Latest news with #HannahandHerSisters
Yahoo
22-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Interview: Patrick Wilson on Playing an ‘Alcoholic A-Hole' in Millers in Marriage
Millers in Marriage star Patrick Wilson spoke to ComingSoon's Tyler Treese about the family drama. Wilson spoke about working with director Edward Burns, playing an unlikeable character, and more. The film is out now in theaters and on digital starting today, February 21, 2025. 'A tale of three middle-aged married couples coming to grips with universal questions about marriage and fidelity, professional success and failure, and the challenge of finding a second act,' says the synopsis for Millers in Marriage. Tyler Treese: Millers in Marriage is a very ambitious movie in terms of its structure. There are three different marriages that are being examined. Kind of reminded me of Hannah and Her Sisters a bit, the Woody Allen movie. What about this project really grabbed your interest? Patrick Wilson: Ed Burns, we did a movie together, God, probably 17-18 years ago, something like that. He's the kind of guy that when he calls you even out of the blue, and it has probably been 15 years, it's a very easy conversation. If you're free, you're gonna go work with him 'cause it's the kind of story, the kind of honest, skilled storytelling that he's gonna do that he does time and time again. It's funny you bring up Hannah and Her Sisters. He's sort of fallen into this, taking the reins of Woody Allen from New York marriage and relationship movies, and likes to reflect kind of, I'm sure, where he is in life, both the good and the not-so-good. Whether it's him or friends that he's around or friends that he grew up with. You don't see movies like this a lot, and I've been looking for relationship movies that kind of reflect what people in their late forties or fifties that we're all kind of going through. You see it explored more in TV, but you don't see it explored in film. So to really have the time and the vision to put it on the screen as something that was an easy yes. You mentioned that you worked with Ed before. How was it just seeing that evolution because he's had a very long and successful career? What stood out about him as a director? I mean, his ease, his skill, and his comfort. He's both skilled and not precious. It's not like he's flying through things going, 'I don't know. I don't know.' You know, man, move on. It's 'I got it. We're good.' He puts together a team of people and from the top down. I mean, Aaron Lubin is producing. All his DPs, all the people that he's worked with, that I worked with a hundred years ago. I mean, he's got his group of people, and it's a very, very fluid process. So that you come in and you got some ideas and he guides you a few ways and you're kind of in and out. He lets you explore. It lets you swing a big stick and reigns you in when he needs to. He knows what he wants. But it's never forced on you. It's the best kind of directing where you can kind of let you explore it. 'What do you want to try? Go for it.' 'Okay.' Maybe guide you this way. So there's an ease and a comfort both as a human and as a filmmaker that makes it a really enjoyable process, you know? Certainly, for people who have been around, it's refreshing. So it's both a pressure-free and precious-free environment, which is always great to do. One aspect of Millers in Marriage that I found refreshing was that all of the characters are very flawed individuals. They're very human. Your character can be a dick. So, what was the process of making that characteristic stand out and not veering off into one-note territory? But also in real life people can be a dick. So, how is it kind of finding that balance? That's different for me. I've played bad guys, but usually, when you play like a bad guy, he's so bad on the page that it's almost easier to go, 'You know what? I can play 'em the other way.' Because you're gonna see that terrible side regardless if it's terrible by action or it's a murderer or something. But with this, he's not a good guy, or he is certainly not a good guy at this time of his life. That's what attracted me to it. Eddie had said, 'Who do you want to play?' And I said, 'I'd like to play Scott. I don't get to play kind of the alcoholic a-hole very much.' And you're right, he's it. Some people are just dicks… I mean, they just are. And that's him right now. So it was a little, I can't say it was super comfortable, you know, because we would do three and four takes, and some would be very subtle, and some might really lay into sweet Gretchen Mol, who was great in the movie, but I kept going, 'God, I'm just terrible to you.' But that's how my character fits into the story, you know? So you can't be afraid of that. You can't apologize for that. You just kind of have to dive in. So I can't say it was fun, but it's certainly rewarding. 