London Film Festival - George Clooney
Handsome, funny, bright, rich, successful. If you have these characteristics and your name is George, chances are that wherever you go to attend a press conference there will be someone who asks questions about your private life, proposes sex or marriage on the spot, or even compares you to Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi.
What a burden.
Journalists are gathered to question stars George Clooney ( also starring in The Fantastic Mr. Fox) and Kevin Spacey about their film The Men Who Stare At Goats, at the BFI London Film Festival, a comedy about US psychic soldiers in which Clooney, in the role of a wannabe Jedi warrior, stars with Ewan McGregor, in that of a clueless journalist. Spacey gets the villain part and seems to enjoy it immensely, while hippy extraordinaire Jeff Bridges is a former US Army official who takes inspiration from LSD to create the so-called New Earth Army, whose soldiers act as “psychic weapons”.
Mr. Clooney and Mr. Spacey, how was it like to work with Ewan McGregor? Did you have fun together?
GC: After the restraining order it was hard to have fun with Ewan. (laughs) Of course we had a great time, I was stunned at what a shockingly normal person he is in everyday life. You know, on a film set there can be misery right until the “Action!” call... but in this case we had lots of fun.
KS: Yes, we had rubber band fights, food fights. The Predator scene (the Predator being a revolutionary plastic weapon shaped like a rooster) did hurt! But it was fun.
This film is taken by a book of the same name by Jon Rosner. He has based the characters on real people, so that facts and fiction blur. How did you relate to this when you created your characters?
KS: Everything I needed was in the script. I have played real-life characters before but I never try to make an impression of them. I treat them just like characters.
GC: We’ve done more accurate films than this. This one was not about real-life people, it was fun.
Do you actually believe in the paranormal?
KS: To work with George was a paranormal experience!
GC: Nah, I don’t believe that stuff.
Mr. Clooney, in this film you kill a hamster and a goat just by staring at them. Are you an animal lover?
GC: Yes, I’m from Kentucky! (laughs) This goat we worked with was very nice, we spent a long time together. It was the best actor around, every time the camera was ready it went “Baaaa!” I’ve also done The Fantastic Mr. Fox (LFF Opening Gala two nights ago), so for now I’m through with farm animals.
Considering the hassle you get, do you think the media attention towards yourselves and celebrities is now out of control?
GC: It’s difficult for me to say, because I grew up in the news environment (nda Clooney’s father Nick is a famous TV newscaster and talk show host) and I know you have to sell newspapers somehow. But now there is little reporting and research, things that are not necessarily true get reprinted and reprinted.
KS: I don’t understand, I can’t understand the notion of a journalist who makes up things. Why is it interesting to write and print false things? And if you prove that a story is false, the journalist will say that you “deny it”, not that it’s actually wrong. That’s a very different thing.
