Nicolas Cage felt marginalised by movie studios 'after a couple of flops'

The 57-year-old star - who was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1998 and has won plenty of accolades for his performances on the big screen - revealed how he decided to take a different approach to his career after he saw a change in attitude towards him as an actor.

He said: "I knew after a couple of flops that I had been marginalised in the studio system; and I wasn't going to get invited by them."

However, he heaped praise on Pig director Michael Sarnoski - who is at the helm of a feature film for the first time with the emotional drama - for taking a chance, and described him as his "Archangel".

Speaking on an episode of Variety's Awards Circuit Podcast, he added: "I always knew that it would take a young filmmaker who would come back or remember some movies I had made and know that I might be right for his script and rediscover me.

"And that's why he's not just Michael, he's Archangel Michael. This wouldn't be happening if he didn't have the open mind to say, 'Come with me.'"

Cage also recalled working on 1997 action thriller Face/Off - in which he starred alongside John Travolta - and revealed one particular moment where the lines of reality and fiction became blurred for him as he played serial killer Castor Troy.

He said: "There was a moment in there where I think I actually left my body, where I just got scared.

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"Am I acting or is this real? And I can see it when I look at the movie, that one moment, it's in my eyes."

Cage - who has enjoyed taking on a diverse range of roles throughout his career - has always tried to stand out by taking advice from Russian theatre practitioner Konstantin Stanislavski.

He explained: "Stanislavski said the worst thing an actor can do is imitate. Being a bit of a rebel, I wanted to break that rule.

"So I tried with Wild at Heart, a Warhol-like approach to the Sailor Ripley character. In movies, like Prisoners of the Ghost Land or even Face/Off or Vampire's Kiss, I was experimenting with what I would like to call Western Kabuki or more Baroque or operatic style of film performance.

"Break free from the naturalism, so to speak, and express a larger way of performance."