Kyra Sedgwick describes “The Woodsman” as a love story, albeit an unconventional one. In “The Woodsman,” convicted sex offender, Walter (Kevin Bacon), tries to assimilate back into society after being locked up for 12 years. He takes a job at a lumberyard and ultimately meets a woman who he grows to love. But the demons inside him haven’t gone away, and Walter learns it is impossible to hide from his true self.

How hard was it to let your relationship go for these characters, and then come back after you finished shooting?
It was definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do as an actor, is to shoot a scene with my husband in that truck where I’m meeting him for the first time with someone who I’m so deeply invested in emotionally and married to for 16 years. It was for sure the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, probably will ever have to do. So it required a lot of work on the character beforehand and a lot of vigilance in staying very committed to the character.

Sometimes when you do a part, the wall between you and the characters can be very porous. You can sort of move in and out of your character’s persona and being. And that just couldn’t happen on this one because of working with him. At the end of the day, you let it go to a certain extent but also it’s something that you have to keep sort of stoked in your belly.

I think that what both these characters share for me is a deep shame. I think [Kevin’s character] for the obvious reasons, but she, though she is the victim of abuse, I think that often as victims we feel somehow complicit in the abuse, that somehow it was our fault. When you hear people that were molested as children from priests and somehow they feel so much shame like it was my fault. Or it’s not even able to be articulated as it is just like this shame. Shame is such an intense emotion. It just can drive you. And I think both these characters are really driven by it. So I think that that’s something that was always sort of in the pit of my stomach throughout the weeks of shooting. Ultimately, you know, I’m a grown-up, I’ve been in this business a long time. I’ve got kids. I’ve got to do my stuff. But I also need to keep it there so I can bring it up again the next day at work or whatever.

What is it like to go home together after intense scenes?
Very hard. It’s great to be together and thank God we had each other. But, in some ways, we were very separate throughout the whole filming, even when we were together. We’d go home and sleep in the same bed, and we were there. But we were both like… It really was, when I really think about it, it was almost like we were in the same space but not together. I don’t know if you’re married, but sometimes there are times where one is really together with their partner. And then there are times when you’re both just in your own thing, but you’re there together. Really, that’s what it was like during the filming of it. And when the kids would come, we’d be on them clearly, but then they’d go and we’d both be separated.

I think it really takes some getting back together after a project is done. Even during “Loverboy,” which he directed, it’s the same thing. You kind of separate even though you’re together because I have to do my job [and] he has to do his job. When we would go to work on “The Woodsman,” I would go into my room, he’d go into his room, and we’d be called together to the set. And just come together on the set as colleagues but really, we didn’t think that we wouldn’t be together in the same room, but we just gravitated away from each other.

Did the kids notice when you were in those moods?
Maybe. They probably feel it on a visceral level, like just on a level. But when they came for the weekends or when I would go home because I wasn’t in every scene, Kev was. But when I would go home, you were there for them. That’s just the first priority and I’ve been, again, in this game long enough that they come first and even if it’s there, it’s there and they don’t see it. They don’t feel it.

How do you feel watching Kevin become a character like that?
Well, honestly, I think his work over the last couple of years has just been astonishing. I have always been a fan, but lately, “Mystic River” and this, he’s been able to commit to his characters in a way that I think he never at the same level was he able to do before. I just think that now, it’s almost like he’s old enough. Like he opens his heart and he just goes, “Okay, just take it.” And I really see that in his work.

He was so amazing in “Mystic River” last year. He was just so solid and so in that character, and he became that character and everything. His eyes, the history, he was so embedded in that guy in such a quiet way without a lot of bells and whistles.

I think in this movie, every time I see his work, I’m blown away by it because he, to me, he really embodied the character so powerfully and so real, so truthfully to me. So it’s painful for me to watch. It’s very painful for me to watch this, and it was painful for me to work with him in this because he’s carrying around so much shame as the character. And it’s really palpable and it was very sad. It’s hard sometimes to remember we’re just acting.

Did you try not talking about work at home?
We really have to because when you’ve been in a scene together and you’ve been shooting all day, that scene or a couple scenes, you know, when you’re in the same movie together, it’s hard to say, “God, I thought I was crappy in that scene.” Or, “I thought the director did a terrible job directing it,” because the other person’s like, “Well, I was in that scene and I didn’t think it was so bad and I don’t know, was it bad? Oh my God.” And you just send them into a spiral with you. Whereas if you’re not in the same picture, if he comes home from work and tells me, “I had a shitty day and I feel like the director didn’t know what the f**k he was doing and I don’t think I was up there and I didn’t do my best work.” I can say, “Honey, I’m sure you did. I’m sure it was great and how can we talk together and decide how you can talk to the director tomorrow and make it a better day for yourself or whatever?” I can be more supportive because I can be objective. But when you’re in something together, it’s very hard to be objective and you’re very subjective. Like he couldn’t come home after shooting a scene in “Loverboy” that I was in and go, “God, you know, I just didn’t get it. I just didn’t get that scene.” And I’m like, “Well, I was in every frame of it. What do you mean you didn’t get it?” That’s the other thing. You sort of keep things from each other, so that keeps you separate.

