(upbeat music)
- Hi, this is Marya Gullo from The Hollywood Reporter
and I'm In Studio today with David Lowry and Sissy Spacek.
Hi. - Hey.
- Hi. - How are you?
We're good.
- Doing pretty good.
- Good, we're here to talk about The Old Man and the Gun.
What an incredible movie.
- Thank you. - Thank you.
- Okay, the first question I wanted to ask is
why did you want to make this particular story?
- Well, it's a really great true story.
It's one of those true stories that's too good to be true
and yet it is. (laughing)
But also, it was sent to me by Robert Redford himself
and so the idea of making this particular story, telling
this particular story with him was too good to pass up
in its own right.
- I thought it was me.
(laughing)
- Oh man, you just caught me red-handed.
(laughing)
Edit that part out.
(laughing)
- As far as staying true to the source material,
was it important for you to stay really close
to the true story aspect of it
or did you feel comfortable taking some liberties?
- I felt comfortable taking liberties.
I felt that it was important to stick close to the spirit
of the original story
and to the character himself, Forrest Tucker.
He was a fellow who really self-mythologized.
You read that original New Yorker article and you see
this is a guy who saw himself as a movie version
of a bank robber instead of a real bank robber.
So, what I thought was why not just tell the story
that he would have wanted to see.
- It's too bad he's passed on.
He would've loved to be memorialized.
- Sissy, tell me about your relationship with Robert Redford
before you were cast together, because you hadn't done
any movies together, but were you friends,
were you running in the same circles?
- No, no we weren't friends.
I felt like I knew him just like everybody else does
because I saw him in so many movies.
He's a part of my consciousness now.
It was great.
We got to know each other onscreen.
It wasn't wasted.
- Yes, yes.
Have you ever been close to being cast
in the same movie together in the past?
- No, isn't that sad?
It's so tragic.
- How come no one ever thought of that?
- I don't know. - It was obvious to me--
Two strawberry blonds that like horses and the outdoors.
- Completely.
- You know, I wanted to ask you that
because there are some horseback riding scenes,
who's the better rider?
- Oh, he is hands down.
- But you're no slouch yourself.
- Thank you, David.
I grew up riding and I think he grew up riding,
but he's got more riding on film than I do.
- Yeah, he knows how to sit on top of a horse in a closeup
in a very particular way.
- He's a fantastic rider.
- Yeah, that's very true.
Tell me a little bit about the chemistry
between Tucker and Jewel.
- The chemistry between...
Oh, not the chemistry between Robert and me.
- [Marya] Well yeah, that too.
- They're very inseparable at this point.
(laughing)
- I think Tucker and Jewel had a lot of...
You know, their whole relationship was based on a lie.
First of all, come to find out he didn't even stop
to help me with my truck.
He was trying to dodge the police.
What a revolting development.
- He also completely told you a false name, never let up--
- And never let up.
- He's not one for--
- Truthfulness.
- Correct, but we still like him.
There's something about him, there's something about him.
- Because he's charming and he's polite and he's funny.
- And he's got some strange version of integrity
that is impossible to deny.
That's what I find.
That's how I reconcile it with myself.
- Yeah, but he has his own formula.
- A very specific formula that works just for him.
- I think, I always thought that
Jewel gave him a safe place to fall,
but he just didn't stay down.
He just had that itch that he had to scratch.
It was too quiet on the farm for him.
And it's what he knew, robbing banks.
- Yeah, that's what he knows, he knows it well.
David, can you tell me a little bit about
cultivating the chemistry between Sissy and Robert?
- Part of it was in the script, I think.
I was trying to write parts that both you and Bob could play
and in doing so, I had this idea that there would be this
rapport between you and I wanted to develop that
and I did that partially on the page,
but then a lot of it was just--
- [Sissy] Oh, I thought it was on the page.
- I'll say 50% of it was on the page, but then there's
an extra 50% that I was just counting on being there
and I remember we got there for that first hour or two
of rehearsal we did.
We had one or two hours of rehearsal, period,
for the entire movie and we ran through that diner scene
and I just remember thinking we need to stop
before we get too far because it's already so good.
You feel that electricity in the air already and we just
needed to start shooting, so we put the rehearsals
to a stop and got down to shooting.
And one of the great things we did with this film,
one of the luxuries we had was that we were able to shoot
all of Sissy's scenes with Bob in sequence.
- That was so amazing because then it unfolded.
- Yeah, you got to know each other on camera.
- Yeah, because we didn't hang out and we didn't chit chat.
We just got to know each other through Jewel and Forrest
or whatever the heck his real name was.
(laughing)
- Bob Callahan, what a liar.
- What a liar, you're so right.
- Another thing about Jewel is that she is
very loosely based on a real life character,
but is her own character because it's based on his wife,
but not at all like his wife
and does not play his wife in the movie.
What is it that you like about Jewel?
She really is a character that's made for you.
- Yeah, and I felt like Jewel was there to serve the story
and to serve him,
only figuratively, not like women need to serve men,
but for the script.
Because he went whichever way the wind blew.
He had no homing device
and Jewel is all about home and she's rooted.
But he's such a charming guy, I think that she just thought
he had the very best pickup line ever.
"I'm a bank robber."
(laughing)
She must have been lonely.
She had her dog and her horses, but I think
she never gave up who she was for him.
