Long before he played the apocalyptic visionary in “Take Shelter,” the literally finger-popping Colonel Strickland in “The Shape of Water” or Superman arch-nemesis General Zod in “Man of Steel,” Michael Shannon was a teenager in Lexington with goals no loftier than finding ways to pass summer afternoons.
He spent hours walking downtown streets, usually with R.E.M. blasting away on his Walkman. He pored through books and plays in the newly constructed Central Library. He strolled under the mighty neon marquee of the Kentucky Theatre.
Shannon was 15 at the time. Now at 51, (“I just reversed the numbers,” he said with a laugh), all of those early Lexington episodes are coming full circle — none more so than the latter…