Kevin Bacon: Kids keep it real

Actor Kevin Bacon likes working with children as they're "very real".

In thriller Cop Car he plays Sheriff Kretzer, sharing the set with young actors James Freedson-Jackson, 13, and Hays Wellford, 12.

Teaming up with the child stars was a pleasure for Kevin, who appreciated how down to earth they are.

"Great kids," he smiled to Total Film magazine. "One thing I loved about them is that they are very, very real. They're not overly precocious. They talk like 10-year-old boys. That's a testament to Jon (Watts, Cop Car director and writer) and his writing. I think that Jon was definitely influenced by things like Stand by Me (1986 film about a group of young boys). I also loved being on set with them because their enthusiasm was so infectious. They were so jazzed about being there."

There's a lot of interaction between Kevin and the two young stars, who play Harrison and Travis, as the whole film is about the Sheriff hunting down the boys, who have taken his car for a joyride. But despite taking the lead, Kevin doesn't have a lot of lines. While it seemed strange at first, he managed to look past it and enjoy the complexities of his character.

"I started out (in this business) as an extra," he reasoned. "When you're an extra you say: 'Well, I hope I can some day get a line.' Then once you get a line, you hope you can get two. It puts you in the headspace of judging your roles based on how many lines you have. Then you start to realise there's a lot of stuff that's not about the amount of lines. If you can tell the story of who this guy is with a look, with a piece of wardrobe or a way of walking, with the timbre of somebody's voice..."