Matt Dillon co-stars in “Being Maria,” (available on VOD and streaming platforms this week) a behind the scenes saga about the making of 1972’s still-controversial “Last Tango in Paris,” told from the viewpoint of its troubled female star Maria Schneider.

Brando has been long esteemed as America’s greatest, most influential actor and for Dillon, 61, bringing the late icon to life in one of his most iconic roles was irresistible.

“You may ask yourself, How do you play Brando? I mean, ‘How dare you,’ you know,” Dillon allowed. “But then I thought, the hell with it. I’m an actor playing a part. I take risks.

“As to, How am I going to approach this? Well, there’s only one way to approach this: Truthfully. I mean, you can’t say, Well, it’s not really Brando. It’s always Brando. So you have to play Brando.

“But the big thing is we don’t do a caricature. That would be a major disservice. But at the same time, he has his characteristics, and you have to play those.

“It’s interesting, because I played other figures before (not a lot) but with Brando there’s so much there to work with.

“Brando’s the actor that had the greatest influence on me. I’m certainly not alone saying that he changed the way of acting. If we’re going to be historical about it, this movie did that with what he did in his performance. People hadn’t done that (candid sexuality) before. I was aware of that when I first saw the film and I was much younger than Maria Schneider who was 19.”

“Last Tango” made Schneider (played by Romania’s Anamaria Vartolomei) a star literally overnight. It also ruined her life.

“Tango” became notorious, due to the scene where Brando uses butter in the act of sexually molesting his partner.

Schneider always said what had happened with that scene was without her consent. That Brando and the director decided to be “real” without telling or asking her. Traumatized and bewildered by her celebrity she struggled with drug, alcohol and mental issues until, at 58, she died in 2011.

“She was put in a very awkward position with that. She’s too young,” Dillon said. “That’s as much a part of it for me, the fact that she didn’t have a voice.

“I’m sensitive to that. I started acting very young” — he was 14 —“so I’m sensitive to exploitation and objectification. And that’s what she was subjected to. Like there was no consideration for what this person thought — because she was young. Because she was naive, they took advantage of her.

“Yet I still will always say that Brando was a gift to me as an actor. I love Brando. He was complicated but that doesn’t excuse what they did.”

“Being Maria” is available on VOD and streaming platforms April 29