in the process that I do. This character fulfilled that, it was a deep character with motives and interests and a life.

Then the other criteria that I have is that it’s got to be an experience to film. I want to work on projects that leave me with really good memories, because I don’t really live by the final product much, as pretentious as that sounds. I know a lot of actors don’t watch themselves, they don’t like to see themselves act — it’s not that for me, I just like to live very much more on set. I live for the scenes that we shoot and the connections that I make and all the things that we do together. So I knew that by nature of shooting in Bombay Beach and in Slab City and talking to Kerry about his mission statement and what we’re trying to do, I knew it was going to be one of those as well. I was really excited to do that.

Speaking of Slab City and Bombay Beach, had you been exposed to those places before this, or was it a whole new experience?

When I was young, my father took my brother [actor Cole Sprouse] and I to Bombay Beach actually, and he told us some stories of him growing up around that area. I had never been into Slab City, and I had never spent a long period of time in Bombay Beach, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world, honestly. I had the best experience there.

With this story being quite personal for the director Kerry, did he share with you what the experience of addiction felt like and did it inform how you approached your role?

Yeah, certainly. Kerry is a very open and honest guy. So we talked a lot about the influences, and I told him my own experiences with people around me who were formerly addicts or who are still addicts, and we talked at length about that and connected on a lot of levels. That certainly informed me, but I think what also made his conversation so special and a lot about why I like Tyger Tyger, in general, is this is a story about addiction, sure, but it’s first and foremost a story about addiction to love and addiction in general. Being addicted to things. The drugs are certainly an aspect of it, but it is addiction overall. And that I felt was a nice understanding of it.

You mentioned the character you play is deep and fulfilled what you were looking for. Can you expand on why you wanted to play him?

I think he’s a character who’s having a hard time rectifying with himself who he really is. There’s this experience that addicts have where they feel like they’re really only truly themselves when they’re on drugs, that the person they are when they’re not on drugs is not themselves. And it’s this sort of dissonance, and I thought after talking to Kerry and after thinking about my own prior experiences with people in similar situations, I was incredibly intrigued to tell that story. As the character is identifying who he really is, he realizes that it’s his real addiction to everything, his addiction to life, that is really making him an addict. It’s his compulsion to indulge in everything that gets thrown at him. And that experiential addiction, [which] Kerry and I talked a lot about, I really loved. I thought it was really astute and interesting. And I thought it was only a story that someone who’s an addict could possibly know.

And finally, I liked that it was kind of light-hearted. There’s so many movies out there about addicts, and it’s so dark and depressing and glum, it almost turns you away from the film because you know what you’re getting into. That’s not to say they’re bad at accomplishing what they’ve done because all of those are great films, I also just felt like that was untrue to what the reality of that is. People take drugs to escape a lot of times because it makes things better for them. This was very much dealing with that idea and almost enticing you in with how juicy it looked and how fun and how wild and chaotic it is because of those situations. I thought that was a really interesting way to tell the story and I felt it was more honest.

When you take on a character, how do you prepare? Are you someone who gets deep into the nitty-gritty of research or do you take a more emotional or inward approach?

Honestly, I’d say it’s probably a little bit of both. I definitely prepare; I do my research and have my own notes on characters that I keep. But also, I’m a firm believer in experience — it’s kind of a keyword when talking about this movie — a lot of that stuff gets done for you when you’re living down there, doing it, acting with the other actors, because you do have to feel out a little bit of that with the chemistry on set and the working conditions. The fact that we were thrust into the environment like we were with such a guerilla team, in a way it was mirroring the style of the characters and what they were experiencing. So it made it a lot easier to click into that mode. But then at the same time, I also pull on some of the things I’ve experienced too, and I pull on the emotional aspect of it.

Did you do a lot of rehearsal on set or was it more on the fly with improvisation?

We did barely any rehearsal. The truth is, [in] a lot of these situations we had maybe an hour and a half, two hours to shoot, maximum. We really had to be ninjas about it. In a way, Kerry wrote the script so that the language and dialogue provided a solid backbone, but he also left it open for improv. We did a fair bit of improvisation using the script as a rock, and we platformed off there a lot.

Can you recall an experience on set that took you out of your comfort zone?

This is actually kind of a sweet story, it’s a little long-winded, but we had a young boy in the film, his name is Cody. He lived in Bombay Beach and is such a radical little guy… So, during that time, he really didn’t have anyone his age to hang out with or play with, and I had my Nintendo Switch. So when we were on set, he’d play Super Smash with us in the trailers that we had on set. On my last day, I noticed that my Nintendo Switch was gone, I couldn’t find it anywhere…I was like, ‘I really hope Cody didn’t steal it.’ So I go to his house in Bombay Beach and his mom said that he was at school and I asked her if my Switch was there and she said no, [but] I had this gut feeling because he had kept playing with it.

So we drove down to his school and I told the teacher there, ‘Hey, Cody forgot something at his house that he needs, can I talk to him for a second?’ They were like, ‘Sure.’ And he was already in trouble I guess, for stealing something at school… He comes out and I ask him privately if he stole my Switch, and he said no. But he was bawling. I asked him if he could show me his backpack and he said ‘yeah,’ and when he said that I knew that he had stolen it. He opened it up and I said, ‘Cody, look, I’m going to take this back. And I want you to know, if you had just asked me, you could have had it.’ He was crying and said that he took it because he didn’t want all of us to leave. It kind of broke my heart a little bit, and then I told Kerry about what happened, kind of in passing. Kerry and I ended up buying him a Switch with all of the workings and a few games and some controllers down there for Cody down in Bombay Beach… I still think of him. He’s an awesome little guy. I hope he’s doing alright.

You’re clearly big into comics and video games — you’ve written Suneater and recently appeared on Gary Whitta’s Animal Talking — do you see those worlds becoming an even bigger part of your career alongside acting as time goes on?

Oh man, I would love to. If I could be 100 percent honest with you, I think it’s my preferred entertainment medium, in truth. I love acting and the expression of it, but I think video games are truly the pinnacle of entertainment we have right now. I’ve always been a huge video gamer. So I would love to; I’d love to work with more studios, but I actually just don’t know who to talk to and I get the distinct impression that it’s a very tight-knit community that’s kind of hard to break into. So one day, hopefully, I’ll get drinks with someone randomly and they’ll be like, ‘hey, come on down.’

You’ve been acting almost your entire life, on and off. What roles are you dying to sink your teeth into that you haven’t explored yet?

I’d love to do genre stuff. I love pulpy-type movies. In general, the stuff that I’ve been drawn to recently have a very clear understanding of what they want to be when [the filmmakers] go out to make it. I’d love to do a western. I’d love to do action.

Can you give me an example of a genre movie that stands out for you?

Oh man, I can give you 20. I guess, someone who’s very good at making genre, at least for his own expression, is Nicolas Winding Refn. I just think he’s incredible at what he does. He sets out with a goal and he makes something that’s visually just so juicy and the storyline is perfectly accompanying what he’s trying to make. I love Robert Eggers too, I think he’s great. In general, those kinds of films to me are the most intriguing because I like when artists go out on a limb to make something with a distinct idea. That to me is always fun. I’m also privy to 80s pulp movies. I love that kind of stuff. I hope maybe one day, down the line.

This interview was edited for length and clarity.