I’ve met a few famous actors. Every time I do, there’s a moment – a split second, perhaps – where I must remind myself that the person standing in front of me who I’ve watched on a two dimensional screen for hours upon hours is a real human. In the case of Christopher Walken that moment is about 10 minutes long.

I’m in a room with about five other journalists. Walken enters. No one says anything. We all adjust, gradually, to the reality that he – the most wonderfully odd of film actors – is a real guy, and a personable one at that.

“I just got off the plane,” he mentions to no one in particular, “And they don’t feed you on planes anymore.” The man is a walking bad omen, not the first celebrity I’d want to meet in a metal tube hurtling through the sky. His was so ill-fed he actually eats the inedible-looking mini cheese treats provided by the publicists.

“Is this all going in the paper?” he asks. “Online,” I answer. He thinks about it. “I don’t have a computer,” he says. An anecdote unfolds: apparently Christopher Walken’s house, when viewed on Google Earth, is just a patch of empty land. He considers this lack of online presence, and decides it means he has no real identity. “I don’t exist!” he exclaims with glee.

Apparently Walken was in A Streetcar Named Desire under the actual watch of Tennessee Williams. When asked about the give-and-take between writers and actors, he reveals this. “I said, ‘What do I do here?’ and Tennessee said ‘Chris, baby, do whatever ya want!” I assume this is an accurate impression of Tennessee Williams. For all I know the guy sounded like Jackie Gleason.

You know that thing people do when they’re talking at length, where they occasionally look away to gather their thoughts? Like everything else, Christopher Walken does it in his own particular way: he keeps making eye contact with a fixed point over my shoulder, and grinning like there’s somebody behind me making funny faces. I sneak a look. There’s no one there.

I don’t mean to make fun of Christopher Walken. He’s a friendly man. Defending his real personality, he says, “I love my cat!” In any case, he doesn’t exist.

Stay tuned for a full interview with Walken and Sam Rockwell when their newest movie Seven Psychopaths opens October 12. Here's our review.