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Leo Woodall, who has a number of actors in his family, tells PEOPLE about the jobs he wanted to have when he was a kid before he decided on acting
“By osmosis, it eventually got me,” he says of embracing acting as his chosen profession
Woodall costars with Dustin Hoffman in the new movie Tuner, in limited theaters May 22 and everywhere May 29
Leo Woodall grew up surrounded by actors, but as a kid, he envisioned working in a field slightly left-of-center to those in frame on the big screen.
“There were some actors in my family. My father’s an actor, my stepfather was an actor before he passed,” Woodall, 29, tells PEOPLE in a recent interview with his costar Dustin Hoffman for their new movie Tuner. “My grandmother, my mom’s mom; it goes back. But ironically, it was the sort of last thing that I wanted to do. I think maybe — not because of that, but I don’t know. By osmosis, it eventually got me.”
“What were your first, second, third choices?” Hoffman, 88, asks. “P.E. teacher, or maybe football [soccer] coach,” Woodall says. “And then stuntman. Stuntman was probably my first ever dream job.”
In Tuner, Woodall portrays a young man and former piano prodigy named Niki who works as an apprentice piano tuner to Hoffman’s master tuner Harry. Niki suffers from ultra-sensitivity to noise, also known as hyperacusis, which derailed his career in music. The movie’s plot kicks into gear when Niki meets a group of criminals who crack safes in wealthy homes and realizes his condition makes him a talented choice for decoding a combination lock.
Tuner poster
Credit: Courtesy of Black Bear
Woodall came to popular attention with roles in Cherry, One Day and The White Lotus in recent years. Despite his recent success, he has not found many opportunities to perform stunts in his burgeoning acting career.
“The only stunt I’ve ever [done on camera] — there’s some stunts in this film, but the biggest stunt I’ve ever had was sort of jumping over a car,” Woodall says. “But I broke wind as I jumped over this car, and it didn’t make me feel exactly like James Bond. We only did one take of it as well, so that’s my only memory of doing stunts.”
As Woodall noted, he is far from the first actor to come from his family. Leo’s father Andrew has acted in dozens of television series and films since the late 1980s, including roles in Hollywood blockbusters like Solo: A Star Wars Story. Leo’s stepfather, a Scottish actor named Alexander Morton, died at 81 in April, per BBC News.
“It was pretty left up to me,” he says of deciding to pursue acting. “It was flirted with occasionally, but once I had said, ‘I think I might want to do this too,’ it was encouraged by everyone to go to school first and train and learn everything that I could.”
Havana Rose Liu and Leo Woodall in Tuner
Credit: Courtesy of Black Bear
But did Woodall actually learn how to crack safes while making the new movie? “Well, I don’t think I should give all the secrets away,” he says, with a laugh. “You can learn how to crack safes on YouTube. It’s in the film, but that’s real. There are some very tiny details, like this little sound that it makes to a normal ear you wouldn’t really hear, unless maybe you have a stethoscope.”
He adds that the ability to crack safes is a “byproduct of the condition” his character has in the movie. “I gave the hotel safe a little once over. No luck. It’s one of the privileges of doing this; you get to learn skills that you otherwise wouldn’t learn.”
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Tuner is in limited theaters May 22 and nationwide May 29.
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