PRESENTS
DECEMBER 26, 2018 OSCAR PREVIEW
BEN FOSTER
GE TS LOST IN T HE WOODS IN LEAVE N O TRAC E
BOOTS RILEY
PICKS HIS FILM AND MUSIC FAVORITES
DREAM TEAMS
J OHN KRASINSKI & E MILY B LUNT SAOIRSE RONAN & MARGOT ROB B IE E T HAN HAW KE & PAUL SC HRADE R OL IVIA COL MAN & YORGOS L ANT HIMOS SPIKE L E E & J OHN DAVID WASHINGTON PAUL GIAMAT T I & KAT HRYN HAHN
STRANGE ALLIANCE GRE EN B O O K, A ND I TS STO RY O F AN U N L I K ELY FRI E N D SH I P, I S T HE OS CA R FRO N TRUN N E R W HOS E MESSAG E CO U L D N OT B E MOR E T I M E LY
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F O R
Y O U R
C O N S I D E R A T I O N
“THE BEST PICTURE OF THE YEAR.” “Yalitza Aparicio gives the best performance of the year.” STEPHANIE ZACHAREK,
“Alfonso Cuarón’s masterpiece. Breathtaking and life-giving.” RICHARD LAWSON,
WINNER•BEST PICTURE New York Film Critics Circle New York Film Critics Online Philadelphia Film Critics Circle San Francisco Film Critics Circle Seattle Film Critics Society
Chicago Film Critics Association Kansas City Film Critics Circle Las Vegas Film Critics Society Los Angeles Film Critics Association
Southeastern Film Critics Association Toronto Film Critics Association Vancouver Film Critics Circle Washington DC Area Film Critics Association
WINNER•BEST DIRECTOR Atlanta Film Critics Circle Chicago Film Critics Association Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Indiana Film Journalists Association Kansas City Film Critics Circle
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Las Vegas Film Critics Society New York Film Critics Circle New York Film Critics Online North Texas Film Critics Association Phoenix Film Critics Society
Seattle Film Critics Society Southeastern Film Critics Association Toronto Film Critics Association Utah Film Critics Association Washington DC Area Film Critics Association
12/20/18 1:20 AM
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FIRST TAKE Ben Foster goes off the grid for Debra Granik’s Leave No Trace The Art of Craft: Black Panther On My Screen: Sorry to Bothers You’s Boots Riley on his film and music inspirations The Foreign Language and Doc shortlists
20
COVER STORY The team behind Green Book share the remarkable journey of Tony Lip and Dr. Don Shirley.
30
THE DIALOGUE: SCREEN PARTNERS John Krasinski & Emily Blunt Saoirse Ronan & Margot Robbie Ethan Hawke & Paul Schrader Olivia Colman & Yorgos Lanthimos Spike Lee & John David Washington Paul Giamatti & Kathryn Hahn
42
FLASH MOB Roma Experience FYC Screenings & Premieres
ON THE COVER Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali photographed for Deadline by Shayan Asgharnia ON THIS PAGE John Krasinski and Emily Blunt photographed by Josh Telles
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MARVELOUS.
“
ONE OF THE YEAR’S MOST ARDENT EXPRESSIONS OF MOVIE LOVE.”
F O R Y O U R C O N S I D E R AT I O N B E S T D O C U M E N TA R Y F E AT U R E
+++++ MAGICAL.”
“
“EXPLOSIVELY 100%
LOS ANGELES FILM CRITICS ASSOCIATION
WINNER
IMAGINATIVE.” FILM INDEPENDENT SPIRIT AWARDS
NOMINEE
BEST DOCUMENTARY BEST DOCUMENTARY Untitled-2 1
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On My Screen: Boots Riley
p. 14
| Foreign Language Shortlist
p. 16
| Documentary Shortlist
p. 18
MAN of the WOODS Ben Foster delivers few lines, but one of the most impactful performances of the year in Debra Granik’s Leave No Trace BY A MY NICHOL SON
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N O I T A ER RIES D I S N O ATEGO C R U O A LL C Y R O F IN
S U O ” I ” C A “ UD L U A“ WERF NCHIN”G P“ O T-WRE TING G“ U HILARA ” ” E“ X VETING YING R“ I ECTRIF EL ine Deadl Time
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SOMETHING WILD Thomasin McKenzie and Ben Foster in Leave No Trace.
BEN FOSTER IS PACING MANHATTAN TRYING TO IGNORE THE CLAMOR. “Sorry about all the sirens!” he groans apologetically. He’s just gotten home from starring as 14th Century general Jan Žižka in the biopic Medieval, hyped as Czechoslovakia’s biggest blockbuster to date, and Foster just wanted to stroll around to appreciate the holiday lights and squirrels “and ambulances,” he jokes.
Over the last decade, he’s played
Will who can survive the apoca-
a half-dozen veterans of the War
lypse—has all the answers.
on Terror in films like Lone Survi-
“She was front and center in
vor and The Messenger. Foster’s
my heart for sure,” says Foster of
resume stubbornly reminds us of
his daughter Ella, now nearly a year
the veterans who’ve been forgotten.
and a half. As were his own parents,
And Will is a culmination of all those
who also gave him adult-sized
roles, a man who made it back home
freedoms at a young age. He was
only to choose to be homeless. The
an observant kid. An undiagnosed
paradox is his desire to raise a child
hearing disorder had the side-effect
off the grid also forces him to be on
of training him to study faces and
the run from social services. He can’t
body language, and how to tell what
evade the future forever. Will’s raised
people felt when you couldn’t hear
a terrific girl—New Zealand new-
their words. In school, Foster won
Foster’s a long way from the
his busy days. “It still fuels my life,”
comer Thomasin McKenzie radiates
second place in an international
Oregon forest where he shot Debra
says Foster. “I encourage anybody
intelligence and bravery as Tom—but
drama competition, yet his grades
Granik’s Leave No Trace, a haunting,
that is finding the world a bit disso-
she’s starting to realize that one dad,
weren’t great. “If I can spell elbow
based-on-a-true-story drama about
nant to take 20 minutes twice a day
no matter how loving, can’t take the
five different ways in a book report,
a survivalist veteran who has trained
and hear your own voice.”
place of a community.
perhaps I should let someone else
his teenage daughter to live with
Meditation might have helped
Foster read the script right after
do the spellchecking and focus my
him in the forest. You sense Foster
his character Will in Leave No Trace,
he learned that he and his wife,
wouldn’t mind teleporting across
who is so uncomfortable with the
Orange is the New Black actress
the country for an hour of quiet.
intrusion of his own thoughts that
Laura Prepon, were going to have a
the Disney Channel’s hands, and
Then again, finding his own quiet
he busies himself chopping wood,
daughter themselves. He cried, and
they flew him from Iowa to Los
is one of his strengths as an actor,
recycling eggshells, and tinkering
knew he had to convince Granik to
Angeles to audition to play the lead
not to mention as a human being
with solar stoves. He’s avoiding ideas
give him the role. So while Prepon
in their sitcom Flash Forward. Disney
dealing with modern chaos. At 4,
that he won’t say aloud to his daugh-
was in her second trimester, he was
asked if his family would move to
Foster’s parents, two hippies raising
ter, Tom—and won’t even whisper
tromping around in the trees thinking
Canada. Astonishingly, they agreed.
a family in Fairfield, Iowa, taught him
silently to himself. The woods are his
about parenthood and responsibility
“They weren’t stage parents,” says
transcendental mediation, a mental
physical and mental escape.
and how to give your child the best
Foster. “I didn’t come from a family
when no one—not even a guy like
that was industry savvy. It was in-
pause he continues to carve out of
6
Foster gets the need for that.
energies elsewhere,” he laughs. At 14, his casting tape got into
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article informed his portrayal. What’s buried inside Will must stay buried. He’d rather leave it to us to note how Will flinches when a helicopter roars overhead. The specifics don’t matter, only the scars they’ve left behind. “Debra’s a deeply humanist filmmaker,” says Foster. There are no villains in the film, not even the government employees who drag Will and Tom out of the woods. When Foster read the script, he was ready to spot the person his character would have to fight. “Every other page I was like, ‘Oh, it’s going to be the trucker, or it’s the lady in the hippie camp who’s going to do the bad thing.’ But it’s not about that. There credible—incredible!—the sacrifices
are good people in the world who
they made. But they recognized
are happy to lend a hand, and I think
that I was happy doing this, and as a
that’s something worth reminding
new parent myself, seeing your child
each other about.”
happy, nothing beats it.”
As for his palpable bond with his
Foster shot five episodes of the
onscreen daughter, on the first day of
show before it went on a year-long hi-
the shoot, McKenzie explained that
atus. Then a wonderful disaster hap-
HOME FREE McKenzie and Foster as off-thegrid daughter and father Tom and Will.
pened. He turned 15 and discovered angst. When his castmates painted butterflies on the dressing room wall,
she would like to do a Maori ritual called a hongi, where they’d hold each other in silence for a full minute. Right when the AD ordered them to
Foster scribbled Soundgarden lyrics.
the set, Foster and McKenzie found
“I think they disturbed the producers,”
a quiet hideaway, bringing along her
says Foster. “They said, ‘Ben doesn’t
mission to push his performances to
make the best of it.” Foster lets the
caretaker, who witnessed and timed
seem so bright and fuzzy.’”
the brink. “Emotional danger turns him
timbre of his voice and the dimming
the embrace. At first, Foster felt awk-
on,” says Foster. “His school is as long
light in his eyes say the rest.
ward. But then, “our heartbeats and
Suddenly he went from being the kid who didn’t mind chirping, “Hey,
as you’re telling the truth to yourself
let’s go get a pizza!” to stubbornly
and listening to the other person, you
talk a lot,” explains Foster of how he
just together in a feeling of security,
insisting that real people don’t talk
can’t lose—and while you’re doing
and Granik pruned her script—not
and care and protection became our
like cartoons. So the show hired him
that, scare yourself, go farther.”
that the Winter’s Bone writer/director
reality. I knew that I would take care
is a chatterbox, herself. “We chose
of Thomasin and she would take care
an acting coach. “He didn’t disagree,”
So he did in movies like 3:10 to
“We talked a lot about how to not
our breath synced up and we were
says Foster, “so we ending up talking
Yuma and Rampart and Hell or High
his words like he would choose his
of me—it was this accelerated con-
about what we were pursuing in this
Water, perfecting his Ben Foster-
belongings: Was it a want or a need?
necting that I’d never experienced.”
scene, and about connection.” He
isms: a whiplash temper, elastic
And if it was a want, he didn’t say it.”
was risking his Disney Channel gig,
vocal chords, and vibrating energy.
but becoming an actor.
Which is why it’s ironic that in Leave
half of Will’s dialogue, especially the
disappeared. “It’s not been proven,
No Trace—the role that’s got Hol-
stuff that most actors would want to
but it’s been suggested that he’s no
He got his education on the set. Barry
lywood wondering if he’ll finally get
do, like any big moments that would
longer with us,” says Foster. Today,
Levinson taught him improv shoot-
his overdue Oscar nomination—
explain how Will got here. There are
the girl would be 26. Foster has no
ing Liberty Heights, where he played
Foster gives a hushed, near-mute
no sermons about the violence he
idea if she’ll see Leave No Trace. He
a confused Jewish kid who dresses
performance. Will and Tom talk in
saw abroad. Instead, there’s just Fos-
doesn’t even know when he’ll see
up like Adolf Hitler as a gag. As misfit
facts and functions—tighten this,
ter’s tense pause when a psychology
it himself. “I experienced it, but I’m
Eli in Freaks and Geeks, Foster learned
light that, this good?—not feelings.
test asks if he has nightmares or
just not ready to witness it,” he says.
how to play a person who never
Occasionally, they scrap speech
troubling dreams. He doesn’t answer,
Maybe he’ll wait till his own daughter
knows when the joke is on him. He
altogether and communicate in
and that’s answer enough. Later,
is old enough to see the movie her
made the audience cringe and sniffle
animal clicks. When the government
Granik filmed Tom discovering an
dad made for her before she was
and laugh all at once. Nick Cassa-
kindly, but forcibly relocates Will and
actual New York Times clipping from
even born. “Maybe she won’t have
vettes’ Alpha Dog, in which Foster
Tom to a house where the bright girl
2015 about a unit of Marines sta-
any interest!” laughs Foster, as he
plays a furious, self-destructive
can go to school, the duo’s deepest
tioned in Afghanistan whose suicide
winds his way through the busy
small-time drug dealer whose anger
exchange goes as follows: “Are we
rate is 14 times the national average.
sidewalk back to his home. “Oh dad
problems get his younger brother
going to be OK here?” asks the child.
