Russell Crowe on 'Les Miserable' singing: 'It is what it is'

JTBC anchorman Sohn Seok-hee is interviewing Russell Crowe in his program "News Room" on Tuesday. / Screen capture from JTBC

Kiwi actor Russell Crowe played it cool this week when asked in a

television interview whether his singing dragged down the 2012 musical drama “Les Miserable.”

“It is what it is,” the 50-year-old actor said with a smile when posed the question by JTBC anchorman Sohn Seok-hee on Tuesday. “I’m not a Broadway singer and I don’t care to be. When I sing, I sing with truth and with emotion from deep inside me.”

Crowe, who arrived in Korea on Saturday to promote his new film, “Water Diviner,” was calm throughout the interview which ran for over 10 minutes.

He said the singing in Les Miserable ― in which Crowe plays the role of Javert ― was different from the stage because the songs were changed to make more sense to the audience and not every song was full length.

“Every Javert that I have seen performing, he did it in a very bombastic way and it was emotionally in a single note,” he added. “That’s mainly because in the stage play Javert has to kind of fight with tension.”

Crowe said he didn’t do much during his three-night visit to Korea because he “didn’t bring that many clothes for the weather.

“I sat on the balcony of the hotel and watched the sun come up and go down and read a book a little.”

As to what motivated him to direct Water Diviner, Crowe described the situation as “strange.”

“It found me rather than I found it,” said Crowe. “I read the script as part of my normal process... I felt not just making decisions on behalf of my character but that I wanted to be responsible for telling this particular tale.”

When asked if fans might be sad knowing he will no longer play “manly” roles such as Maximus from the 2000 film “Gladiator,” he said he is still willing to do so “if it was something I felt deeply about.”

“I would like to live in my skin. I would like to know who I am and be real about that. Not pretend that I am a younger man. I would like to play a role that suits the age that I am,” Crowe said.

Crowe said he plans to direct his second film based on book called “Happiest Refugee” by Ahn Do. “It’s a story about a Vietnamese family who left Vietnam in a nine-meter boat hoping for a new life in Australia.”