Ewan McGregor interviewed in the LATimes last weekend:
How much of what goes on in “The Men Who Stare at Goats” do you think is true? The LSD, the telekinesis, the military secrecy . . .
Most of it’s true! In fact, the most unbelievable parts of the film are the true ones. The mundane bits are the bits we made up. The journalist in Iraq — my story, the character I play — is an invention. But there was a rumor that the Russian psychics were bombarding the U.S. president with negative energy, and there was a group within the military trying to combat it. It’s crazy, but war is crazy.
For the actors, it certainly looked like a good time.
My first scene with Jeff Bridges we were supposed to be tripping on acid. We had these amazing contact lenses that made it look like our pupils were wide open and we were waiting in this room that just so happened to have this old electric piano in it and I remember Jeff got so excited. He was like, “Oh, man! They put this keyboard here so we can get into it!” And so he started playing these wild, trippy sound effects on this keyboard. Us in our big black eyes, the Dude on keyboard, I just thought, “It doesn’t get much better than this.”