Bring up that article to Foster, and
and his make-believe—why doesn’t
kidnapped and killed, gave him per-
Will simply replies, “We’re going to
he’d rather not elaborate how the
he get a real job!?” ★
Foster never went back to school.
8
They wound up removing nearly
The real life father and daughter who inspired the story eventually
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DIANE WARREN
PERFORMED BY
JENNIFER HUDSON
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CHARTED TERRITORY
Gold Derby’s Oscar Odds At press time, here is how Gold Derby’s experts ranked the Oscar chances in the Best Picture race. Get up-to-date rankings and make your own predictions at GoldDerby.com
BEST PICTURE
Making a Massacre
How Roma production designer Eugenio Caballero recreated a moment of darkness from Mexico City’s past EXTERNALIZING THE MEXICO CITY OF HIS CHILDHOOD IN METICULOUS DETAIL FOR ROMA— his radically unconventional, black-and-white passion project—Alfonso Cuarón set an enormous challenge for himself by mounting a recreation of the Corpus Christi massacre, on the very street where it transpired. An infamous confrontation between student demonstrators and heavily armed soldiers that took over 100 lives, this moment cut to the heart of Cuarón’s concerns, examining, blow for blow, the way in which the personal and political collide to shape a life. Drawing on ample photography of the massacre, production designer Eugenio Caballero dealt with streets that had changed dramatically since the 1970s, altering six or seven blocks’ worth of façades. Creating period police gear from scratch and sourcing vehicles from the ’40s, ’50s and ’60s, the designer placed substantial focus on one central location: a furniture store, with vast windows, where a pregnant Cleo (Yalitza Aparicio) shops for a crib, only to watch the tragedy unfold before her. “We went to that place and stripped it out completely. [Before], it was a gym, and it was completely transformed,” Caballero says. “We put in all the wood grain, and then we painted the walls.” Working with the VFX team to digitally alter certain elements, Caballero calls the entire experience of building Cuarón’s vision, a “delicious process”. —Matt Grobar
FREDDIE’S FASHIONS Bohemian Rhapsody costume designer Julian Day captures Freddie Mercury’s style and Rami Malek’s imagination
10
ON BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY— which charts the rise of Queen and the band’s singular front-man, Freddie Mercury—costume designer Julian Day encountered one of the most fastidious lead actors he’d ever worked with. Stepping into the fashion icon’s boundarypushing stylings, Rami Malek needed Day to aid him in capturing Mercury’s essence. “I think in the back of his mind, he was probably aware that people would try to
ODDS
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13/2
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Roma
15/2
3
Green Book
15/2
4
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19/2
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10/1
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If Beale Street Could Talk
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criticize what he was doing,” Day reflects. “If he didn’t get Freddie right, the film wouldn’t work.” Fortunately, in Day’s very first fitting with the actor, a breakthrough came. “I fitted these flared trousers on him, and they fitted so well, they literally could have been made for him,” Day recalls. “I used that as the base pattern for pretty much all the flared trousers I made in the whole film, for everybody. We called it ‘the Freddie Flare.’” —Matt Grobar
LA VIE BOHÈME Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury.
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Carter dipped into the comics to draw inspiration for T’Challa’s Black Panther suit, considering designs going back to the 1960s. The suit was designed to be simpler and sleeker than the one worn in Captain America: Civil War. Vibranium, the fictional metal upon which Wakanda’s people rely, became a stylistic motif across Carter’s costumes. The surface of the suit incorporates elements of the Wakandan font and language. It also features an Oka-
The Art of Craft
vango pattern, comprised of triangles. “The triangle is in artistry throughout the
Designing T’Challa’s supersuit for Black Panther
continent. It’s like sacred
BY MATT GROBAR • ILLUSTRATION BY ADI GRANOV
mother and the child.”
geometry: the father, the
The combination of
“PART OF THE OVERALL THEME OF BLACK PANTHER WAS, WHAT DOES AFRICA MEAN TO ME? For [director] Ryan Coogler,
patterns was a nod to the
it was an exploration of his own ideas about Africa, what he knew and what he didn’t know. It was important to delve into culture, into what things are mysterious about Africa to people, and dispel a lot of those mysteries. To tell the stories of the tribal customs and beautiful traditions that we see across the continent.” –Ruth E. Carter, Costume Designer
the continent.
texture of African wax prints, common throughout
The “beauty suit”, used by Boseman in the less physical scenes, was too thin for stunt scenes. “Tough suits” were created for these shots.
TWO research trips to Africa for Ryan Coogler
Rachel Morrison shot the film with
The Chibock Road set measured
THREE
50,000
main lenses:
square feet
27, 30
1500 costumes created
12
and
35mm
2,456 VFX shots in the film
A cast drawn from
EIGHT
countries and
12
key female creatives
The Busan fight scene features only
SEVEN cuts
RYAN M E I N E RD I NG / VI S D E V
Numbered Black Panther’s particulars
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SCREEN ACTORS G U I L D AWARDS
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SUNDAY JAN 27 8ET 5PT
TM & © 2018 Turner Entertainment Networks, Inc. A Warner Media Company. All Rights Reserved. SAG-AFTRA and Screen Actors Guild Awards are registered trademarks and the Actor statuette and SAG-AFTRA logo are TM and © SAG-AFTRA. © 2018 Screen Actors Guild Awards, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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#SAGAWARDS
12/20/18 1:21 AM
MY DESERT ISLAND MOVIES One would be about how to build a raft [laughs]. I’m not a person that keeps watching something over and over 10 times, but I like Crooklyn, Dog Day Afternoon, and El Amor Brujo by Carlos Saura.
Boots Riley
The musician-turned-director of Sorry to Bother You on his film and music favorites BY DINO-RAY RAMOS
BOOTS RILEY, THE HIP-HOP ARTIST TURNED DIRECTOR, has made quite an impression with his debut Sorry to Bother You. The absurdist comedy about a black telemarketer was nominated for three Gotham Awards, and two Indie Spirits. Born in Chicago and raised in Oakland, Riley made the conscious decision to set his film in the latter. “I think people are tired of seeing the same cities on film, especially the way a lot of movies are made,” he points out. “They’re really just trying to use it for Every City, USA so it’s not really specific to that place. [But] the more particular you can get, the more universal you actually get.”
MY FAVORITE SCENE TO SHOOT There are so many. I felt satisfied as a filmmaker with the scene where Cassius [Lakeith Stanfield] walks out of the bar across the street to talk to his friends and Detroit [Tessa Thompson]. Before he gets across the street there are art bikes, there’s something going on on one side and then some folks peeling out in their car, and dancing near the car over on the other side—there’s all sorts of noise around. There’s a lot of cool stuff, and all the sound design on that. And then, when he’s talking to the group of folks across the street, Detroit interrupts him and then we go to a two-shot of them before closing in on her earring of a man sitting in an electric chair. Behind her in the same exact position is a billboard of a person sitting that exact same way in a chair, with a sign that’s patronizing and putting forth racist tropes in the Black community. Then we dissolve to the next day and the left eye gorilla art folks have changed it to something revolutionary.
14
MY HARDEST SCENE There was nothing that was emotionally overwhelming in shooting it [Sorry to Bother You], but the compliment battle was tough. I had only written the first four or five lines of that and we had done readings, but it was hard to get. It was hard for me to gauge how long we could stay in that moment. I’d only written a few backand-forths between [Cassius and Salvador] and it was hard to get that tone. If you do it in the comedian way, it becomes obvious someone’s trying to make a joke and then it’s not that funny. Then to get that look where they want to kill each other, that took a lot of tries. Once they got it, it was clear that it was hilarious.
MY GUILTY PLEASURES You know, I’m pretty weird so I’m not sure people would be surprised by anything. I like a lot of silly movies and stuff like that—like Will Ferrell and Anchorman. I know I said don’t watch things 10 times, but Anchorman I’ve watched dozens and dozens of times. That’s not even a guilty pleasure though. I never feel guilty about anything I like… Oh, here we go: Tegan and Sara. That’s a guilty pleasure.
THE STORY THAT SHOULD BE A FILM There could be a great film about the life of [labor activist] Joe Hill—not Stephen King’s son. I think I would love to watch a movie version of [the comic] Saga, but I don’t think it can be done for less than $300 million or something like that, so I’d be interested to see somebody try.
THE LAST MOVIE THAT MADE ME CRY If Beale Street Could Talk— I started crying seven minutes into the movie and I was like, “What the fuck is he doing to me? Why are they doing this?”
THE FIRST MOVIE THAT MADE ME FEEL SEEN A tie between Purple Rain and The Goonies—and Chunk [Jeff Cohen] is my lawyer! There are times when you feel like you’re stepped on and left out. The characters in these movies felt like they were trying to figure out how to not feel that way. I once was going to ask a woman to marry me, and I think she kind of expected it too, and we were on the plane ride somewhere. She hadn’t seen Purple Rain. I told her, “You’re going to have to watch it before anything goes any further, and we’re going to have to talk about it.” She told me she liked it… but I didn’t marry her.
RE X /S H U T T ERSTO CK
On My Screen:
THE DIRECTORS I ALWAYS LOVED For all the chaos and craziness that he brings, Emir Kusturica with films like Black Cat, White Cat, Underground, and Time of the Gypsies. For the way that actual scenes attain an epicness with the individual directing: Michael Cimino’s The Deer Hunter and the beginning of Heaven’s Gate. For that same reason, stuff like Milos Foreman; Firemen’s Ball and the beginning of Loves of a Blonde. There’s the poetry of some stuff by Paul Schrader like Mishima, then there’s Kubrick and how every single thing that they have on the screen is important. Then there are the Coen brothers and how everything is hilarious but nothing is a joke, it’s all played straight. Spike Jonze, Charlie Kaufman, and Michel Gondry—he has ways of doing things that are just organic and making them happen on screen. Terry Gilliam’s Brazil and Time Bandits and Brian De Palma’s way that he uses score to build tension.
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Language Barriers The Academy narrows its Best Foreign Language candidates to nine titles BY NANCY TARTAGLIONE
PERHAPS THE MOST SURPRISING THING ABOUT THE ACADEMY’S DECISION LAST WEEK ON THE NINE FILMS IT WILL ADVANCE TO OSCAR VOTING IN THE BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM CATEGORY IS HOW FEW SURPRISES THERE ARE. IN CONTRAST TO RECENT YEARS, THE FIELD LARGELY REFLECTED FILMS THE PROGNOSTICATORS SAW COMING.
COLD WAR
But that doesn’t mean the ever-present
in Venice where it won for its script, later
folks’ favorites weren’t overlooked. In what
scoring Cuarón’s first Oscar nom in the Original
was one of the richest rosters in recent mem-
Screenplay category, but was not submitted
ory, the Phase 1 Foreign Language Committee
to the FL race. A Mexican entry has been
and the Executive Committee certainly had
nominated before, but never won the gold.
a tall task to whittle the submissions down
Cuarón has a thank-you credit on Pawel
from 87 to nine. Ahead of the unveiling, Exec
Pawlikowski’s Oscar-winning Ida, and here finds
Committee Co-Chair Diane Weyermann said,
himself on the same shortlist with the Polish
“I think there is a very strong feeling among
helmer’s latest, Cold War. Also a black-and-
the committee and the people participating in
white film, the time- and country-spanning
Phase 1 that this year is exceptionally strong
music-laced romance drama from Amazon was
and it’s going to be difficult.”
shockingly omitted from the Golden Globes
The Foreign Language Committee decided
nominations earlier this month. It is often cited
on six titles for the shortlist while the Execu-
as the major threat to Roma and won five Eu-
tive Committee chose films to fit three further
ropean Film Awards, as well as the top Foreign
slots, which Co-Chair Larry Karaszewski said last
Language laurel from the National Board of
month are earmarked for those that may have
Review, the New York Film Critics Circle and the
been “sort of forgotten”.
New York Film Critics Online. Upon its Cannes
There’s been no forgetting Alfonso Cuarón’s
debut, it scooped Best Director.
