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This is fresh air. I'm Dave Davies. My guest Nicholas Cage has appeared in

more than a hundred films.

Depending on which ones you've seen, you might think of him as an action movie hero.

He's done plenty of those.

You might also remember him starring with Cher in the romantic comedy Moonstruck or playing the

dim-witted but lovable criminal in the Cohen Brothers Raising Arizona.

He won a Best Actor Oscar playing a writer drinking himself to death and leaving Las Vegas.

In adaptation, Cage played two characters, Twin Brothers, sometimes in conversation with each

other in the same room.

In Face Off, he and John Travolta's character trade physical

identities through face transplants so he has to morph into Travolta's character in the film.

Cage grew up in California around moviemaking and is a student of film history.

He's known for meticulous preparation for his characters and sometimes taking them

to extremes in his performances. He's earned a golden globe nomination for his latest

role which is somewhat more subdued. In the movie Dream Scenario he plays a college

professor who strangely finds he's appearing as a bystander in the dreams of his friends,

his family, his students, and eventually millions of people who make the connection and make

him famous for well nothing.

...