Screwball comedies natural for Coen brothers
Joel and Ethan Coen are analog guys in a digital world, highly amused by the absurdity of talking about big ideas amidst the frenzy of a film festival.
The sibling filmmakers are also just off the plane from the coast, having arrived for last night’s North American premiere of Burn After Reading, their spy vs. stupidity spoof at the Toronto film festival. (The movie opens wide Sept. 12.)
While chatting with the Star last night in an exclusive Canadian interview, Joel, 53, reclines in a hotel chair while Ethan, 50, paces the room. Jet-lagged and jumpy, they act as if someone – Batman’s Joker, maybe? – just filled the place with laughing gas. They do love to kid.
If the bros sound even more playful than usual, it’s forgivable in the context of “the idiocy of today,” a theme of their movie, which stars George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Tilda Swinton, John Malkovich and Frances McDormand.
Q: You worked on both Burn After Reading and No Country for Old Men at the same time …
Ethan: Sort of writing it at the same time, yeah …
Joel: (interrupting) Is that a question?
Q: It is. It’s like we’re playing Jeopardy. I actually see a link between No Country and this one.
Joel: (laughing) We did work on them at the same time …
Ethan: (interrupting) Actually, to tell you the truth, we’re laughing because Claudia (the studio publicist) told us, “He only has one question.”
Joel: You were very clever. You came in and made a statement for us to react to. So we were going to pull your leg a little bit.
But okay, to answer your question, it’s only that this one was so complicated to pull together from the point of view of all these high-profile actors all being available at a specific time. So we shot it after (No Country). It was sort of a window of opportunity when we could shoot George and Brad and John Malkovich and Fran and all that.
Ethan: (laughing hysterically) Whereas, for No Country, Josh Brolin was always available! Josh’s schedule was open!
Joel: Yes, Josh was available. I’m sure he’d be saying right now, “Thanks, guys!”
Ethan: (laughing) Can you write about that in an especially slighting way …
Joel: (laughing) … so we can send it to Josh?
- from here
George Clooney Parties in Geneva for Barack Obama
George Clooney helped raise big bucks for Barack Obama’s presidential campaign by appearing at two intimate events in Geneva, Switzerland, Tuesday night.
Reuters reports that around 170 donors paid $1,000 each to rub shoulders with Clooney and other VIPs at a museum cocktail party, and following that, some 75 contributors paid $10,000 each to dine at “an intimate seated dinner” with the ‘Burn After Reading’ star.
Combined, the two intimate events could raise more than $900,000 for Obama’s campaign, says Reuters.
Sarah Larson cheated on The Clooney?
Larson was at a preview of Lavo in the Palazzo Saturday night with her new man, minor-league promoter Joey Vanas. Vanas kept his hand on Larson’s leg all night as they sat in a booth with Lavo owners Noah Tepperberg and Jason Strauss and Vegas showman Jeff Beacher, drinking vodka.
Larson seems to have a roving eye. Sin City sources say that while the former cocktail waitress, who’s trying to kick- start a modeling career, was dating Clooney, she “came to Vegas for a weekend and cheated on him” with a media mogul.
Larson and Clooney broke up earlier this summer. Sources said it was because they had little in common and because Larson insisted on getting breast implants. But, ever the gentleman, Clooney helped promote her new career before he dumped her, and she got a spread in Harper’s Bazaar and a few runway gigs at LA Fashion Week.
- from NYPost
George Clooney Up in the Air for Jason Reitman
George Clooney is in talks to star in “Up in the Air,” an adaptation of the Walter Kirn novel that Jason Reitman adapted and will direct for DreamWorks.
Clooney will play an unapologetic corporate downsizer whose untethered life is consumed by collecting air miles.
The project is set up at the Montecito Picture Co., which has its first-look deal with DreamWorks.
Producers are Ivan Reitman, Tom Pollock, Joe Medjuck and Jeff Clifford for Montecito and Hard C’s Daniel Dubiecki and Jason Reitman. Ted Griffin will also be involved in a producing capacity.
- from Variety
Coen brothers dark comedy premieres at Venice fest
The Coen brothers wrote their dark comedy, “Burn After Reading,” with stars George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Frances McDormand in mind. Not necessarily a compliment.
The movie, which premieres Wednesday at the Venice Film Festival, is a tale about idiots — and what happens when their worlds collide.
Pitt and McDormand are a pair of hapless gym employees who get in way over their heads when the memoirs of a failed CIA analyst (John Malkovich) fall into their hands and they try to peddle them as classified intelligence secrets. Clooney plays a hypochondriac philanderer having an affair with the CIA analyst’s disappointed wife, played by Tilda Swinton.
“Looking at the parts we are playing, I’m very concerned about what you think of us,” Clooney said at a news conference.
It’s Clooney’s third film with the Coen brothers — completing what he called “his trilogy of idiots” after “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” and “Intolerable Cruelty.”
