Between the Acts: Shape of Water's Michael Shannon on his band and his hate for obliviousness

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In Between the Acts, The Globe and Mail takes a look at how artists manage their time before and after a creative endeavour.

In the yet-to-be-released film The Current War, the mesmerizing Michael Shannon plays George Westinghouse opposite Benedict Cumberbatch's Thomas Edison in a drama about the battle to harness electricity at the end of the 19th century. When he has the time, the in-demand actor relaxes by plugging a guitar into an amplifier with his bandmates in the folk-rock trio Corporal. Shannon spoke to The Globe and Mail about writing songs, his hate for obliviousness and the things that give him the willies.

I haven't been able to get together with the band for a while. I've been working non-stop for the last 1,000 years, so I've had very little free time to do that. I'd like to do more it, though. The guys in the band are kind of scattered all over the place right now. We're very rarely in the same city at the same time.

The songs I write come out of a very subconscious place. I couldn't write a ballad with a story – I just can't. My song Folklore, though, is ultimately about storytelling. It's questioning whether people are listening, or whether people are noticing what's going on around them.

I happen to think we live in a somewhat oblivious culture. And I don't like obliviousness. For me, what I do is all about paying attention. Sometimes I wish other people would pay more attention themselves.

There's some of that in the film I did, The Current War, as well. The period in time in which the film takes place was not a period I was terribly familiar with. But I sure enjoyed learning more about it.

The decisions that Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse were making every day, and the discoveries they were making every day, are so monumental they're hard to fathom. It's hard to believe human beings having that kind of impact. But they did.

It's humbling, honestly, for me to even be a representation of George Westinghouse. If that man walked in here right now, I'd [be shocked]. Not just because he's dead, but because I couldn't fathom being that kind of man.

You think about everything flying around in the air right now. Nikola Tesla mentions it in the movie. He says: "The wires, do we even need them?" Think about it: It's literally in the air right now. Technology is coursing through us as we're sitting here having this conversation.

It kind of gives me the willies sometimes. Not to sound like a paranoid delusional schizophrenic. But it's true, right? It's happening.