In a year when it’s truly unclear who will fill out the Best Actor field its important not to forget the great work by Joel Edgerton in Jeff Nichols’ “Loving.”
The Aussie, who is best known for his roles in “Zero Dark Thirty” and “The Great Gatsby,” plays Richard Loving, a man found himself in a protracted legal battle over the legitimacy of his marriage to Mildred Jeter (played by Ruth Negga) in the state of Virginia after they were married in 1958. Loving was a reserved man who did no enjoy the spotlight and you can easily argue Edgerton ends up delivering the most transformative performance of his career.
We spoke to Edgerton, who also received acclaim for writing and directing last year’s surprise hit thriller “The Gift,” a few weeks ago. The conversation covered how he researched the role, his thoughts on the benefits of smaller scale film productions and what he’s up to next.
Having seen the movie both at Cannes and its Los Angeles premiere I was struck by how different the reaction was in both cities.
Yeah, I mean showing at Cannes was very special because it was the first time sharing it with a group of big people. There was so much love, but at Toronto the audience was a North America crowd and they just found a lot more humor in the movie. I think a lot of people could assume this is just one long dark cloud, but there are some really great moments of human worth and humor in there. Whether I don’t have a bullshit filter or its broken or it needs a new battery or something, everything that has come back to us about this movie has been very special and worthwhile.
I know you shot ‘Midnight Special’ with Jeff beforehand, but when did he approach you about ‘Loving’?
It was sort of toward the end of that shoot. He sort of let slip that out of his excitement for the project that doing the ‘Loving’ story and was telling me a little bit about it. Jeff has an element of my character in the movie he’s shy but very confident. In his own kind way, he did come up to me one evening when we were out and said, ‘Look, I have this other thing that I may want to talk to you about’ and then spilled a bit of information about it. And then really started to get really serious and share the documentary with me.
I come from Australia I really didn’t know anything about who Richard and Mildred were. I, in fact, knew nothing about them. And beyond that I became very surprised that very few American people knew who Richard and Mildred were.
One of the more strange things I’ve experienced recently is to run into so many people watch the trailer and had no idea this even happened recently or at all.
It’s so interesting. I think it’s because it just wasn’t a very newsworthy, violent, newsworthy event. I understand why it never entered the civil rights timeline, but it really does hold a very serious place there when you think about it.
How much of your research for the role came from HBO’s ‘The Loving Story’ documentary, the script or other sources?
It really was very much about on the surface watching the documentary in terms of movement and sound and posture and all that stuff. Then really kind of looking deeper as to the other things [such as] the space between the couple. The relationship that they had. That sort of energy that exists between two people. Their interactions with the children. The family life. And then to ask questions about what happened when those cameras were turned off. Cause your only getting the supremely shy Richard who kind of wishes the documentary crew really weren’t there. And that he really wasn’t in the spotlight, but the biggest thing was really about that relationship. It was like searching for clues in the documentary to use our imagination to create that relationship which was more important than the characters individually themselves.
Their daughter is still alive, correct?
Peggy is still alive. She is the only remaining living child. Donald and Sydney are sadly not here anymore.
Did you talk to her? I know Ruth did.
Peggy came to visit the set a couple of times with her children and she, as Jeff described, is very much her dad. She keeps her cards close to the chest and speaks very little, but expresses a lot. But doesn’t use many words to express it. You just got a feeling that she felt safe and comfortable, that Jeff had her support. That she felt good about what he was doing. She felt good about what he’d written and she felt like Jeff was looking after her parent’s story. She said some really cool things to me that helped in the other half of the picture that the documentary doesn’t show. Little clues like how much as sense of humor her father had and it was just nice to have her support.
Do you enjoy making smaller films such as ‘Loving’ compared to the bigger studio films you’ve shot recently?
I enjoy how focused everybody is when you make movies at a small price because people are careful how they spend their money and therefore I think it focuses creative decisions. it focuses time spent on set. Apart from that the momentum that is created on a shoot that is 25 days or 30 days instead of 70 days mean you are doing more in a day and that focuses you as well. And on a script level I think it focuses the potential on making sure that document is somewhat airtight before you go into production. I feel very safe with a director like Jeff who crafts his screenplay so thoroughly, so mindfully, before you arrive on set. This is not an indictment on all studio films, but it’s generally a looser attitude as to what the script needs to be before you start spending copious amounts of money and you are bringing in big pieces of equipment. It feels like there is more of a laissez faire sort of attitude. ‘Oh, we’ll fix that on the day. We’ll rewrite that…’ Jeff is not that guy and most independent filmmakers know they have that small period of time so they have such a pointed focus. And that is what I really appreciate on small budget filmmaking. It stands on character.
READ MORE: Love Finds Justice In First Trailer For Jeff Nichols’ ‘Loving’
Do you think those sort of conditions can bring out better performances in actors as opposed to when you have three months to make a movie?
I think they can. When a story’s biggest element is character and the drama between human beings than the human character is the spectacle of the movie. And big budget filmmaking that actually uses special effects or sweeping adventure stories, the spectacle is not the character. The character is having a competitive situation with the landscape or the competitive situation with the spectacle. The character is not really in the foreground. I love filmmakers like Christopher Nolan and people who can hold both in their hands at the same time. They can create a spectacle, but really driving the spectacle is character. When you get that it’s a perfect storm.
In my opinion ‘The Gift’ was robbed of an Original Screenplay nomination last year. Do you plan on writing or directing anything else anytime soon?
My plan is that I am going to get into it as soon as I can. I’m working on a couple of things. I’m really interested, my life as an actor is about looking for different opportunities and mixing it up and trying my hand at different things. I feel like that as a director too. Not that I feel like I’m checked a psychological thriller box, but I don’t necessarily want to just make the same movie again and what I’d like to do is take the enjoyment from that movie and turn it into my next one. The real enjoyment was working with actors. My next thing I’m writing is very much a drama, a big ensemble drama, but it’s not a crazy big movie. It’ll be bigger than ‘The Gift’ and it’s based on a true story, so I’m deep into writing and researching right now. And I’m also developing a science fiction thing. I got so much enjoyment out of making that movie and it’s stressful and a huge responsibility to be part of making all the decisions. I just felt so good and all I can remember is that I was just happier than I usually am. And more engaged and more healthy than I usually am. That was sort of a sign in and of itself that I’ve got to do it again. Luckily I have a day job that I can keep doing and learning from and I can keep stealing ideas from all the great directors I’m working with like Jeff.
When you made ‘The Gift’ was there one filmmaker who you asked for any advice or that you wanted to see first for their feedback?
I invited everyone I worked with to come and check out the production. I got an E-mail that at the time I thought was a joke, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he backed it up that Ridley said he’d come down and shoot some second unit for me. I was like, ‘Ha ha ha.’ Then I was like, ‘I wouldn’t imagine that was a lie. He would.’ You get all sorts of advice from people from the pure intelligent filmmaking stance like ‘Don’t leave your most important scene to the end of the day. You might run out of time.’ To the simple advice of ‘Change your shoes at lunchtime.’ That is actually some of the best advice I ever had. I never sat down when I was at the monitor. I never sat down when I was on set and changing shoes at lunchtime is like giving your feet a holiday. But I think most of what I learned is from jus observation and the presence of people. The thing I learned the most is from people like Jeff, David Michod and my brother which is I’m constantly reminded that to me the best approach in storytelling is to try and not draw attention to the camera and just find the place where the camera needs to sit with that lens to tell that part of the story. And keep building it very simply piece by piece like that.
“Loving” is now playing in limited release.