'Cause then you can see how he's gotta be kind of a ballast. You gotta be a point to Benjamin Bratt's character and how Ben comes in. So, everybody kind of fits into the puzzle. So you've gotta really make sure that you go full throttle on yours to make the others work, if that makes sense. You mentioned Gretchen, she's great in the film, and I wanted to ask about that chemistry. Because It's a special type of chemistry. It's not like you're bubbly together. This is very much a strained relationship. So, can you speak to find that chemistry where you're at each other's throats a bit? How is it finding that? Yeah. Well, she's so nice. There's a safety in that, when someone gets along. Also, I think when you go into an Ed Burns movie, right? Ed gets people together, if you get along with him, which 99% of the people in the world will, everybody's kind of circling him. He's really the north star for us or the sun, like whatever metaphor you want to use. So his energy dictates how we all are on set. He's so easy and comfortable that you want to be easy and comfortable. It actually allows you to, when you've got a scene where you're really at somebody's throat, to go full throttle because there's never a discomfort once you yell, 'Cut!' you're really good friends and all having a great time together. So that actually helps. I think it would be hard to be really mean and rude in a set that's really tense. 'cause You kind of don't know where it ends. But these sets are super fun and rewarding, and you're also dealing with people that have been… You look at the cast, I mean, there's hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of movies between all of us. So, you can deal with a bunch of pros. So we come in there to work and have a good time. And when you have that safety, then you can actually let loose. And if it's let loose in an angry and violent way, then almost that's a lot easier when it's a comfortable set, if that makes sense. It's the 20th anniversary for Hard Candy. I thought that was a really great movie. I really enjoyed it. How do you kind of look back on that film? You and Elliot Page just had so many great scenes in that. Yeah, yeah. You know, there was a time during Covid when people were doing all these script read-throughs. Like Zoom reads of movies, and we got approached to do one, and then it fizzled. I always remember that. Because I don't think I've looked at a frame of that movie and certainly thought about it other than fans or something saying, 'Hey, I love that.' But you know, usually my go-to as soon as someone says, 'I love that movie,' and I go, 'Well, that says quite a lot about you.' But yeah, we shot the movie in what, 18-19 days? I mean, it was really like this crazy exercise. I'm super proud of the movie still. I think the movie holds up even in the tech landscape. You know, a lot of movies from that era just kind of dissipate with an iPhone [laughs. And that holds up. You know, and I'm super proud of all our performances and yeah, I love that movie. I can't believe it's been 20 years. That's crazy. I really enjoyed your directorial debut, which was . Thank you. That's a horror movie, but the family drama aspect was also very surprisingly strong. I remember really enjoying that part of it, which is sort of what we see in Millers in Marriage as well. But are you looking to do more directing going forward? Yeah, yeah. I'm looking at a couple things. I've been fortunate to have a few things thrown my way, but haven't really found the right film yet. Then there's a couple that are certainly outside of that genre that I'm pushing uphill for me to direct and shepherd from just inception, I guess. So that's exciting to do. So, yeah, I spend most of my day thinking about what I'm gonna direct next [laughs]. It's a true story. Thanks to Patrick Wilson for taking the time to talk about Millers in Marriage. The post Interview: Patrick Wilson on Playing an 'Alcoholic A-Hole' in Millers in Marriage appeared first on - Movie Trailers, TV & Streaming News, and More.