Roma. The Oscar-winning director’s personal
Also out of Cannes, Hirokazu Kore-eda’s
black-and-white reflection on his childhood in
Palme d’Or winning Shoplifters was considered
Mexico City and the women who surrounded
a lock for a shortlist slot, and delivered. The
him growing up has been riding a critical wave
family drama, which explores the meaning of
since it premiered at the Venice Film Festival
the ties that bind, also has a Golden Globe
and won the Golden Lion there. The Spanish-
nom. Magnolia released it domestically after
language drama, which recently debuted on
the film hit box office milestones in both Japan
Netflix, also has a significant theatrical com-
and China. Kore-eda previously repped Japan
ponent which Cuarón says he believes is bigger
(which has won the Oscar once, and has three
“than if we went a conventional route”.
Honorary Awards) with 2004’s Nobody Knows,
Roma has three Golden Globe nominations and prizes from myriad critics bodies, and is
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Y Tu Mamá También, had its European premiere
whiff of controversy was missing, or that some
but it did not advance. Another Asian title on the FL shortlist is
expected to spread out across other main races
Lee Chang-dong’s Burning, which was recently
at the Oscars. His last Spanish-language movie,
named runner-up to Roma in the LA Film Critics
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the origin of human creativity?” Now for the surprises. One pic to make it that we hadn’t heard much about, outside its Cannes Best Actress win, is Kazakhstan’s Ayka from Tulpan director Sergei Dvortsevoy. Set in wintry Moscow, the film centers on a migrant who has just given birth to, and abandoned, a
NEVER LOOK AWAY
child she can’t afford to keep. Now undocumented and in debt, she also must avoid corrupt police officers and countrymen. Ayka has not had a huge profile on the fest circuit since Cannes, although it is slotted for Palm Springs in January. Kazakhstan has one previous nomination and one other appearance on the shortlist under its belt. Among the titles that fell short of the shortlist, there are two particular standouts: Golden Globe nominee and Cannes Camera d’Or BURNING
winner Girl by Belgium’s Lukas
BIRDS OF PASSAGE
Dhont and Sweden’s audacious Border from director Ali Abbasi. Girl has faced backlash from
Association’s Best Picture cat-
main character and the audience
Cristina Gallego who co-directed
egory. Unbelievably, this is the first
listening to footsteps or whispers,
sprawling epic Birds of Passage
some critics regarding the casting of
time that Korea has ever made the
[which] can be much more vivid,”
with previous Oscar nominee
a cisgender actor in a trans role (af-
shortlist since it began entering
Möller says. “In every good film,
Ciro Guerra. Tracing the origins
ter last year’s Oscar winner A Fantas-
pictures back in the early 1960s.
there is something being kept from
of the Colombian drug trade as
tic Woman broke ground for the trans
That’s despite Korea having one
the audience that gets filled in just
it slowly corrupts a native Wayúu
community). The Netflix release tells
of the most vibrant and developed
outside of frame.”
family, Birds of Passage opened
the story of Lara, a 15-year-old born
the Directors’ Fortnight section
in the body of a boy, who dreams
local industries in the world as well
Another well-received title that
as very sophisticated audiences.
was expected to factor on the
of Cannes in May, later screening
of being a ballerina. It’s inspired by
The movie is loosely based on Haruki
FL shortlist, and made the cut, is
in Telluride, Toronto and London.
the life of Nora Monsecour who
Murakami’s short story Barn Burn-
Nadine Labaki’s Cannes Jury Prize
Guerra’s last film, Embrace of the
worked closely with Dhont, and it
ing, and follows an alienated young
laureate Capernaum from Lebanon.
Serpent, was produced by Gallego
won the Un Certain Regard prize for
man whose already difficult life is
It was acquired by Sony Pictures
and was Colombia’s first to gain
lead actor Victor Polster. “I want to
complicated by the appearance of
Classics on the Riviera and is also
any traction with the Academy,
listen to different opinions about my
two people, one a spirited woman
in the Golden Globe race. Labaki
receiving a nomination in 2015.
film,” the director says. “I learn from
who offers romantic possibility, and
has repped Lebanon twice before
the other a wealthy young man with
for the Oscars, more than any other
winner Florian Henckel von
of representation is important. But
a mysterious hobby.
filmmaker from the country that
Donnersmarck returns to German-
I don’t think a director should only
scored its first nomination last year.
language filmmaking and to the
be limited to making films that only
Academy’s shortlist with Never
pertain to his or her identity.”
Likewise a first for Danish helmer Gustav Möller, his taut
A social drama, Capernaum
The Lives of Others Oscar
that… Representation and the future
debut feature The Guilty gives the
follows an abused and neglected
Look Away. The acclaimed big
Border made the Makeup and
filmmaker his first shortlist slot. A
12-year-old boy who has had to grow
canvas Venice premiere has a
Hairstyling shortlist, but not FL. The
breakout Audience Award winner
up much too fast, serving a five-
Globe nomination and follows
trippy, quasi-political treatise on “the
at Sundance in early 2018 (and the
year sentence for a violent crime.
a painter who, with the love of
other”, which includes one of the
subject of an upcoming remake
In flashbacks, Labaki reveals the
his life, escapes post-war East
most unusual sex scenes ever filmed,
with Jake Gyllenhaal), the story
terrible deprivation that sends him
Germany for the West, but remains
is the story of a customs officer with
of a police officer assigned to an
on his tragic destiny, as he struggles
tormented by his childhood under
an uncanny knack for sniffing out
emergency call center takes place
to make sense of a world that has
the Nazis and begins to create
guilt. Border was the top Un Certain
in two adjacent rooms as a mystery
rejected him from the day he was
works that mirror his own fate and
Regard prize winner in Cannes and
unfolds over the phone, allowing the
born, and sues his own parents for
the traumas of a generation. Von
has a Directors to Watch nod from
viewer to conjure their own images
the very act of bringing him into a
Donnersmarck, who is one of only
Palm Springs. Both of these omitted
of what’s happening off-screen.
world of such suffering.
three German directors to have
helmers, as well as many others that
won this category, says the film
haven’t advanced this year, appear
hangs on the question, “What is
to have bright futures ahead. ★
“Some of the best moments in the film are not dialogue, but just the
Joining Labaki as the only other female filmmaker on the shortlist is
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FREE SOLO
The Doc Leaves As the field narrows to 15 films on Oscar’s Best Documentary Feature shortlist, which title will prove the cure? BY MATTHEW CAREY
THE DISTANT BARKING OF DOGS
FOUR OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL DOCUMENTARIES OF RECENT YEARS REMAIN IN CONTENTION FOR A PRIZE BEYOND BOX OFFICE GLORY—THE KIND THAT COMES WITH AN OSCAR TROPHY. Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, RBG, Three Identical
make a feature-length horror film as
tary shortlist as the Academy culled the list of 166
a teenager, a vision that turned into
eligible nonfiction films down to an exclusive 15.
a nightmare when her adult mentor
Morgan Neville’s Neighbor, which explores the work of children’s television pioneer Fred Rogers, has become the
absconded with all the footage. Releasing on Netflix gave the
top-grossing biographical documentary of all time with
filmmaker a worldwide platform.
more than $22 million in earnings. RBG, the film directed
“I knew that Netflix would reach
by Betsy West and Julie Cohen that documents Supreme
these people now in Croatia and
Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, started the box office
Bhutan and small towns in Nebraska.
gold rush earlier in the year, amassing just over $14 million.
Versions of me,” Tan explains. “I
Three Identical Strangers, Tim Wardle’s story of iden-
wanted to speak to them and tell
tical triplets who were separated as infants and reunited
them to be brave and just go forth
by accident as adults, has tallied $12.3 million. Free Solo,
and do it and take them along on
about mountain climber Alex Honnold’s death-defying
this journey with me.”
ascent of Yosemite’s El Capitan without ropes, has collected over $10 million so far. “Alex brought it, so we had to do justice to what he did,”
A shortlist surprise came with the omission of another Netflix documentary, Quincy, a film celebrating
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, who directed Free Solo with her
music great Quincy Jones that was
husband Jimmy Chin, says. “I think people are very satis-
co-directed by his daughter, actress
fied by watching someone have this audacious dream, and
Rashida Jones.
actually achieving it.” Netflix documentaries scored two of five Academy
18
recounts her ambitious effort to
Strangers and Free Solo all made the Oscar documen-
Streaming service Hulu actually outdid its rival Netflix, landing two
Award nominations last Oscar season, but the stream-
docs on the shortlist. Crime + Punish-
ing service won’t repeat that feat this time around. Only
ment, from director Stephen Maing,
one of its major contenders made the shortlist, Shirk-
exposes an alleged policy within the
ers, directed by Singapore native Sandi Tan. The film
New York Police Department that
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Carracedo told Deadline at the IDA Awards, where the film won the Pare Lorentz Award. “Spain is ready to remember. Spain is ready to break that pact of forgetting.” Several more films with an international focus joined The Silence of Others on the Oscar shortlist. On
OF FATHERS AND SONS
Her Shoulders, from director Alexandria Bombach, follows Nobel Peace Prize winner Nadia Murad, a survivor of the genocide of the Yazidi minority in Iraq, who were targeted for destruction by ISIS. Syrian filmmaker Talal Derki, director of Of Fathers and Sons, posed as a jihadist sympathizer to gain entry into a militant Islamic family in Northern Syria. His main character was Abu Osama, a founder of Al Nusra, the Syrian wing of Al Qaeda. “The uprising of ISIS and Al NusCHARM CITY
CRIME + PUNISHMENT
ra in my homeland was very quick,” Derki notes. “For me really making the film is a step to think about this
forces officers to meet a quota of
idea of [creating] a community
arrests or face the consequences.
portrait. It was impossible to write
mense, but they’re not insurmount-
Hulu’s other contender, Minding the
a log line. It was literally impossible
able,” Ness explains. “I think people
Gap, directed by young filmmaker
to write a synopsis. I talk about the
who have confronted unimaginable
national dimension made surprise
Bing Liu, has become one of the most
film conceptually and not literally
hardship are probably stronger than
appearances on the shortlist, not
honored films of the year, winning the
because if you talk about the film
most of us, and when they walked
having received nearly the atten-
IDA Award for Best Feature Docu-
literally then that becomes ‘what
through the fire, they decided what
tion of their competitors. Com-
mentary, among other awards.
these scenes are about’ and ‘what
they were going to harden was love.”
munion, from Polish director Anna
Praise for the film—which centers on Liu and two friends in Rockford, Illinois, who gravitated towards skate-
this moment means,’ not what your relationship to it is.” While some first-time filmmakers
“I do think the challenges are im-
phenomenon. How it happened, to film the process of it.” Two other films with an inter-
Dark Money and Charm City
Zamecka, focuses on a teenage girl
come from the same producer—
caring for her “dysfunctional father
Katy Chevigny. Oscar winner Pedro
and autistic brother.” The Distant
boarding to escape abusive home
like Ross were rewarded, a couple of
Almodóvar, meanwhile, has put his
Barking of Dogs, directed by Simon
life situations—has been a challenge
doc legends were left out.
name behind another of the films
Lereng Wilmont, features another
to make the shortlist, The Silence of
young protagonist, a boy living in
trashing Fahrenheit 11/9 has earned
Others. Almodóvar serves as execu-
Eastern Ukraine as war with Russia
cal attention. “It is not normal. It is
over $6 million theatrically, didn’t
tive producer on the documentary
envelops his village.
the opposite of anything I have ever
make the shortlist. Nor did Frederick
directed by Almudena Carracedo
experienced in my 29 years of life.”
Wiseman, the 88-year-old director
and Robert Bahar, an emotional
into the Oscar sweepstakes that
of Monrovia, Indiana, his exploration
exploration of the legacy of torture
enjoyed support from Spike Lee, did
of a pocket of red-state America.
and political murder committed
not wind up making the shortlist.
Another is RaMell Ross, director
The politically-themed Dark
under the reign of Spanish dicta-
The film, which takes viewers inside
of Hale County This Morning, This
Money, about the nefarious impact
tor General Francisco Franco. After
Aretha Franklin’s recording of her
Evening. His film, winner of the IFP
of untraceable cash on American
Franco’s death in 1975, there was
live gospel album in 1972, emerged
Gotham Award for best documenta-
elections, earned a spot on the
no “truth and reconciliation”-style
from a 46-year limbo to qualify
ry, deploys moving imagery to reveal
shortlist for director Kimberly Reed.
commission to heal the nation. In-
for Oscar consideration belatedly,
African-American experience in a
Charm City, from director Marilyn
stead, there was a “pact of silence”
missing the opportunity to compete
rural part of Alabama.