Pitt said he had waited a long time to work with the Coen brothers.
“Like George … I’m not sure if I should be flattered or insulted,” he said. “I’m still a bit unsure.”
Asked if the movie is a love letter from her husband, Joel Coen, McDormand quipped: “Have you seen the film? And you call that a love letter?”
The movie’s opening shots are of McDormand’s Linda Litzke having her behind, belly and arms scrutinized by a plastic surgeon in her attempt to fend off middle age.
“We started writing the movie as kind of an exercise, thinking of what kind of parts these actors might play, what kind of story they might inhabit,” Ethan Coen told a news conference.
- from AP
Clooney, Pitt leave personal questions open
George Clooney and Brad Pitt: Bachelor and family man.
Inevitably, a news conference Wednesday promoting their new Coen brothers film, “Burn After Reading,” turned to the birth of Pitt’s twins with partner Angelina Jolie, and whether his good friend would ever settle down.
Clooney, 47, put on a look of mock bemusement.
“I am so surprised to hear that question. That is honestly the first time I have been asked that,” Clooney said. “I am getting married and having a child today.”
Pitt, whose brood has grown to six children with the birth of twins Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline last month, offered to share his children with Clooney, adding deadpan: “I’ll have two more by next year.”
The movie, which premieres Wednesday at the Venice Film Festival, is a tale about idiots — and what happens when their worlds collide.
Pitt, 44, looked flustered as a Spanish TV journalist pushed her way to the front of the press conference dressed in red gym shorts similar to garb he wears as a gym trainer in the film. She asked Pitt if he would help her work out.
“It’s a movie,” Pitt reminded her.
“Would you run after me?” she asked Clooney and Pitt.
“I think we’re more likely to be running away from you,” Clooney replied to laughter.
- from AP
Clooney, Pitt arrive in Venice for film festival
George Clooney hosted a charity event Tuesday night to raise money for victims in Darfur.Clooney, who’s in Venice for the premiere Wednesday at the Venice Film Festival of the Coen brothers’ film “Burn After Reading,” swept past reporters as he arrived for the fundraiser for his Not On Our Watch charity.
The event was expected to raise $2 million, said Manuele Malenotti, the executive director of the Italian clothing company Belstaff, which sponsored the event.
Not On Our Watch has raised more than $7 million to help victims both of the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan and the cyclone in Myanmar, according to executive director Alex Wagner.
The charity, which was started last year by Clooney, Brad Pitt and some of their “Ocean’s Thirteen” colleagues, uses their celebrity appeal to bring attention to human rights abuses, but it isn’t so easy to get even two of the founders together because of filming and family demands, Wagner conceded.
Pitt, who arrived in Venice earlier with sons Maddox and Pax, was expected at the event, but hadn’t arrived by the time cocktail hour was over. He also appear in the Coen brothers’ film.
“Scheduling is very difficult. Two of them happened to be in Venice at the same time because of the ‘Burn After Reading’ premiere … so there was a brainstorming session,” Wagner said of the planned joint appearance.
- from Yahoo
George Clooney and Brad Pitt to walk red carpet walk for charity
George Clooney and Brad Pitt will make two appearances at the Venice Film Festival this week.
They were slated to appear Tuesday night at a fundraising event for their charity, Not On Our Watch. Then they were to return to the red carpet Wednesday when the Coen brothers film “Burn After Reading” opens the 65th edition of the festival, which runs through Sept. 6.
Not On Our Watch has raised more than $7 million to help victims both of the humanitarian crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan and the cyclone in Myanmar, also known as Burma, according to executive director Alex Wagner.
The charity, which was launched last year by the stars and some of their “Ocean’s Thirteen” colleagues, uses their star appeal to bring attention to human rights abuses, but it isn’t so easy to get even two of the founders together because of filming and family demands, Wagner said.
“Scheduling is very difficult. Two of them happened to be in Venice at the same time because of the ‘Burn After Reading’ premiere … so there was a brainstorming session,” she said.
- from AP
Clooney Keeps His Digital Distance From Obama
As far as George Clooney is concerned, he and Scarlett Johansson are in the same boat.
“I have never texted or emailed Senator Obama. And I’ll offer a million dollars to anyone who could prove otherwise. In fact, I’ve only talked to the Senator once in the last year and a half….on the phone,” the Oscar-winning actor said Tuesday in a statement released by his publicist, Stan Rosenfield.
No, that’s not just a random statement. It’s in response to an item published by the Los Angeles Times Friday stating that Clooney “frequently text messages the Illinois senator with whom he’s been friends for many years.”
“I’ve spent more time with Senator McCain (he did my TV show) then I have with Senator Obama,” the jocular thesp continued.
“I would hope that my friend John McCain would join me in condemning this kind of politics. Although I support Senator Obama I would never be dumb enough to offer policy advice to either candidate. They seem to be doing fine without me.”
- from Variety