Los Angeles Times
31-01-2025
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
Not for his haters or his superfans, this Woody Allen biography is for the rest of us
It's certainly possible to not have an opinion about Woody Allen at this point, but it would take some work. Did he molest his adopted daughter, Dylan (as she claims), or did his former partner, Mia Farrow, coach Dylan into smearing Allen? Is it really OK to woo (and eventually wed) the teenage girl whom your partner (Farrow again) adopted and whose Sweet 16 party you attended? Or is that just textbook grooming? Patrick McGilligan's exhaustive biography 'Woody Allen: A Travesty of a Mockery of a Sham' addresses such questions, though it would be a stretch to say it weighs in on them. To the extent that it does, it places a thumb on the scale in favor of the subject to which it devotes some 848 pages. McGilligan writes that Allen's affair with Soon-Yi Previn 'raised puritanical eyebrows,' as if anyone who objected to such behavior was stuck in some outdated bourgeois rut. He treats Allen's '70s trysts with teenage girls as a sign of the times. (The author also trots out queasy phrases like 'the Woke Generation' in a way that suggests he'd like you to get off his lawn.) He spends a lot of time writing about how long Farrow breastfed the son she had with Allen, Satchel Ronan O'Sullivan Farrow (who would grow up to be a spokesman for Dylan and Farrow and a leading journalist of the #MeToo movement). At such moments the book grows rather strange, though its overall dissection of the immensely dysfunctional Allen/Farrow family is both finely detailed and deeply sad. Once you get past the sordid stuff — if you can get past it enough to pick up the book in the first place — you'll find an engaged, engaging and tirelessly insightful account of Allen's life and career, from a writer who has few peers in the film biography business. McGilligan, whose previous subjects include Alfred Hitchcock and Nicholas Ray, is a professional biographer, a document digger who knows how to use an artist's life to reflect on his or her body of work, and vice versa. He writes with authority and wit on the highlights of Allen's career ('Annie Hall,' 'Hannah and Her Sisters,' 'Crimes and Misdemeanors'), and he's blessedly brief on later trifles like 'Small Time Crooks,' 'Hollywood Ending' and 'The Curse of the Jade Scorpion,' which, among others, made it clear that a new Woody Allen movie could be cause for as much disappointment as excitement. McGilligan is particularly strong on Allen's showbiz beginnings, or, as he writes, his 'crucial development from a neophyte TV writer to a knock-kneed stand-up comic with a zany, neurotic persona.' His ascent was indeed remarkable. Allen began submitting gags to newspaper columnists as a high school student, used that work to break into the television writing business, picked up mentors including Neil Simon's older brother, Danny, and eventually met the two men who would, slowly, launch him into stardom. Jack Rollins and Charles H. Joffe saw a stand-up comedian in Allen well before Allen himself did; as his personal managers they pushed him into duty in New York comedy clubs. He initially floundered, clueless in matters of connecting with audiences and sustaining a performance, but found his footing as a digressive, less-topical, self-deprecating Mort Sahl type. Though even Allen admits his brand of intellectualism is pretty superficial — he never had much use for or interest in college — he crafted the Allen persona we would come to know, a stammering, angsty nebbish, terrified by the inevitability of death, quick to drop a reference to Sartre or Joyce into a comedic context. Not surprisingly, given his cinema bona fides, McGilligan handles Allen's development as a filmmaker with keen insight. He digs deep into Allen's collaboration with cinematographer Gordon Willis, dubbed 'The Prince of Darkness' due to his fondness for deep pools of shadow. Like Allen, Willis was a New York outsider. McGilligan writes: 'Both boasted tireless work ethics and stubbornly avoided any 'fooling around' during filming. Both despised cinematic cliches.' Their first collaboration, on Allen's masterpiece 'Annie Hall,' was particularly fruitful. In the words of the movie's star Diane Keaton, who won an Oscar (and started a casual fashion craze) for playing the free-spirited title character, Willis showed Allen how a master shot 'could be used to deliver the variety and impact an audience needed without cutting to close-ups.' Willis worked on seven more Allen movies, but 'Annie Hall' remains the director's most visually alive and imaginative creation. When both director and movie won Oscars, Allen famously stayed in New York, playing clarinet at Michael's Pub, instead of attending the ceremony. Unlike Eric Lax's 1991 'Woody Allen: A Biography,' which was celebratory if not terribly inquisitive, McGilligan's book is unauthorized. This means McGilligan had nobody and nothing to answer to but himself and the truth. As we have learned, however, the truth about Woody Allen can be elusive, which was the case even before the fog that surrounds his various scandals descended. Not for nothing did Variety dub him 'Mr. Secretive.' All the more impressive, then, that McGilligan was able to piece together what he has here. This isn't the takedown that Allen foes might have wanted, but nor is it hagiography. It is, for the time being, the definitive study of a man and an artist about whom it remains hard to be neutral. Chris Vognar is a freelance culture writer.