Ness, takes a vérité-style view of
that precluded the chance for
for pre-Oscar awards.
downtrodden sections of Baltimore,
justice. Perhaps unexpectedly, The
With Amazing Grace and dozens
tion, and that is the point—to see
where violence is commonplace and
Silence of Others has emerged as a
more films consigned to the sidelines,
black lives represented in a holistic
opportunity elusive.
hit in Spanish theaters.
15 documentaries go forward to the
for Liu to assimilate. “It’s weird,” he admits of the criti-
Liu is one of the fresh faces in documentary to make the shortlist.
Hale County resists easy defini-
fashion and not the stereotypical
Michael Moore, whose Trump-
The director found reason for op-
“It’s become a whole movement
Amazing Grace, a late entrant
next cutoff point, on January 22.
manner that has proven so destruc-
timism, as she followed local heroes
where people are bringing their
That’s when the Oscar nominations
tive and dehumanizing.
who work to uplift the community,
friends, their parents, their neigh-
will be announced, narrowing the
breaking a cycle of hopelessness.
bors. Screenings are selling out,”
field to the final five nominees. ★
Ross describes his goal as “The
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ROAD
Warriors
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ON A TOUR OF THE SOUTH IN THE 1960S, piano maestro Dr. Don Shirley sought to fight racist attitudes with his incredible talent. Anticipating the slings and arrows of an environment determined to reject him, and which left Nat King Cole beaten bloody when he played “white music” in Birmingham, he hired an Italian-American nightclub bouncer, Tony ‘Lip’ Vallelonga as his driver and personal security. As the two men clocked many miles on the road, theirs became a lifelong friendship that changed each of their lives. Culled from long conversations with the two men by Lip’s son Nick Vallelonga, who co-wrote the script with Brian Hayes Currie and director Peter Farrelly, Green Book has become one of the year’s most promising Oscar hopefuls. The players describe how they got there to Mike Fleming Jr. D E A D L I N E .C O M / AWA R D S L I N E
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BETWEEN FRIENDS Left to right: Viggo Mortensen, director Peter Farrelly and Mahershala Ali.
E
ven before the people chose Green Book at the Toronto Film Festival, anointing Peter Farrelly’s film as a surprise Oscar contender, it had survived a road trip as overflowing with twists and turns as the story it depicts. It recreates the concert tour of piano virtuoso Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali), a black man touring the Deep South in 1962 with only a Bronxbred burly Italian driver and temporarily unemployed Copacabana bouncer, Tony ‘Lip’ Vallelonga (Viggo Mortensen) as security from the dangers of the Jim Crow era. Polar opposites, the two men discover substance beneath each other’s surfaces, and are reshaped by the distance they travel together.
It bears similarities to crowd-pleasing mismatched
But they wouldn’t let him use their restrooms, or eat
Automobiles and 48 Hrs., and it even has a Christmas
at their restaurants. Determined to upset their notion
theme that makes it theatrically relevant in holiday
of what a highly educated and cultured black piano
season. But it veers into a timely and gentle tale about
prodigy was capable of, Shirley suffered the indignities
tolerance and race, while serving as an unsubtle
and, for the most part, kept his emotions in check.
reminder of the indignities that faced people of color
22
venues that looked like former plantation manors.
buddy and road trip comedies like Planes, Trains &
Vallelonga was handed a copy of The Negro
in the South only 50 years ago. During the tour, Shirley
Motorist’s Green Book: For Vacation Without Aggrava-
played to cultured, educated powerbroker types in
tion and it was his job to find lodging for the virtuoso
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leaves you feeling sick and manipulated. I wanted it to be hopeful. I loved the heart in this. How does the friendship happen? Get stuck in a car for two months and you cut down all the walls and the bullshit and you find out: I don’t care who you are, people have a lot in common.” Farrelly first had to get the blessing of the younger Vallelonga, himself a director of small budget films, who saw this as the breakout he’d waited his whole life for. “Whether it was with an iPhone and a couple meatball sandwiches, I planned to direct this movie myself,” Vallelonga says now. “But I felt a click when I met Pete, like maybe my father was kicking me in the back of the head from heaven. I said, let’s do it.” Vallelonga is burly like his father—he plays a steely-eyed mob boss in a short scene in which Tony Lip has to answer for punching out a made man who started a fight in the Copacabana—but when they made a quick deal with Focus Features president Jim Burke, his inability to control his emotions while pitching his father’s story proved helpful. “We’re pitching and as Nick starts talking about his father, he starts to blubber,” recalls Farrelly. “Jim was like, ‘Wow, this is real, and he bought it in the room.’” By the time they wrote the script, Burke was gone (he became a producer) and Universalbased Focus lost interest. “The other guys were less enthused than Jim, and their foreign guy said it would be hard to sell a movie about race overseas, which I thought absurd because it’s a buddy movie. But they were kind enough to give it to Jim in turnaround.” Farrelly says he felt it then, and would feel again, the resistance studios had in gambling on him making the leap to drama the way Rob Reiner and Adam McKay have done. It wasn’t the first time he felt his comedy background when white-only establishments wouldn’t accept
hands of a hit-making comedy director whose
marginalizing how he was assessed. His favorite
him. Lip was known as the “best bullshit artist in the
drama debut nobody coveted. And while its sto-
road trip movie is Jonathan Demme’s Some-
Bronx”, and his words and fists that quelled trouble
ryline had the makings of a great road trip film, it
thing Wild. It was where he and his brother got
at the Copa proved useful, to either talk or fight their
had to be careful to avoid the ‘white savior’ movie
the idea to pair Jeff Daniels with Jim Carrey for
way out of trouble. Theirs became a lifelong friend-
trope at a moment of unparalleled sensitivity.
Dumb and Dumber. “It had everything in it that
ship as, on the road, they revealed their true selves;
Green Book became more than a pipedream
I love, including a look that was a real capturing
Vallelonga that he wasn’t just some racist palooka,
when Vallelonga agreed to write it with Currie, who
of a slice of Americana, and I loved the colors. It
and Shirley that he wasn’t simply a genius who
acted in several of the blockbuster comedies made
was shot by Tak Fujimoto. He was the first guy
didn’t identify socially with blue-collar crowds of any
by Peter and Bobby Farrelly and told him the story.
I went to on Dumb and Dumber. And he very
color or ethnic makeup.
Looking for a dramatic detour while his brother took
quickly passed.”
The film landed five Golden Globe nominations for Best Picture and for Farrelly, Ali and Mortensen, as well as the screenplay Farrelly wrote with Nick
a personal sabbatical, Peter Farrelly couldn’t get the road trip out of his head. “A true story of a black concert pianist whose
So Farrelly expected the resistance from studios with Green Book. “I told them it was a departure but I get that in their minds,
Vallelonga and Currie. It has earned Screen Actors
record company sends him on this tour of the South
they’re thinking, can he do a departure? Is he
Guild Awards nominations for its stars and was
that leaves him nervous enough to hire as his driver
going to try to get silly? Is he going to make
named Best Picture by the National Board of Re-
the toughest bouncer from the Copacabana in New
it broad? He might blow it by trying to get
view, and AFI, among others.
York City, an Italian guy with a sixth grade educa-
jokey,” Farrelly says. “I didn’t blame them. I
What started essentially as a great family story
tion, and they end up finding common ground and
spent 25 years doing one kind of movie and
passed like an inheritance from Lip to his son Nick
becoming lifelong friends,” Farrelly says in recalling
all of a sudden I say I can do this. I knew I
became a crowd-pleasing film only after weath-
the pitch. “I was like, what? The lifelong friend thing is
could do it, but I hadn’t done it before. But
ering adversity. It was a story that had to remain
what got me, but it was tricky because what I didn’t
then Viggo Mortensen and then Mahershala
untold until the subjects had died, placed in the
want to do was make a movie about race that just
Ali came into the picture.” D E A D L I N E .C O M / AWA R D S L I N E
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I’VE HAD MY EXPERIENCES. I GOT PULLED OVER BEFORE, OR ASKED MYSELF, ‘WHY AM I IN A STORE, BEING FOLLOWED AROUND WHILE I’M SHOPPING?’” —MAHERSHAL A ALI
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DOC AND LIP
of the road trip; a point raised by, among others,
me never to do that, even after he passed away. I
Shirley’s own family. These brickbats have stung Lip’s
struggled with that, but I had enough from him to
son, who has watched members of Shirley’s family
tell this story, about that trip, and not his life. It is not
BEFORE ALL THAT CAME THE PROCESS OF
dispute parts of the story that Vallelonga took from
a biopic, not about his family; he didn’t want that in
what facets of the characters, and which road
the extensive interviews he did with both men, on
there and that’s why they were not involved in the
stories to include in the movie. Co-writer Vallelonga
condition that the story stay buried until its subjects
story. I honored and respected his wishes.”
clearly reveres his father, and despite early scenes in
passed away. This was important to Shirley, and
which Lip attaches disparaging ethnic tags to black,
Vallelonga kept his promise.
Chinese and German people, Vallelonga doesn’t
That was the only reason the story didn’t surface
Sure, there were creative liberties beyond truncating an 18-month road trip through 48 states and Canada into an 8-week tour of the Deep South.
remember such language being used in the house,
earlier, when Lip could have gotten any of a number
Remember that early scene where Lip tips the Copa-
partly because his churchgoing mother would never
of great filmmakers interested. After his road trip
cabana hatcheck girl to give him the cherished lid of
have tolerated it.
with Dr. Shirley, Lip started acting, playing small roles
a mob boss, which Lip returns to the mobster to be
in The Godfather, Goodfellas, Raging Bull, Dog Day
in his good graces? “It was Sinatra’s hat,” Vallelonga
anyone,” he says. “What I was trying to show there
Afternoon, Pope of Greenwich Village and Donnie
reveals. “He took Frank’s hat to Jilly’s around the
was leftover residual stuff, from how these guys were
Brasco. His most significant role came as the recur-
corner and returned it to him. We made him a mob
brought up, but I don’t remember the N word ever
ring crime boss Carmine Lupertazzi in The Sopranos.
guy instead, to show that Lip had the chutzpah to
said in front of me and my brother. Only remnants of
But Lip had left the story behind Green Book like an
pull something like that off.”
things in how he talked about certain people. It’s a
inheritance for his son.
“My father never really said a bad word about
hard thing to say, because any comment is racist. To
“I’d made independent films, some OK, some not
Both Vallelonga and Farrelly said that the racism in the South was scarier than depicted, and that
say that someone is a racist, to me, that’s like hatred
so much, so I’ve been criticized before,” Vallelonga
there were other incidents that would have changed
in someone’s heart, and so I’m going to get chopped
says. “This has been harder, because it’s personal.
the tone or made the movie too long. “There have
down for this, but he wasn’t some ugly racist running
There have been attacks on my dad and who he was,
been comments made by some of the family who
around with a freaking hood on his head.”
and attacks on me personally. What I tried to do was
said, [Dr. Shirley] never got beaten up,” Vallelonga
Vallelonga remembers meeting Dr. Shirley as a
show, through these two people, how we’re all the
recalls. “I’m sorry to say he did, and my father had to
kid and regarding him as cool. His father took him
same, and can come together on a very simplistic
help him. There were other incidents related to the
to Shirley’s loft above Carnegie Hall. “He had this
level. I wasn’t out to cure racism; I’m just saying this is
YMCA type of thing that happened that I left out
throne, and a grand piano, and he wore this African
what happened to these two men and it shows the
because I wanted to deal with that issue as respect-
robe and he sat me on the throne and my father said,
baby steps toward people coming together. I wanted
fully as I could. There were a lot more things that
‘Play him something, Doc.’ I thought he was the cool-
people to see that and feel good about it.”
happened with the cops, and we combined two,
est guy in the world.”
He disputes criticisms that the film doesn’t do
when my father punched out a cop and that was one
The road trip had changed his father com-
enough to detail Dr. Shirley’s life and background.
time they got arrested. They also got arrested when
pletely. “My father was head of the family and he
“It’s very simple,” Vallelonga insists. “I am a white
they were going 25 mph and a cop said they were
talked about what it was like in the South,” Val-
Italian writer telling a story about my father, along
doing 75. It was a shakedown and the cops were
lelonga remembers. “It changed the whole way we
with my co-writers Brian Currie and Pete Farrelly. It’s
pissed my father was driving this black man. That’s
were brought up, this simple story of two guys who
from that point of view, so it was important to show
when the Robert Kennedy phone call happened. And
showed us how people can change if they learn from
my father’s background, and how he changed. But
a lot more stories like that Christmas concert when
each other and grow.”
what no one seems to understand is that Dr. Shirley
Dr. Shirley couldn’t eat there.”
