You can’t learn from your mistakes if you don’t make any. Robert Downey Jr., Benedict Cumberbatch, Eddie Redmayne, Steve Carell, and Michael Keaton are doing pretty well for themselves these days, but they have imperfect pasts just like everyone else.
During a recent chat for the Los Angeles Times and EPIX’s five-part Hollywood Sessions, the actors were asked what advice they’d give their younger selves now that they’re older, wiser, and more experienced.
“I wouldn’t. I would just say, ‘Nailed it,'” The Judge star Downey Jr., 44, quipped of his well-documented history, which includes struggles with addiction and multiple run-ins with the law.
Sherlock actor Cumberbatch, 38, who had a Golden Globe-nominated role in The Imitation Game, joked, “I would get Matthew McConaughey to do it for me.”
Carell, who appeared in the acclaimed drama Foxcatcher, offered a more earnest answer, with saying he’d tell his younger self, “Don’t be so afraid of girls.” (The Office alum, 52, has been married since 1995 to wife Nancy.)
Birdman star Keaton, meanwhile, referred to a quote from Reese Witherspoon‘s new movie Wild in his answer. Watch the video above to find out what he said, and tune in to the “Lead Actor” edition of Hollywood Sessions on Monday, Dec. 29, at 8 p.m. on EPIX.
