Michael Keaton on His Role as Reporter Who Exposed Church’s Sex Abuse Scandal

During his 2015 Golden Globe acceptance speech for Best Actor, “Birdman” star Michael Keaton referenced his family’s Catholic roots, saying, “My name’s Michael John Douglas, I’m from Forest Grove, Pennsylvania. I’m the son—seventh child—of George and Leona Douglas. And I don’t ever remember a time when my father didn’t work two jobs. When my mother wasn’t saying the rosary or going to Mass or trying to take care of seven kids in a rundown farmhouse, she was volunteering at the Ohio Valley Hospital where I was born in the hallway.”

Keaton’s next film is “Spotlight,” which is based on the Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize-winning investigation into the Catholic Church’s sex abuse scandal there. Keaton portrays editor Walter “Robby” Robinson, whose investigative team slowly uncovers the story.

Because of Keaton’s Catholic background, it was interesting to read his comments about the scandal in a new “Entertainment Weekly” interview. He said:

Rachel [McAdams] is so good. You see how much [her character] is hurting because she doesn’t want [her grandmother]’s world to come crashing down [because of the newspaper’s story]. That’s part of this movie that I think is not mentioned enough: all the people who really lost their faith. My brother was so upset about [the Church scandal] that he walked away and wanted nothing to do with the Church. He’s a smart guy, so he’s kind of hovering back around, you know, to his faith. But when you believe in something so much and people let you down… It’s not like being let down by a president. This is 50-fold. This is a deep, deep, deep, deep, deep blow. Disappointment. Because it’s about faith, it’s about everything.

That passage says some interesting things about Keaton’s worldview. For instance, when he notes that his brother abandoned the Church after the scandal, he adds, “He’s a smart guy, so he’s kind of hovering back around, you know, to his faith.” In other words, Keaton ties being smart to having faith. He seems to differentiate between the sinful nature of some of the Church’s representatives with the Catholic faith itself.

Keaton also gives voice to the depth of betrayal felt by Catholics in Boston (and everywhere) after the story came to light. But he doesn’t dismiss faith in general as ridiculous. Instead he acknowledges, “It’s about faith, it’s about everything.”

I haven’t seen “Spotlight,” but I think it’s fair to say that this will not be an easy film for Catholics in particular to watch. At least Keaton seems to understand the nature of faith better than many in Hollywood because the people he loves the most in this world have given him a shining example of it.