Farrelly needed the contrast to be sharper, but almost everything they put into the story was told by
only wanted me to tell his story as it related to what happened to him and my father.”
Vallelonga said there was another incident in a hotel bar that refused to serve Dr. Shirley, until Lip
the two characters who shared the car, in audio-
Shirley gave Vallelonga extensive time, based on
taped interviews made by Vallelonga before they
a further promise to keep the focus on the tour and
they were saying if we serve him then we have to
died, and in the letters from Lip to his wife Dolores,
not the other events of Shirley’s life. “Dr. Shirley said,
serve every—I’ll use the word ‘negro’—in the city. My
which progressively went from rudimentary to
‘I don’t want anything else about me in there.’ He
father talked them into it, but then there were cops
swoon-worthy under Dr. Shirley’s tutelage.
didn’t want to tell me about his family. He could’ve
all over the place, looking for Dr. Shirley and my father.
had 10 brothers and sisters, and my father didn’t
They had to sneak out of there and leave town.”
“Lip was racist in the way that everybody in New
promised trouble. “They let him have one drink, but
York was a racist at that time,” is how Farrelly saw
even know that. He didn’t want me to have informa-
Adds Vallelonga: “We took some creative license,
it. “He used the N-word. He took those glasses and
tion about aspects of his personal life. He granted
condensed things and moved some around, but the
dropped them in the trash if a guy drank out of them.
me the right to tell this story of this time between
heart of those stories are all true.”
And then he went down south and saw systemic
him and my father, nothing else, and he specifically
racism and was appalled by it.”
told me, ‘Don’t contact anyone about me. What I’ll
detailed the moment of JFK’s assassination. The
Another scene—shot but cut from the final film—
The film tries to thread a needle at a particularly
tell you will be enough. No one was there but me and
pair were actually in Ontario when Lip learned the
sensitive moment, when movies are being assailed
your father, so no one can even give you any informa-
President had been shot. As people crowded around
over issues like ethnic and gender-specific casting.
tion about what happened in that car.’”
the television, Dr. Shirley asked what was going on. “I
Not everyone has bought it, with critical articles
Ali, who remains proud of the film, reached out
don’t know,” Lip replied. “Some president got shot.”
claiming the film still falls into the ‘white savior’ trope
to Shirley’s family after its completion to express
of cinema, even though it seems Vallelonga benefits
regret that he hadn’t contacted them, having been
that he called Bobby Kennedy that same day. He told
as much if not more from his time in the car than
unaware Shirley had living relatives. In fact, Shirley
Vallelonga in one of their interviews, “You can imagine
did Shirley, who smoothed out the rough spots in his
told Vallelonga that the biographical information on
how busy that man was, and yet he took the time to
tough guy driver.
the back of his records would be all the information
talk to me and tell me what was going on.”
The other criticism is that Shirley’s own life is barely revealed beyond what unfolds in the events PHOTOGRAPHS BY
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Shayan Asgharnia
he should glean. “I respected the man’s wishes. I didn’t contact anyone because he adamantly told
Dr. Shirley was so close with the Kennedy family
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says. “But it would have become too much about Kennedy, and we already had RFK in that one scene.” The film was shot in Louisiana, and there were plenty of lingering racist attitudes to go around. “We were going to shoot in a bar,” Farrelly recalls. “We scouted it and came out and a black guy, a local, came over and said this bar is a racist bar. I googled it and sure enough, the owner of the bar had thrown a bunch of black guys out, saying, ‘We don’t want your type in here.’ So we didn’t shoot there. We went somewhere else. It wasn’t like it was over, those days. They were still around us and certainly in those kind of areas.”
VIGGO AND MAHERSHALA
of education and physicality, ethnic background. I’m
those things as much as other friends or family
going to have to do it really well or it’s going to be a
or the layperson walking into a store, doing some
mess. You break it down and think, well, how could
shopping, who may get followed around or asked
this be a bad idea? It could be a really bad idea if I
questions. But those things [I’ve experienced] don’t
do some caricature and Italian Americans go, ‘Jesus
necessarily push me towards signing onto some-
Christ, why is he playing that?’”
thing. If anything, I just have a different degree of
Farrelly foresaw what eventually happened, that Mortensen could pack on some muscle and beef— he’d gain 45 pounds—and he would look like, as
insight that is specific to that character, as far as like what that experience is like.” He recalls living with his grandfather, who was
Farrelly describes it, “not a body builder but like a guy
the president of a local chapter of the NAACP, and
on The Sopranos. Those guys are all big. They’re over-
fought to secure low-income housing in Alameda,
weight, but you know they have muscles and they
CA. His brother, Ali says, was the Vice Mayor of Oak-
could kill you. That’s what he was going for and that’s
land, and president of its chapter of the NAACP. “So
actually what Tony Lip looked like. My argument was,
in my family there was always an awareness around
‘You did Eastern Promises, which was so immersive
civil rights issues and being a public servant. When I
a role that this is a walk in the park by comparison.
was a young kid, it was all about basketball, but I’ve
You’ve lived in New York. You know these guys.”
had my experiences. I got pulled over before and had
Mortensen kept pushing off Farrelly, while he read
my car torn apart, or other weird experiences with
SPEND AN HOUR WITH THE TWO ACTORS
the script over and over trying to find a hole so he
cops, or asked myself, ‘Why am I in a store, being fol-
that lead Green Book and it is hard not to notice
could say no, but liking it more each time. “I wound
lowed around while I’m shopping?’”
in conversation how closely they roll to the way
up saying, ‘This is incredible, maybe I’d be an idiot not
they portrayed their characters. They have an easy
to do it.’ Pete’s doing his first drama and he wouldn’t
maculate wardrobe of Dr. Shirley. “I was named Best
rapport, led by Mortensen who is gregarious, funny
miscast one of his main two guys, would he? He
Dressed in high school, and part of it was, I liked
and anecdotal; Ali a bit more reserved as he takes
must know something.”
clothes and liked being neat, but what happens to
it all in and measures his words. Even though they became friendly and expressed
Still, Mortensen asked for another night to make
It factored into his understanding of the im-
a young black person like me is, some black men
the decision. He read the script a final time, as he
will dress defensively, and that’s what I was trying to
a desire to work together when they spent time
headed out to join his girlfriend who was walking her
articulate a little bit about Don Shirley and speaking
together two years ago on the Oscar circuit, each
dog. He read lines out loud as he walked. “People
about the awareness of your environment and how
actor carefully considered the risks. Mortensen, of
must have thought I’m nuts,” Mortensen recalls.
you present yourself if you feel you’re being observed.
Danish descent, would be playing an Italian right out
“There’s a lot of actors that people think are crazy
How you carry yourself, how you speak, the words
of a Scorsese movie; Ali bore the burden of follow-
escaped lunatics, and they’re just actors working
you choose to use in certain contexts and environ-
ing his breakout Oscar turn in Moonlight with a role
their shit out. I’m not even sane at this point, like
ments, it’s all inspired by trying to protect yourself,
as a black man who required “saving” by his white
what the fuck, look at this crazy tourist, and I’m all
and at times putting other people at ease simply so
costar. The script also included a seminal moment
sweaty. I get there, she’s sitting with her dog, under
you could be at ease. Like, if you can relax, then I can
that called for Dr. Shirley to eat fried chicken for the
those trees. She looks at me, I’m glistening with
freaking relax. I was born in 1974, but all those things
first time in his life. They were both aware the subject
sweat, and she says, ‘Well you’re going to do this
applied to Don Shirley.”
matter, as fact-based and well-meaning as it was
movie.’ I ask her why, and she says, ‘You’re differ-
written, had to be executed just right to fit the bill as
ent; you already look like another person. I’ve seen
to include the chicken eating scene. “I remember
a satisfying road trip movie, and not something that
it happen a couple of times before. You’re doing the
how nervous we were about the fried chicken eating
glorified stereotypes.
movie. Stop fucking around.’”
scene, and how it could be perceived the wrong way,
Farrelly leaned heavily on Ali to figure out how
“At first we talked a lot about we had to get an
While Farrelly could see Mortensen becoming
like, ‘These people love their fried chicken,’” he says.
Italian or it would ring false,” Vallelonga says about
Tony Lip, he was more concerned about Ali as Dr.
“But we didn’t make that up; it was right from Tony
the role of his father. “We didn’t want a bad Joe Pesci
Shirley. “If there was a flaw in Moonlight, it’s that he
Lip, who says [Don Shirley] didn’t eat fried chicken,
imitation. We talked about some great actors. Pete
disappeared too long,” Farrelly says. “I loved his pres-
and was trying to get him to eat it.”
came up with Viggo. He’s one of my favorites of all
ence, but he comes off so strong; such a physical
time. The most iconic Italian American movie char-
force. I wanted Dr. Shirley to be a force in a different
ing, ‘A Kentucky Fried Chicken in Kentucky, what
acter of all time is Don Corleone and he was played
way, and that was my only concern: can you believe
are the odds?’”
by Marlon Brando, who is Irish. Viggo studied me and
that this guy needs a bodyguard? Because he was so
my family, and got down perfectly the dialect that is
imposing in those other movies. He is 6’2” but when
was far more than a funny scene to him. “That’s
Calabrese intertwined with the Bronx. There was a
he came in and met with me, he’d lost about 25
the one thing you learn, that you will not touch
lot of my father on tape and Viggo transformed into
pounds for another role and I could see it.”
the watermelon and you will not touch the fried
him. That is my father up there on the screen.” Mortensen was a much tougher sell. “I was con-
Ali also loved the script and relished the chance
Says Mortensen: “I love that scene, Tony say-
Ali remembered the moment well because it
chicken, period,” Ali says. “Because I’m not giving
to share the vehicle with Mortensen, but he too
you that. You already think that we love fried
scious of [the Italian thing],” he says. “This is a real
struggled with the role. Even subtle racism, or being
chicken and watermelon. And in public like that, I’m
guy that existed, whose family is still alive and there
defined by stereotypes, is something he has seen his
not touching that fried chicken or the watermelon.
are some pretty good Italian-American actors out
whole life. Declining to get specific, he mentions an
So I can totally see how Don Shirley never had fried
there doing movies and television. You always worry
incident that happened while they launched the film
chicken, because of that stereotype.”
a little, but it depends how far removed it is from
in London as evidence it all doesn’t go away.
me. I mean any character you play, you’re taking on
Farrelly says Ali and executive producer Octavia
“It’s just part of the black experience,” he says.
Spencer were invaluable sounding boards. “I needed
someone else’s point of view. In this case, it was one
“I am someone who is fortunate enough to have a
them to say, ‘This is not right,’” he remembers. “See-
of those characters that’s really far removed in terms
presence in the culture where I may not experience
ing laws that said, ‘You can’t sit here, or be there, or
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I WOUND UP SAYING, ‘THIS IS INCREDIBLE, MAYBE I’D BE AN IDIOT NOT TO DO IT.’” —VIGGO MORTENSEN
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try those clothes on, or you can’t go into town at night,’ it blew Tony Lip’s mind, and yet he recognized he was the north’s version of that guy. That’s where the chain starts.” One of Ali’s accomplishments in the film is
A LASTING BOND IT DOESN’T TAKE LONG INTO AN HOUR’S interview with Mortensen and Ali to notice they
to look convincing as a virtuoso pianist, even
replicate the banter their characters share in
though he doesn’t play piano. He accomplished
Green Book. At one point, they are talking about
it with the help of Julliard prodigy jazz pianist Kris
how none of them can believe that Mortensen
Bowers, an unsung hero in the movie. Bowers
is 60—Ali said he looked it up online because he
never heard of Shirley, but was blown away by
didn’t believe he was more than 50—and all perk
his music. There was no sheet music for Shirley’s
up when I note I’d seen Mortensen in a Miami Vice
compositions, and Bowers had to break it down
rerun.
himself, note by note. He did such a good job
And suddenly they are launching into hard
that the film’s score was disqualified from Oscar
luck stories of breaking into the business.
consideration for being too close to Shirley’s
Mortensen was originally cast in a big arc on the
original compositions.
episode as a slimy villainous circus daredevil
It is Bowers’ hands you see often in the movie,
aerialist, but had a ganglion cyst removed and his
gyrating over the keys and co-writers Vallelonga
hand blow up, sending him to the hospital. By the
and Currie said the movie would have been
time he called to postpone, he was told they’d
hobbled without him. “I practiced eight or nine
recast and it was over. He got another chance to
hours a day which I hadn’t done since college, to
play a cop alongside Lou Diamond Phillips, team-
transcribe all the music and record it for Maher-
ing on an undercover bust with Don Johnson and
shala,” Bowers says. He was surprised to find the
Philip Michael Thomas.
actor equally meticulous to pretend to be playing
“We were a mirror image of those guys and
that music. “Our first introductory lesson was
we’re walking down this long street in Miami,
mainly to meet, but I showed him the C major
we’re supposed to be throwing a football and the
scale, and he played it for three hours, so focused
dialogue had to be timed right and trying to make
on making sure the notes sounded right. Play it
it work,” Mortensen recalls. “After I blew it on two
wrong, start over. Play it right, start over. He was
takes, Don Johnson says, ‘On the uptick [snaps
so dialed-in, right away. Then he talked about
his fingers]. This ain’t Hamlet.’ I say, I know, and
posture and how we should sit. Here I am, used
we laugh even though he went after me in front
to playing jazz piano hunched over like Schroeder.
of the whole crew with ‘This ain’t Hamlet.’ And
And he would make sure our backs were straight,
the scene ends with a bust, right, and we go up
our posture just right. His attention to detail was
to the door, and someone says, ‘You go.’ And then
remarkable.”
