It’s awards season again, and there are some filmmakers who always get brought up around this time when they have a new film. One of those names is James Gray, who is making the rounds to promote his new drama, “Armageddon Time.” And over the course of a few different interviews, the filmmaker has been dropping a some interesting nuggets of info.
During his stop over at the WTF Podcast with Marc Maron, James Gray talked about a project that was offered to him but he passed on. Gray mentioned that “The Devil’s Own‘ with Harrison Ford and Brad Pitt, directed by Alan J. Pakula, was something he was offered, but didn’t feel that the screenplay was strong. “There was no script to it and I was just worried I would screw it up which I’m sure I would have,” he explained.
“‘Good Will Hunting’ was one,” Gray admitted, talking about more projects he passed on. “I thought [Gus Van Sant] did a great job [with it]. It was a huge hit, I’m an idiot. I’d never even heard of Matt Damon or Ben Affleck and I didn’t know what I was doing. Jesus, It was like 1997 [after ‘Little Odesssa‘] and I was getting pitched stuff.”
“But it’s not because I’m pompous about it or I think I’m too good for the material,” he added, explaining why he turned down a lot of these films. “It’s quite the opposite, usually I think it’s because I won’t do a good job doing what they want me to do with it. I like doing action sequences, but there’s a panache and quicksilver skill that they want that I don’t have that.”
The conversation eventually turned toward the future and the idea of Gray potentially taking on a much larger project. Maybe even a franchise film.
“Why not, it’s a great tapestry to play with,” he said, highlighting how much he loved Tim Burton‘s second ‘Batman’ movie. “Batman’s cool, right? Batman is a real person at least. Do I want to do a comic book movie? I’m saying if they offered me one, would I contemplate one? That’s the one I would do, Batman. He’s a real person, he’s not like a talking fox or whatever.”
Interestingly enough, while being interviewed by The Big Picture podcast, Gray echoed the sentiment that he would direct a blockbuster or a franchise film if he was given creative freedom, specifically calling out “Star Wars” and Bond as something he could do if he had some control and could still make it feel personal.
“For example, I would love to do a [‘Star Wars’] film, I would love to do a James Bond film, but you’d have to have some measure of control,” the filmmaker said. “I don’t mean where the ending is grim, I’m talking about when it’s still you, and your ideas are all taken away and everyone says no and the whole thing becomes a mish-mash. And if that were the case, I would definitely do one. If they said, ‘here, you have control, go do ‘Star Wars’ would I do it? Yeah, I would. But that’s never going to happen.”
You can hear both podcasts, as well as a great conversation between Gray and Matt Reeves on the DGA Director’s cut podcast, below. And by the way, while we’re being a little bit completist with recent James Gray news the filmmaker recently told Vanity Fair the “I Am Pilgrim,” spy thriller he was attached to a few years back is dead.