Nicolas Cage: Dream Scenario is a response to the 'meme-ification of so-called Nic Cage'

Watch: Nicolas Cage explains why Dream Scenario spoke to his lived experience as a meme

Nicolas Cage has been turned into an internet meme many times over – and with Dream Scenario, the actor channels the experience into his performance.

In the Kristoffer Borgli-directed film, Cage plays Paul Matthews, a professor who suddenly starts appearing in everyone’s dreams, whether nightmares or those of a sexual nature. Thanks to this unexplainable phenomenon, Matthews transforms into an overnight celebrity; he’s essentially a viral dream sensation.

Read more: Nicolas Cage's best movies: A celebration of the many phases of Cage's career

One scene in particular, where Matthews apologises to the world’s population for haunting their dreams, is particularly meaningful to Cage.

“I meant it, man, I wasn’t acting,” Cage tells Yahoo UK.

“I was feeling exactly what Paul was experiencing. That was my response to the meme-ification of so-called Nic Cage.”

Cage calls Dream Scenario an “interesting analysis” on the subject of fame and points to a specific moment within his own life that mirrored his character’s experience.

“I might have been the first actor who woke up one morning and went online and saw a mash-up of different moments in movies that were cherry-picked which were specifically designed for freakouts and meltdowns, with no regard for the first and second acts to where the crescendo emerged,” he says, referring to what later became the Cage Rage meme.

“I was thinking maybe it would compel someone to watch the movie and see how that character got there. But what also happened was it turned into a meme-ification with Photoshopping and T-shirts, and I had no reference point for that. It was not why I got into filmmaking.

“When I read Dream Scenario, I thought, ‘I get it.’ I understand how Paul feels and I can take those emotions – whatever I felt whatever, however heavy I felt – I could take that and turn it into a little bit of gold, meaning I could do something constructive with it.

"It was personal.”

Watch a trailer for Dream Scenario

Cage went on to discuss making personal projects, such as Dream Scenario, despite franchises dominating the box office. He also addresses those filmmakers, including Martin Scorsese, who directed Cage in Bringing Out the Dead, who have spoken out about their fears for the future of cinema.

“I get the frustration, I understand it,” he says.

“But you just had this marvellous success with the Barbie movie and the Oppenheimer movie, men talking in suits. I think that there's plenty of room for everybody. And certainly my movies, especially the movies that I profoundly care about, are not in conflict with franchises.

“Who's gonna say you can't make Joe, you can't make Pig, or you can't make Dream Scenario because there's another Marvel movie? No one's gonna say that.

“That's why I keep going back to the source, which is independently spirited drama, because that's where I can experiment, and that's where I can take the risks that originality brings.”

Dream Scenario reaches cinemas 10 November.