I do, and I get blown to smithereens.” And Lou
Farrelly wasn’t surprised. “When I sit at that
Diamond gets to be in the whole episode.
piano I want every piano player in the country
All three laugh, and then Ali ups the ante.
to say, ‘He plays the piano just the way I do,’”
“I got this movie, my first feature film, I was the
Farrelly remembers Ali telling him.
lead, and it was like a week out of grad school,”
“He worked his butt off,” says Farrelly.
he remembers. “It was about a young college
Despite all the work and the presence of
student who leads an Occupy Wall Street-type
its celebrated stars, Green Book was a film
movement, with these amazing speeches. I was
without a distributor after it was jettisoned
supposed to play a character who confronts the
from Focus. Its $23 million budget was
leader, and I talked my way into the lead role, even
furnished by Participant Media, after long
though he’s white. We shot 20 hours a day in Wis-
conversations between Farrelly and top ex-
consin and I couldn’t wait for the next day. And
ecutives about tone gave them confidence he
the movie still hasn’t come out, 20 years later.”
wasn’t treating it as a high concept comedy. The film still needed distribution and strangely the road trip film made a U-turn back to
Farrelly asks Mortensen about Witness, the first time he saw the actor onscreen. “I was an extra and they bumped up my
Universal. That was because Farrelly begged
role, and just had me tag along with Alexander
his longtime CAA agent Richard Lovett to
Godunov,” Mortensen says. “I had a scene where
show it to another of his clients.
I’m watching Harrison Ford, and Godunov being
“I knew if Steven Spielberg saw this movie
jealous, wanting the affection of Kelly McGillis,
he would see the bigger picture,” Farrelly said.
whose husband just died. And come to think of it,
“He watched it alone at his house, called me
I’m standing there, eating chicken. Peter Weir tells
up and said, ‘This is the best buddy movie I’ve
me, ‘You just eat the chicken and watch them.’ So
seen since Butch Cassidy and The Sundance
nothing has really changed for me.”
Kid.’ He said it should be at big Universal,
We are back to the movie and I mention the
would I be open to that? That’s how we went
scene in which the black appliance repairmen
through Dreamworks and Universal.”
leave and Tony Lip takes the glasses they drank
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water from and drops them gently in the
two years in things we see popping up here
wife Dolores (Linda Cardellini) puts them
and there, acts of violence, rallies and protests
back in the sink. I say Lip’s gesture was to
and people getting physical.”
please the Italian family watching him and it
Farrelly interjects. “Or even the president…”
reminds me of my own father and how he for-
Ali: “Whoever. We don’t even have to go
bade me to listen to black music when I was
there with him. But I worry they’re getting
12. I did it anyway, sensing that like Tony Lip,
permission to feel like, this is OK again. You
this wasn’t an attitude he believed, but tribally
hope it won’t bleed back into the culture
felt obligated to pass along. I said I could see
and is given space.”
my father being as outraged as was Tony Lip
Mortensen: “I just remembered something
to see real Deep South racism, and maybe as
about my mother’s mother and this conver-
sympathetic as Tony Lip was when Don Shir-
sation we had, when I was probably 14. She
ley was caught in a YMCA with another man
would come over Sunday nights after my
and the cops left them handcuffed naked
grandfather died and my mom would make
and degraded.
dinner. This was in the ’70s. I don’t know why
“You think he was just buying into a belief system?” Ali asks. Yes, I said, and that as a superinten-
it came up, but we are talking about this stuff, and my grandmother says, ‘When the white people went to Africa and discovered it…’ And
dent for the NYC Transit Authority, he
I go, ‘How did they discover it? There were
would talk about the time he saved a
people there.’ She goes, ‘Well, when they went
“black guy”, and each time I would drill
down and saw what was going on, there were
down and ask why he could not simply say
no factories, there was no industry, there was
he’d saved a man’s life. It was generational
no train tracks, there was no this and that.’ I
but half-hearted and an easy cycle for me
go, ‘There was no pollution either, right?’ She
to break raising my own children.
goes on, ‘Well, and so they went and made
Mortensen and I are nearly the same age,
that stuff for them… I like black people, they
and he brings up his own father, and how he
seem very nice, but they’re not as smart or
thought Archie Bunker from All In The Family
they would’ve had the factories.’ And I got re-
was the funniest character on television.
ally pissed off, and had this big argument with
“My father looked a little like Archie, and I
my grandmother. She says, ‘I don’t know why
was sitting there watching it with him one day,
you’re so upset, these are just the historical
and he’s got his glass of juice, and laughing
facts.’ I say, ‘But they built civilizations. Just like
and laughing. He’s Danish, but he had been
in Georgia, where the whole state was farms.
living in the United States a long time, and
There was a massive farming culture and the
he’d go, ‘This is the best show!’ I say, ‘Yeah,
Spanish came in and one guy with smallpox
sure. You do know that you’re just like him,
wiped them out. There were things happen-
don’t you?’ He answers, ‘What do you mean?’
ing before those white guys showed up, and
He had no idea. And I go, ‘Come on.’ Because
they were probably better off in many ways
he would say things about Puerto Ricans and
than train tracks.’ I finally had to give up and
whoever else. Just free-flowing. Maybe not as
say, ‘OK, grandma, we’ll just disagree.’”
bad as Tony Lip, but similar. You knew it was
Ali: “But that’s great that Viggo just shared
what he learned when he came as a young
this, and I’ll tell you why. That is the simplest
guy in the mid-1950s to the United States.
way to put in context why Don Shirley wanted
That’s what he heard from the white guys. So
to go down South, because of knowing that
his turns of phrase and certain words, that’s
like happened with his grandmother, that
what people said. And he’d look at Archie
was the view and perspective of black people
Bunker and say, he’s so funny, he’s such an
and black culture, and here was an individual
idiot. I’m like, ‘Yeah, you’re just like him and
who’d had an opportunity to be educated
you even look like him.’ And he goes, ‘I am
and to pursue his talent and passion, who
nothing like him.’”
could go down there and cut right through
“Isn’t it funny how culture gives us per-
ON THE ROAD As Dr. Don Shirley and his driver, Tony Lip, Mahershala Ali and Viggo Mortensen took their own road trip through the Deep South.
Ali: “But what’s happening now, in the last
trash. He didn’t break them though, and his
that point of view. And that view couldn’t hold
mission to think things are OK for periods
anymore. How do you react to somebody
of time?” says Ali. “So much of it is about
who could address you in any language that
the conversations of the permissions of
you basically wanted to speak, could play
culture, and how that shifts, and it’s no
anything for you that you could think of, and
longer permissible, because of the aware-
could outwit you at every turn? You could not
ness that it is no longer OK.”
walk away and just say, ‘Well, those people are
“It starts with some small act by someone, not usually a politician who says, ‘This is not alright, don’t do it anymore,’” adds Mortensen.
this way, they’re inferior.’” Adds Mortensen: “And she was sweet, my grandma.” ★ D E A D L I N E .C O M / AWA R D S L I N E
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John
How much does your parenthood spill into
KRASINSKI ★
part was the most personal to me, because everything that she feels about her children, I feel about mine. The line between myself and Krasinski: I mean, I think it’s the reason why I did the movie. I’ve talked about it before,
BLUNT ★
Blunt: I think to an immeasurable degree. This
the character became very blurry for me.
Emily ★
these performances?
★
but I couldn’t watch a horror movie let alone make one. The thing with this was the truly overwhelming sense of clarity that hit me, that the movie would be the perfect metaphor for
★
parenthood. Yes, it would be scary. Yes, it would
The husband-wife team are riding high on the success of their first collaboration, A Quiet Place BY J OE U T IC H I
have tension and all those things. But it would also be like writing a love letter for my kids. In every word I wrote, or every shot I directed, and all through the performance. When we first started talking about it, Emily
THOUGH THEY STARTED DATING A DECADE AGO, John Krasinski & Emily Blunt had never worked together before this year, when the Krasinski-directed A Quiet Place cast them as husband and wife and tapped into the unspoken language they’ve come to share. Krasinski was nervous to approach Blunt to star, but on screen, as they navigate a world in which the slightest sound could mean instant death, it’s that real-life connection that telegraphs everything another movie might wrap up in dialogue. The film has been the runaway horror hit of the year, and Krasinski is already at work writing a sequel.
said it would be the scariest role she’d ever played. I asked her why. She said, “Up until now, every performance has been pretending. Professional pretending. This is the first time I’ve had the same fears as my character.” Not that monsters would come out of the woods to eat the kids, but that thought of, what if I wasn’t there in my kids’ moment of need? It was our biggest fear. Talking of scary, Emily, Mary Poppins Returns came out before Christmas. Taking on that role must have come with fear.
A Quiet Place has had an extraordinary
Emily, John once told me he was
Blunt: I won’t say my trepidation to play her
life in the nine months since its
nervous to ask you to be in the movie,
was instantly overwhelmed by the delight of
release. Could you have predicted it?
until you read the script on the plane
playing her, but I did feel that very strongly.
John Krasinski: I’ll speak for myself when
and insisted on playing the part. But
I heard the resounding gasps from all of my
I say it’s completely and totally surreal.
that he’d always wanted it to be you.
friends when I said I was taking on Mary
I genuinely don’t know if I’ve processed
Blunt: I’ll be very honest—he never gave
Poppins, which is a thought that can only fill you
it yet. We treated it like a neat little indie
me that indication. I was going headfirst
with dread. You’re taking on something iconic,
movie; it felt like an indie movie. We
into Mary Poppins 2, which was going to
and you shouldn’t be meddling with such a
thought it was really special, really unique,
be an entire year of my life. I think he knew
treasured character. But once I’d decided to do
and really different, but we were pretty
that I wasn’t in the headspace to sign on
it, I dove in headfirst.
sure we wouldn’t get much more than four
to another job right after that. We’ve also
or five high-fives from friends. And turns
always been very protective about working
Have your kids seen it?
out we have a lot more friends that we
together, and I think I probably felt even
Blunt: They did see my version of it at
didn’t even know about.
more protective of not being in this one
Thanksgiving. We did a little screening for John’s
Emily Blunt: It has been overwhelmingly
initially, because I knew it was such a big
family, and [my daughter] Hazel came to see
exciting for me to see people watch this
swing for him. And then I read the script,
it and she absolutely loved it. She just thought
film and have their hair blown backwards
and immediately I was like, “Well, I now
it was incredible, and she talks about it all the
by it. I always thought we would get here.
have to do this movie.”
time. She now asks me to do the Mary Poppins
I remember John showed me one little bit
Krasinski: You always try to write with
voice for her, which is the most surreal thing in
of one scene in the early stages of the edit,
your dream actor in mind, because it helps
the world, to be honest.
while he was trying to find the first cut. It
you see the performance in your head,
was when the basement is flooded with
and I think Emily is the best actress we
Isn’t that every parent’s dream; to be cool
water. I flipped out. I remember saying,
have. Also, I’ve been there firsthand when
in the eyes of their children?
