CS Interview: Bruce Dern Talks About Last Call, Nebraska, and More!
Ahead of the limited theatrical release and digital film, ComingSoon.net had the opportunity to speak to two-time Oscar nominee Bruce Dern about his role in the Jeremy Piven-directed dramedy Last call as well as revisiting areas of his iconic career, including his career-inspiring role with Alexander Payne Nebraska.
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Looking back when he first got the script for the film, and Dern was thrilled to see people “see me differently” even at 84, the star noted that the film was “an adult animal shelter, if you will, with a bunch of guys adding inches to their dick and thinking it sounds like a lot of “fun” and believing that “movies should be fun, you know? “
“You still have a few people together in the locker room doing this and that and holding a competition,” explained Dern. “In some cases that includes the father or the grandpa, and in the end he is kind of a surprise. That got me interested every now and then, people send you stuff where you see some kind of open cleverness, which I liked about this material, it was clever. It was an upgrade on another level and that somehow fascinated me. “
Despite his excitement about the good time he was going to have on the project, he had a little problem with the film that arose from its original title Crabs in a bucketGiven the situation in fishing town, he believed it wasn’t a title that would draw the crowd in theaters, but that the Tory had taught him a few things to make the title more meaningful.
“I didn’t know the shrimp fisher lived near Hoboken, New Jersey. I would have thought it was near Delaware or something like that,” noted Dern. “But it’s a whole clan of people and they depend on a boat and on getting along with things they still have. You can’t afford to fix what can’t do this or that. So it was a way of exploiting the state of the art, and I like that the cleverness was very much left to the cast. If there is something, a film like this comes along Crabs in a bucket, or Last callThey say to themselves, “Well, I don’t know these people, they don’t know me, we’re going to go in there and surprise each other.”
Another thing Dern found difficult at first was that he was “not funny” and “never funny” to himself, even though he used an epitome that he had around 65 that it is more important, ” trying to make it as real as possible ”and that good performance is more about“ the behavior ”without necessarily“ putting the words aside ”, due to his time working with Alexander Payne Nebraska.
“Many times, actors and actresses seem to feel like it’s all about the written word, the written word is there, but the behavior has to be there,” said Dern. “You have to understand how it behaves, who these people are, where it comes from, and luckily I came across Alexander Payne seven or eight years ago, and Alexander, for lack of a better expression for me, revived my career in Nebraska. ”
Click here to rent Last call!
Dern recalls the film’s debut in Cannes, where Payne was the only one to see the wet cut. He recounts how little faith Paramount Pictures had in the film given the “great, long battle” the studio had with Payne over blacks. and-white format and that they sent Dern home a day early after allowing him to see daughter and Oscar winner Laura Dern (Marriage history), Ms. Andrea Beckett and his assistant, in their day, but that the early departure made him miss one of the most exciting things about its premiere.
“I left on Saturday morning and on Sunday morning Laura called me and said, ‘Did you hear something? ‘I said, “Did you hear anything?” She said, ‘Dad, Alexander just called me and you won a Palme d’Or in Cannes,’ “Dern recalled warmly.” I said what ?! Oh my god I forgot everything. ‘I’ve been to Cannes four or five times now to do different films and it wasn’t something I ever dreamed of. When I saw the film with them, it was the first time I saw the film. I was amazed at the reception that evening, but I don’t think it’s the best film and best performance at the Cannes Film Festival. “
Looking back on filming in 2012, Dern recalled a very important lesson Payne told him on the first day of shooting that not only showed that he had a truly collaborative director for the project, but also something important that he carried over into other films would.
“What Alexander said to me the first morning we were filming in Lyon, Nebraska, was, ‘Did you see something on set today that you’ve never seen before?'” Dern explained. “I said, ‘Yes, I do. I see everyone seems to be pulling their ore. ‘He said,’ Well, hopefully that’s because we have 88 crew members and 75 work every day on every movie I’ve ever made. ‘ That was his sixth film at the time, and I said, ‘Wow’. He said, “I wanted you to know this is Phedon Papamichael, he’s your cameraman. I just want you to know that you can dare take a chance because we have your back. I wonder if you would do something for Phedon and me that I am not sure you have ever done in your career. Never show us anything, let’s find it, ‘and I knew I had a partner.’
Dern has had a successful career in the film industry for over 60 years. He and his daughter and ex-wife Diana Ladd were the first family to have all the stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, while also winning their first. When Dern was nominated for an Oscar in 1979, he still found that throughout his career Urged to know that he and his family “had no help in this business” and used his 2007 bio Things that i have Said, but probably shouldn’t have hammering home that he and his family didn’t just “fall off the beet truck”. He also notes that should he ever write another book in the future, it would be about a certain type of character that he has taken a real interest in all his life.
“I always thought it would be fun to write a book about people who came second and never got the recognition they deserve,” said Dern. “The only thing that has impressed me more than anything in my life is people who do shit. The best statement I’ve ever heard in my life, whether you like the guy or not, was when William Randolph Hearst first showed Marion Davies Citizen Kane in her arena theater and at the very end she went apeshit. She started chasing after him and said, “You are such a great man and you will do this and that. If you’re such a damn great man, you’re going to prevent this movie from ever coming out. ‘Cause when it comes out you’re dead and I’m dead cause we’re a joke, don’t you get it? “He said,” Marion, I will not tolerate that language. Second, I never said that I was a great man. I just said I was a man who had the chance to be great, but not. “I don’t care what you thought about the guy, he got shut down, I’m always looking for it.”
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Mick (Jeremy Piven), a local success story and real estate developer, returns to his bohemian Irish neighborhood in the shadows of Philadelphia for a funeral and is committed to staying to ensure his parents’ troubled family business gets back on track. In the midst of it all, he drifts closer to childhood (Taryn Manning), who is also back in town, while enduring the constant ridicule of his old hometown crew. When Mick begins reconnecting with the neighborhood he grew up in, he is at a crossroads as he is forced to either destroy or reanimate the family bar.
Last Call is led by Paolo Pilladi (Invisible mountains) from a script by Greg Lingo and Pilladi and the stars Piven (entourage, Lucky coincidence), Dern (Nebraska, The Great Gatsby), Manning (Orange is the new black, Hustle & Flow), Jamie Kennedy (Scream Franchise, Malibu’s most wanted), Cathy Moriarty (Raging Bull, analyze this), Jack McGee (The fighter, gangster squad), Zach McGowan (Black Sails, agents of SHIELD) and Cheri Oteri (Saturday Night Live, scary movie).
The film is now available in selected cinemas as well as on digital platforms and VOD!