Kevin said you didn’t originally want the role.
Yeah. I guess I was afraid that I didn’t want to… First of all, I wanted him to get a bigger star than me to be perfectly frank. I just thought, “It’s a great script, it’s a great part. Let’s get you somebody great and hot and sexy to work opposite,” because it’s a business and I’m very aware of this business, you know? And there was also, I was concerned that people would be distracted in some way. I knew that he would be so amazing in the part and I knew that he would commit himself so utterly. I knew that he would be able to be transformational. And I didn’t want to confuse the issue by being in the film with him.

How did you overcome that?
Ego probably. I probably was just like, “Look, it’s such a good part. I just can’t turn it down.” But also Nicki was very instrumental in just saying, “I want you in this movie. I wanted you before I wanted Kev.” If she was here, she’d tell you that she saw “Personal Velocity” and really wanted me to play this role desperately. And so I think that her belief in me really made me feel confident. I also started to think, you know, maybe we could pull it off. We’re good actors, we’ve been working a long time, maybe we can do it. Honestly, the first time I saw the first cut of it I was so relieved because I thought, “I really buy them. I buy Walter, I buy Vickie. It’s all good. Thank God.

Do you go into a project like this aware that the subject limits its appeal?
Absolutely. I mean, it’s not “Lord of the Rings.” I put the same amount of heart and soul into a $100 million movie as I do a $3 million movie. You have to. You can’t just deliver your performance based on the size of the budget. But there’s that risk and that’s the effect of it, basically, that I made on the picture.

How did this script get to you?
What happened was…the script came to me in a very strange way. I was down in the Carribbean and I was walking up the beach and I ran into this guy that I kind of knew a little bit. Not in the movie business, I knew he wasn’t in the movie business. He was in the real estate business and he said to me, “Kevin, do me a favor. Do me a big favor,” and he sent me the script. He told me the name of an actor who was attached to it and he said, “They tell me that it’s going to be an Academy Award-winning movie. I don’t know, I can’t tell from this, but they want me to invest in it and I’ve never invested in a movie before in my life. My wife said don’t do it.” He said, “Can you tell me if you think it’s any good?” Very uncharacteristically I said yes. I was in a good mood. It was Christmas, the sun was shining, I gave him my address [and] he sent me the script.

I came back January 2nd, January 3rd. I sat down, “Oh, ‘The Woodsman,’” read the script, my jaw dropped. I said, “Honey, you’re not going to believe this. I know I’m not looking for another indie. I don’t want to do something dark, I want to get paid. But I think I’ve found something that I have to say yes to.” She read the script and said, “Yeah, you’ve got to play the part.”

I called up the producer and we sat down together. At that point they weren’t really… I think they were kind of stuck. I think they had been through a bunch of actors – for obvious reasons most people turned them down – and I think they sort of said, “Look. Let’s see if we can pull some money together…” And they said, “We’ll do it with unknowns.” They budget had been kind of slashed to where it is now and he said, “You’re crazy. Why would you want to do this?” And that was the producer! I said, “Look, you know, I’ve got to. I’ve got to do it.” So he said, “Well, what about Kyra?” Now, the director always had Kyra as her first choice, coincidentally, because of a movie she did called “Personal Velocity.” I went back to her and said, “Take a look at this again and tell me what you think about playing Vicky.” She said, “Look, you know, you could get somebody better.” She didn’t want to do it with me. She thought it would get in the way, but we talked her into it.

What kind of research did you do for the role?
Well, let me first say that I did not spend any time with sex offenders. When I played a Marine, I spent a lot of time with Marines. But it’s not something that I didn’t feel like I was going to be able to learn anything that was going to influence me, because I don’t think you can really pick these guys out in a crowd. I think it’s they come from every single walk of life and socioeconomic background, and I wasn’t ready to go there.

Nicole had done a lot of work, research, clinical case histories, psychological studies, all of that was very helpful because she laid a lot of that on me and I was able to read that. Then I did what I do for any character, which is an autobiography. I actually sit down and write it. You know, start with his history and his past and started answering questions, some of which I get from the script, some of which I just kind of make up on my own. After all that, think about the way that those internal things are going to manifest themselves in terms of his external life, hair, make-up, wardrobe, teeth, whatever it is, dialogue. And then think about the 12 years in prison and think about how that’s going to affect his, let’s say his first relationship with a woman. That’s going to have a pretty damn big effect on him.