“John, this is so cool!” And as he knows, we
she has been the very representation of
Blunt: Well it won’t last long. I feel like once
Brits don’t enthuse too readily, unless we
strength and motherhood and fertility; she
they’re in their teen years, they’ll immediately
really mean it, so I think he knew I meant it.
has superpowers that I will never be able
sink John and I to the very rock bottom of cool.
to comprehend. As I wrote the character, it
So I’m going to enjoy it while I can, for the next
was all filtered through her.
10 years. ★
Even people who hate genre movies loved this movie.
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Josh Telles
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Margot
ROBBIE ★
★
have scenes where she can giggle and have fun. It was great, because I would sit there and just be thinking, “I just want to fun things.” I was sitting alone in a room doing things with flowers. It was about
RONAN ★
having so much fun. My character doesn’t
be hanging out with girlfriends and doing
Saoirse ★
this amazing bond and they were always
imagining what the other one is up to, and feeling that pang of envy. You’ve both consistently chosen
★
complex roles. Is the only way to get
The rival monarchs of Mary Queen of Scots discuss on-set separation, smallpox and the power behind the female throne B Y A N T O N I A B LY T H
more good female roles is to put more women in positions of power? Robbie: Yes. It’s one thing to say we want to see women in these roles, but you need to be a part of the conversation when
HE REAL QUEEN ELIZABETH I AND MARY STUART PROBABLY NEVER MET. But when you cast a film with Margot Robbie as Elizabeth and Saoirse Ronan as Mary, it seems only right that they come together, if only for one scene. Josie Rourke’s Mary Queen of Scots may briefly put the two monarchs face-to-face, but otherwise, staying true to the characters’ separate lives, Ronan and Robbie didn’t meet on set at all until they were on camera together—a decision Ronan calls a mutual “experiment”—and one that turned out to perfectly serve a tale of rivalry, isolation and oppressed female power.
T
those choices are made, when who’s getting hired is the actual conversation. So, I think it’s really important that we have people in those positions who want to make those choices, and when it comes down to it, they actually do say, “Yes, I’m going to hire this person over this person who’s had more of an opportunity so I’ve seen more of their work.” I love that Working Title gave this movie to Josie. She’s obviously an amazing director in the theater world already, but I think it was incredible for them to say, “We want this to be her film, and we’re not going to make her go do a micro-budget indie
Saoirse, you signed on to play Mary
You had totally separate shooting
drama.” Because that’s generally the only
six years ago, but what did you know
schedules, except for your one scene
space up-and-coming female directors are
about this story going into it?
together. How did that help you?
allowed. We just need people to be brave
Saoirse Ronan: I didn’t know much, really.
Ronan: It really helped me. It was Margot
enough to make those choices, I think.
I learned a very small amount about Mary
and I that both agreed from the very
Queen of Scots when I was in school, and
beginning that we didn’t want to see each
Was there an inciting incident when
there was so much about her that had
other, and we thought it would be quite
you thought, “I’m going to have to
been entered into the history books that
a fun experiment to try, because I had
become a producer or director to get
just wasn’t really true. When I finally did
certainly never tried that before. Margot
the roles I want”?
start to do research, when I signed on to
started before I did, and our meeting
Ronan: For me I think it was a slightly
do the film years ago, I realized she came
scene was the very first thing that I shot.
different thing because I started when I
from a very well-respected yet very fiery
To know in the three weeks that I had off,
was young, so there wasn’t that pressure.
family, the Stuarts, who had been ruling for
all of the English court stuff was being
But one of the things that I did experience
hundreds of years. It was very exciting to
shot, and that this whole world was
during my teenage years, and every female
know that there was another side to the
existing that I didn’t really know anything
warned me, “When you get to about 18,
story that hadn’t been told.
about was exhilarating. You were sort of
the roles just stop and there will be nothing
Margot Robbie: I knew very little. I had
guessing what they were up to, and who
interesting out there.” And they were right.
an image of Elizabeth in my mind, the way
was in alliance with whom, and it just
I definitely had a few years where I just
we see her at the end of this film with the
meant that when we did finally do that
didn’t work, really. I made the decision
white face and the red lips and elaborate
meeting scene, we were acting definitely,
to basically not work at all instead of
dresses. That tableau existed in my mind
but it was personal. It became a very, very
taking something on that I didn’t believe
but I had very little context for it, so I really
emotionally loaded day for us.
in. Having said that, I was very lucky that
was starting at the beginning, and Josie
Robbie: The isolation and the loneliness
I could do that because I was a kid and
was incredible at helping me put together
Elizabeth feels is definitely a huge part of
didn’t have bills to pay, or kids to look after,
a timeline, and gave me a catch-up of the
her story, and I think it helped so much
or any of that sort of stuff. But that was
history up until that point.
to know Saoirse and the other girls had
definitely something I experienced. ★
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Ethan
minutes of the movie there’s a 12-minute dialogue scene of two people discussing
H AW K E
their inner life. That’s rule number one in screenwriting class: don’t do that [laughs]. You’ve broken that rule yourself on several occasions.
Pa u l
Hawke: Yeah, I’ve broken it before, but the
SCHRADER
★
★
★
★
★
reaction to that scene has been incredible. I thought, even when we were doing it and I loved it, that this might be the place where 90% of the audience turned the movie off. Instead it’s the opposite. Schrader: It’s the scene that drops them
More than a year since its premiere, First Reformed remains in the conversation, bolstered by strong reviews BY J OE U T IC H I
into the rabbit hole. You also have a couple of moments where the film goes off the deep end; like the levitation scene and the ending.
AUL SCHRADER AND ETHAN HAWKE DID NOT EXPECT TO BE HERE. The writer/director and his actor are still talking about First Reformed, 18 months on from its premiere at Venice, as they receive nominations and awards to add to the mountains of critical praise the film has drawn. Its examination of a crisis of faith for a pastoral minister as two of his flock struggle with the decision to bring a child into a fractured world is, at turns, social realism and cinematic fantasy, but the questions it asks are all too relevant for the star and his director.
P
Hawke: Those two scenes are connected in a lot of ways. The levitation scene prepares you for the direction the movie will end up in. It just lets you know that you can’t believe it when people tell you that audiences aren’t interested in serious movies. People can go with you. They can handle every Tarkovsky reference [laughs]. Paul, what made you think of Ethan in the first place? Schrader: There’s a certain physiognomy of a suffering man of the cloth. We’ve seen examples of this in Country Priest, Belmondo in Léon Morin, Priest, or Monty
First Reformed tackles a lot of the
What did you make of it, Ethan?
Clift in I Confess. You have a certain look
anxieties we’re facing in today’s world.
Ethan Hawke: When Paul sent it to me,
for this guy, and he’s not Brendan Gleeson
Where did this character and this
I remember, in the first three pages or so
in Calvary. It’s very hard to imagine the
premise begin for you?
of the script he had written down what
corpulent Brendan Gleeson wasting
Paul Schrader: Well, strangely enough,
the books were on Reverend Toller’s desk,
away with self-torment. So you do have
it was an intellectual decision, not an
and they were all books my mother had
a physiological archetype. So as you’re
emotional one. I had written a book
given me. It immediately interested me.
writing along you’re thinking, who are
about spirituality and film when I
When you see religious life portrayed in
these people? Ethan was a little older
was a film critic and I never felt that
contemporary movies, it’s usually with
than I’d imagined, but he’s just about the
was the direction I wanted to go as a
a mocking or a malevolent tone. They’re
right age. Both Oscar [Isaac] and Jake
filmmaker. I was too interested in the
performing exorcisms or something. But
[Gyllenhaal] would have been a good
juice—the action, the empathy, and
a serious dialogue about where spiritual
fit too, but I thought Ethan was a better
the psychological realism—to do a cold
leadership is today is really exciting. And
fit. So I sent him the script, because I’d
film like that. And then a couple years
also we get to do a three dimensional
written up a spec. He replied the next day.
ago I was in conversation with Pawel
portrait of somebody that’s dedicated
Then, of course, as always happens it took
Pawlikowski. I was giving him an award
their life to their faith, and I’ve never been
a while to get financing.
for Ida, and we got to talking about
asked to do that.
Hawke: Right. One of the things that you
my book, and about his film. This was
Schrader: One of the things that surprised
say, that I do think is interesting for writers,
downtown and I had to walk home to
me about the reaction is how easily people
is that writing for an actor that you like can
Chelsea. By the time I got back I decided
have slipped into that. There’s a lot of God
breed laziness. It’s kind of easy to write
it was now time to write the script I
talk. This is people quoting Bible verses
a good line when you imagine Al Pacino
swore I never would.
and going back and forth about religious
saying it, because basically everything
matters, and movies aren’t like this. I didn’t
he says is interesting. And you have to
came quite quickly. I broke through the
expect people to get caught up.
challenge yourself to write a script that
hymen of my unwillingness to tackle
Hawke: In fact, it does so many things
is actor-proof. I mean the worst actor in
spiritual matters.
that you’re told you can’t do. In the first 20
America could make it pretty good. ★
Once that penny dropped then it all
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Olivia
there’s a trust, but you don’t really have to
COLMAN ★
don’t communicate a lot orally so you just feel like you can be more at ease even while you don’t have to say a lot. So of and better.
LANTHIMOS ★
feel more and more comfortable. I already
course it helps knowing the person better
Yo r g o s ★
think about it much or discuss it, you just
★
★
You had a sort of wacky rehearsal period, but Olivia, I understand you’re not a huge fan of rehearsing. How did that play out? Colman: Well, it’s different. I love rehearsal
The star of The Favourite piled on the pounds and dove into her director’s odd rehearsal process B Y N A N C Y TA R TA G L I O N E
for theater; that’s probably more fun than doing the play… even then there’s still a chunk of time when people have to talk about stuff in a really irritatingly intellectual way. Rehearsal for screen stuff I’ve never
FTER COLLABORATING ON 2015’S THE LOBSTER, YORGOS LANTHIMOS AND OLIVIA COLMAN reteamed for this year’s twisted take on the court of Queen Anne, giving a jolt to the period cinema genre, and picking up accolades all along the awards season trail. Lanthimos has said he wouldn’t have made The Favourite without Colman, whose character is the linchpin of a trio of strong women at the center of the movie. Director and star recently hopped on the phone with us to riff on the road to The Favourite, their working process and the friendship they’ve established over the years.
A
liked before because it’s sitting down and talking, which I don’t really like doing. This was really good fun because it was basically theater rehearsals. And it took us a while to realize, but then all six of us actors doing the rehearsals said, “Oh, right, this means there’s no embarrassment, there are no inhibitions.” We know each other so well by the time we start filming. It was joyous, and you end up knowing the whole film chronologically in the back of your head or psyche without having to really think about it. Yorgos, is that your typical process?
Yorgos, you’ve said wouldn’t have
You guys previously worked together
Lanthimos: Whenever I have time for
made The Favourite without Olivia.
on The Lobster, so I imagine that
rehearsals, this is my general approach.
Why is that?
builds up a lot of trust. How did that
As Olivia knows, I don’t think trying to
Olivia Colman: This is awkward, isn’t it
experience influence this one?
recreate the scenes as you would do on
Yorgos?
Colman: Sorry Yorgos, but Yorgos isn’t
film helps, or definitely not talking about
Yorgos Lanthimos: It’s weird that I have
the biggest smiler in the world. But I
it or analyzing and explaining. These are
to say this in front of Olivia, but I told
knew from The Lobster he is actually the
things that I think don’t work for the things
her at the time I just couldn’t think of
biggest-hearted, kindest, gentlest man you
that I want to do so I’d rather rehearse with
anyone else for this role, it just didn’t
could meet. So it did mean that going into
the actors.
work. For me, casting is very instinctive
playing Queen Anne and putting on the
and if I don’t feel good about it, I just
weight felt great. He’s lovely, it’s a brilliant
a physical way. I want them to play games
can’t go ahead and make the film. It’s not
script, I already know I love working with
and get to know each other, and especially
like we’re going to fix it, you have to feel
him. I suppose it just made me run into it
on this film because it was a period film,
confident about the actors.
really excited about the whole process. I
and there’s a certain expectation of how
was a bit nervous hoping I would do it well,
people should carry themselves and speak
Olivia, how do you feel about that? Did
but I think you should feel that when you
and move. I just wanted to break that
you need to be convinced?
really like the script and the job. It helped
preconceived notion around it and show
Lanthimos: Yes, why don’t you tell us
me totally throw myself in because I knew
that we were fooling around; it’s not going
about that, Olivia [laughs].
that it was going to be fun.
to be serious.