She was old enough to know better than to run off with him
and she wasn't going to become a criminal just because he was,
but she couldn't let him go.
It was sad.
- It was important because it is called
The Old Man and the Gun and it's about Forrest Tucker,
but I think that Sissy and Tika and Ari Robinson
who plays Casey's daughter and Elisabeth Moss
all are the moral compass of the film.
When you watch it, you just see them time and time again
grounding the film from a very specific and from my point
of view, correct perspective and that was really important
to me when making a film about a guy who's a liar
and a cheat and a robber, but we still can't help but love.
(laughing)
- Right, well, one of the things I noticed about this movie
is just the pacing of the movie.
How did you figure out the pacing, how it was going to flow?
- A lot of the pacing was in the script, that unusual rhythm
that it has, but then more of it came into play at sunset
as I watched the actors have fun with the dialogue and we
would just go exploring within the confines of the scenes
and then when we would get to the edit
and just mess everything up.
We'd just throw everything out the window
and put it back together again
and just really try to find a rhythm that felt alive.
I wanted this movie to feel alive.
It's very quick, it's not a long movie.
It's very efficient in its running time, but I wanted to use
that running time well and just weave in and out of these
events that you would normally expect to see
in a crime film, but we get there in unusual ways.
So, that pace and that rhythm were key to me and we just
were constantly just shuffling the scenes around,
trying different things until finally it felt right.
It's like a piece of music.
You just really have to get that rhythm right
and then with film then you could add music to it,
which illuminates that rhythm in a very unique way,
but the film itself, I always try to treat it
as if it's a piece of music in its own right.
- What was it like putting together the Over the Hill Gang?
- The Over the Hill Gang, I just thought of a lot of actors
I liked and by a lot I mean two and we sent the script
to them and they both said yes.
It was incredible.
I still can't believe they both agreed to come be a part
of this because they've been heroes of mine for so long.
Danny is an icon, he's a legend just like Bob and Sissy are
and then Tom is just one of those guys who seems to exist
outside of time and space in a way.
I don't know--
- [Sissy] He belongs in a gang. (laughing)
- He belongs in a gang, but he just is his own thing.
He's like one of his own song lyrics.
It's really interesting.
He's a truly unique and special human being
and I'm so glad that I got a chance
just to hang out with him.
If he had turned the movie down, but we got a chance
to just talk on the phone about it, which we did,
that would've been enough for me, but then,
what do you know, he just said yes and came to Cincinnati
and shot this movie with us and we're all the better for it.
- And were Tom Waits, Danny Glover and Robert Redford
comfortable with each other?
- Yeah, they had known, I think Danny and Bob had known
each other a little bit and of course everyone has admired
Tom for so long whether they've met him or not
that it all clicked into place instantly.
As you see in the movie, they have this ease and comfort
around each other just like three old friends hanging out.
- This guy has a very relaxed set.
It's amazing.
He just puts everybody at ease.
Most of the people on the crew, he's worked with
since the beginning of time, since he was a toddler.
- Like this tall, yep. (laughing)
I really like to have a family environment
when I'm making a movie.
I really like to work with people who make it feel like
we're not going to work every day, we're just hanging out
with friends and having fun and if you can create
that environment, I think it shows through
in the finished film.
- Sissy, when you look back at your career,
do you have any goals that you consider...
What's your iconic role?
- My iconic role?
Probably Badlands, that was the beginning of everything
for me, so probably that.
- And is there a character from all the characters
that you've played, is there anybody that you would like
to revisit now?
- Coal Miner's Daughter, that was the hardest one
to give up,
but since there was already the real one, I thought it best
for me to...
- [David] Let it go.
- Let it go, but that was the hardest thing about that one.
- In the era that we're living in, you've made a movie
that's about human nature and character.
When people leave the movie theater,
are there any questions you want them to be asking?
- That's a great question in its own right.
I made this movie with the express intention
of just giving people a good time at the theater.
I really want people to go
and walk out with a smile on their face,
but I'm incapable of leaving well enough alone
and just leaving it with that.
So, if people are asking questions, I think it should be
are we living our life to the best possible extent
that we can, to the greatest extent that we can,
are we doing good in this world,
are we making the world a better place?
This isn't a movie about those things, but nonetheless,
those are things I was thinking about while making it.
I don't expect anyone to have questions like that
on their mind when they're walking out of the theater,
but if they do,
I hope that the movie gives them good food for thought.
- And I know that Robert has said that this might be
his last film and then walked that back because he realized
that was a very strong statement to make.
- Got everybody going, didn't it?
- Yeah. - Yes, it did.
- Do you think that if you had the opportunity
to work with him again, you would?
- Oh, absolutely. - [David] Yeah, 100%.
We'd get in line behind everybody else.
Maybe in front of everybody else.
- I would love to write another
continuing adventures of Bob and Sissy.
I would love to keep that train going because I think
this movie's only 90 minutes, we could use
a couple more hours of that in our lives, don't you think?
- Yeah, I agree and I'd like to see some more
horseback riding from both of you.
- You should've seen me on the horse
before they got that shot.
It was acting up.
We had to go to horse number two.
(laughs)
- They are finicky creatures.
- Oh my God. (laughing)
- Well, Sissy Spacek, David Lowry, thank you so much
for being here and go check out Old Man and the Gun
in theaters now.
- Thank you so much.
- Thank you.