Colman: Well, thrilled, because if he
I work with them like Olivia described, in
Colman: The one I always remember is
had thought about it any longer, maybe I
Yorgos, have you developed a sort of
the six of us holding hands becoming a
wouldn’t have done the job and I’d have
shorthand with Olivia?
sort of massive human pretzel and tying
been really devastated to watch someone
Lanthimos: I don’t know that I’ve
ourselves up, then trying to undo it while
else doing it. I loved it when I saw the script
changed anything in how I go about it. Yes,
saying the lines. That was hilarious. It’s
and already loved Yorgos, so I was very
you get to know each other, you feel very
actually a really good Christmas party
happy. Thank you!
confident and you just go and do it. I guess
game to play. ★
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Spike
remember my pops coming up out of the pit. It was just so dramatic in my mind. He
LEE
came up after a take and he was like, “You want to come down there?” I looked at my mom, and she was like, “No, he can’t go.” I was so pissed. From that, and being on the Malcolm X set, I was in heaven. Spike had
John David
to calm me down.
WA S H I N G T O N
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★
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★
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Has his process improved since the Malcolm X days, then? Washington: Please say yes. Lee: Yes [laughs]. I knew he could do this part as soon as Jordan gave me the six-
The director and star of BlacKkKlansman have shared a bond since before the younger man was born BY J OE U T IC H I
word pitch—one of the greatest pitches ever. “Black man infiltrates Ku Klux Klan.” That’s high concept. It was exciting, but at the same time I asked Jordan if it was true, and he said it was. I said, “I’ve seen this a
S
PIKE LEE’S BLACKKKLANSMAN OPENED IN AUGUST, on the one year anniversary of the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Lee’s film, based on the memoir of black police officer Ron Stallworth, who successfully infiltrated the KKK in the 1970s, had so many parallels with what happened in Charlottesville that they couldn’t be ignored. Lee cast John David Washington in the lead role, having known him since he was a baby. It was the second time they worked together, after Washington’s childhood cameo in Malcolm X, which starred Washington’s father Denzel.
million times; it’s the Dave Chappelle skit.” He went, “Nah, nah, this is real.” Did you meet Ron Stallworth before you shot? Lee: We both met him, the first day at the readthrough. Washington: I was asking Spike, right after we talked and I read the book, when he told me, “See you this summer.” I was stalking Spike for Ron’s number, and he wouldn’t give it to me. I think one time he said, “Not yet.” I don’t know why you did that, but I’m glad you did. Lee: You know why.
How much did the movie become
Spike, when you cast him in Malcolm X,
Washington: I think it was beneficial for
about what had happened at
did you see the spark of talent?
the performance; for the process of trying
Charlottesville in your mind?
Lee: Yeah, if he chose to do that. Everyone
to figure out something like this in a film of
Spike Lee: When our brother Jordan
has their own path. But it was really when I
Spike Lee’s.
Peele called us, Charlottesville had not
saw him in Ballers.
Lee: It was my thinking that he would
happened. Charlottesville happened
Washington: I also worked with his wife
meet Ron and want to walk like him, talk
August 11th, and we started shooting in
Tonya. She produced a movie called
like him. It wasn’t like playing Malcolm X.
the middle of September. Kevin Willmott,
Monster that I was in. So I must say,
No one knew who Ron Stallworth was, and
my co-writer, and I, we felt that we could
Spike picked me first, but I feel like Tonya
that gives you freedom.
make a hit film—a contemporary film—
believed in me first. She really fought for
that takes place as a period piece in the
me to get the role, and it was a great role,
John David, describe the experience of
past, but that we wouldn’t have to dig
to explore something totally different from
being directed by Spike.
long and deep to find things that connect
myself. That experience; I’m indebted to
Washington: Well, it’s a lot like this
what happened in the story with what’s
her for that.
interview. Colorful.
happening today.
Lee: What year was Malcolm X?
Lee: Loud.
Washington: Right, but Tonya gave me
Washington: But also quiet sometimes.
more meat on the bone [laughs].
What he didn’t say to me was very helpful,
John David, you worked with Spike on Malcolm X when you were how old?
and instrumental in my direction. But I
John David Washington: Six years old.
What’s the first set you remember
also learned what a well-oiled machine
Lee: I knew him before he was born.
being on?
of organized chaos looks like. Spike
Washington: My whole life. We’ve always
Washington: I remember being on Glory.
comes with a wealth of experience and
been a strong family unit, the Lees and the
Lee: In Savannah?
knowledge that he’s so open to share. I’m
Washingtons. But after my first experience
Washington: Yeah, I guess we were in
ready to just listen.
of working for him, I didn’t know if it was
Savannah. I think it was the final epic
Lee: Let this crazy old man talk, right?
ever going to happen again. You know, I
battle scene. I wasn’t in that, but I wish I
Washington: Nah, not old. Maybe a little
wanted it to.
was. But I was there for that scene. I do
crazy, though. ★
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PHOTOGRAPH BY
Dan Doperalski
12/21/18 10:12 AM
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12/21/18 10:12 AM
Pa u l
Giamatti: I had to go get tomato paste…
G I A M AT T I
Hahn: And we happened to meet in the lobby. Tamara was heartbroken. Giamatti: It was one of those great things where we just started laughing when we saw each other. It was great. We didn’t even say hello to each other. I went and got
Kathr yn
tomato paste and went upstairs. Then we had a rehearsal.
HAHN
★
★
★
★
Hahn: Tamara put her director hat on very subtly and then we read through the script. Then we got to look at a donor egg website together.
★
Isn’t this story drawn from Jenkins’
The on-screen couple of Tamara Jenkins’ Private Life grapple with fertility issues and tomato paste B Y D AW N C H M I E L E W S K I
own life? Hahn: She would say it’s more emotionally autobiographical than actually biographical. Giamatti: Her husband does have one testicle, by the way. When you have a
N PRIVATE LIFE, KATHRYN HAHN AND PAUL GIAMATTI portray a middle-aged couple struggling with infertility. The film paints a funny but unflinching portrait of their efforts to have a child, from painful IVF injections, to anxious adoption interviews, to the humbling search for a donor. Throughout the journey, they remain a unit. With their on-screen chemistry fully intact, Hahn and Giamatti greet each other with a long embrace. They immediately fall into a couple’s rhythm, completing one another’s sentences when talking about their collaboration with writer-director Tamara Jenkins.
I
conversation with him, it comes up. He announces it all the time, so I feel comfortable saying he only has one testicle. Tell me about Kayli Carter, who plays Richard’s niece; a college dropout who plays a central role in her aunt and uncle’s quest to have a baby. Hahn: There was another performer that had to exit because of scheduling stuff. But luckily for us in the end, because they discovered this amazing human. Giamatti: I can’t imagine that character being portrayed by anyone else, you know?
What attracted you to this film?
spiritually left my scent in the room. This
Paul Giamatti: I have known Tamara for
was one of those parts that just never
a long time, and we had tried to work on
usually goes to this human.
something before and that didn’t work out.
Anyway, she put me back in a cab and I
I wanted to work with her. Clearly, someone
got on the airplane. I remember watching
else didn’t work out, so she came to me.
The Other Woman with Leslie Mann, but
Kathryn Hahn: [Laughs] She vaguely
most of my brain was thinking about this
knew who I was. We had never met before.
movie. I wanted in so badly, though it took
Giamatti: That’s bullshit.
a while.
Hahn: No, really. [Casting director] Jeanne
Giamatti: The way it was presented to
McCarthy whispered, “Well it’s Kathryn
me, she was incredibly excited about you
Hahn.” And she was like, “Who?”
going in. Then she put me on the phone
Giamatti: I’m not buying any of this.
with you. Do you remember that? You were
Hahn: That’s her narrative. I read the
like, “Giamatti, you doing a picture?” I was
script and I was huge admirer of The
like, “Who the fuck is this woman?” I mean
Savages. I flew myself to New York just to
I knew you, but I was like, “Jesus Christ. She
meet her for like an early dinner. We just
put you on the phone with me to convince
sniffed each other out. We spilled wine.
me?” I was already going to do it.
It was just kind of like a courtship. We kind of flirted. I had to do temporary [ADR] for a show
Tamara Jenkins arranged for you to meet at Paul’s Brooklyn apartment
I was doing called I Love Dick. So she said,
as an ice-breaker. She offered to cook
“Do you want to come up and use my of-
pasta. How was that meeting?
fice?” I went up to the office, where all the
Hahn: She wanted to cook us dinner. She
mood boards were up for the movie. Very
missed the actual meeting, and she was
evocative, moody photos. I just kind of like
heartbroken about it.
40
D E A D L I N E .C O M / AWA R D S L I N E
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Hahn: Tamara’s a sorcerer when it comes to casting. What surprised you when you saw the film? Hahn: I would say how little I thought of the actual baby. It was so much more about the baby project than it was about the baby. Had I stopped and actually thought about the baby, I would have lost it because there was so much loss attached to it. It’s like they almost forgot who they were before this project. Giamatti: They haven’t been able to reproduce in any way. They’re not creating anything in the world. Her book is getting fucked up, I’m not a director. They’re not procreating in any way. It’s like, yeah, I’m making pickles now. I’m not directing theater. Hahn: It’s like a metaphor for mortality. Giamatti: I said in the middle of it, I was like, “This is Waiting for Godot.” That’s what I thought when I finished it. It’s like they’re always going to be there, in some way. They’re always going to be waiting. ★
PHOTOGRAPH BY
Josh Telles
12/21/18 10:13 AM
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12/21/18 10:13 AM
Gabriela Rodriguez
Eugenio Caballero
Yalitza Aparicio
Alfonso Cuarรณn
Roma Experience D E C E M B E R 9, L O S A N G E L E S
An exhibition and panel for the Netflix release. See more photos at Deadline.com
Skip Lievsay & Craig Henighan
Private Life Kayli Carter, Kathryn Hahn & Tamara Jenkins
42
DECEMBER 11 LOS ANGELES
RE X /S H U T T ERSTO CK
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D E A D L I N E .C O M / AWA R D S L I N E
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THE ACTOR’S SIDE Intriguing one-on-one conversations between Deadline’s awards editor and leading actors of film & television NEW VIDEOS EVERY WEDNESDAY WATC H N OW AT D E A D L IN E .C O M
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Keira Knightley Marina de Tavira, Alfonso Cuarón, Yalitza Aparicio & Nancy García García
Martha Stewart
‘Roma’ film premiere Yalitza Aparicio
Alfonso Cuarón
D E C E M B E R 17 / M E X I C O C I T Y
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‘Mary Poppins Returns’ film screening
Emily Blunt & Lin-Manuel Miranda
D E C E M B E R 17 / N E W YO R K
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‘On the Basis of Sex’ film screening
Amy Adams & Adam McKay
‘Vice’ BAFTA film screening D E C E M B E R 17 / N E W YO R K
44
Armie Hammer & Felicity Jones
D E C E M B E R 16 N E W YO R K
RE X /S H U T T ERSTO CK
Daniel Stiepleman
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Italian Masterpieces
Mr Moonlight bed designed by Ludovica + Roberto Palomba. Spoleto, Italy poltronafrau.com Los Angeles Beverly Blvd Ph. 310.858.1433
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YOU LOVED A LOT OF FILMS THIS YEAR, BUT ONLY ONE FILM LOVED YOU BACK. WINNER
IFP GOTHAM AWARDS
INDEPENDENT SPIRIT AWARD
PGA AWARD
5 CINEMA EYE HONORS
NOMINEE
NOMINEE
NOMINATIONS
3 CRITICS’ CHOICE DOCUMENTARY AWARDS
INCLUDING
INCLUDING
AUDIENCE AWARD BEST DOCUMENTARY BEST DOCUMENTARY BEST DOCUMENTARY WINNER
WINNER
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NEW YORK FILM CRITICS ONLINE
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BEST DOCUMENTARY
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“A balm for our current climate of intolerance and hatred.” Stephanie Zacharek, TIME
“This film is a gift.” A.O. Scott, The New York Times
“Morgan Neville’s masterpiece.” Pete Hammond, Deadline
FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE “
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A film by Morgan Neville © 2018 TREMOLO PRODUCTIONS, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ARTWORK © 2018 FOCUS FEATURES LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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