The Coen brothers are known for putting ordinary people in extraordinary situations, and their latest film Burn After Reading is no different. First there is Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich) a CIA agent who just got fired from his job, which is of little surprise to his wife Katie (Tilda Swinton). While Cox turns to drinking and writing his memoirs, Katie delves deeper into her ongoing affair with federal marshall Harry Pfarrer (George Clooney).
Meanwhile, across town in the Washington, D.C. suburbs, the employees at Hardbodies Fitness Center, Linda Litzke (Frances McDormand) and Chad Feldheimer (Brad Pitt) come across a copy of Cox’s memoirs, certain they’ve found some top secret CIA files and of course chaos ensues.
Hollywood.com was on the scene at the Toronto International Film Festival with Pitt, Swinton, Malkovich, Joel Coen and Ethan Coen to get the scoop on Burn After Reading.
Brad Pitt on his inspiration for fitness buff Chad Feldheimer:
“That was all me. That was all me in a former day. I really don’t know. It’s a mystery to even me and I’m somewhat disturbed by it all, including my other half. She’s disturbed by it as well I think. I can’t really say, it was just this idea of assuming or presuming a situation would go the way it’s supposed to go and it doesn’t. Then not understanding how there is any other realm of possibility.”
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Tilda Swinton on working with George Clooney:
“I’m working on having George Clooney in every contract. It’s tough but I’m trying. I’ve gotten the consolation prize of having Brad Pitt in every contract also. George and I do have the aim one day to be in a film where we say one nice thing to each other. Hopefully one day.”
Click here for ‘Burn After Reading’ movie stills
Ethan Coen on using the Washington D.C. subculture as a backdrop to the movie:
“I guess we sort of wanted to do a spy movie. It didn’t exactly turn out that way. I don’t really think it is a spy movie. That’s how the original idea was structured. Like most of our stuff, it’s not really meant to be a comment on Washington. It’s really about these particular characters…Whenever you do these things you want to be specific about the place that your story is set…not just the people who are in government in Washington, but also the people who are just sort of ancillary to that, who live in that community. We had an idea of people that we were thinking vaguely about as references for the characters in a way. It wasn’t a specific kind of lampoon of anybody.”
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John Malkovich on staying within the boundaries of the script:
“Oh, I enjoyed it very much. No, I wouldn’t say it was more or less of a workout than usual. Particularly as per Tilda’s remarks, the script…there is nothing to change or improv with a good script. You just do it. There is a reason they say a football field has boundaries. There are a million ways to do a good script within those boundaries. Then you play with those and it was a delight.”
Brad Pitt and John Malkovich on playing characters less intelligent than themselves:
Pitt: “The leading man role is the guy who has the answers, can figure things out, and diffuse a bomb within seconds. It’s all experienced. All of that is pretty good for the ego sometimes. It’s much more fun to play the guys who make the wrong choices, have limited experience, and make the wrong presumptions. They have to deal with it from there. That is all the fun we had with this one.”
Malkovich: “I would never say a character is more or less intelligent than I am. I just don’t think of it that way. I read what they do and when the writing is good it gives you a fairly clear notion of how they see the world…I never think ‘Oh, is this man brighter or less bright than I am?’ We have the great misfortune to hear some excerpts from his book in the film. Yes, I did say ‘That’s not a book I would rush out and buy’ [laughs]. I feel like it’s something I could do without, but I haven’t written a book myself. I really shouldn’t comment probably.”
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Joel and Ethan Coen on comparing the meaningfulness of No Country For Old Men to the meaninglessness of Burn After Reading:
Joel Coen: “Maybe having seen this you would like to take back having liked the previous movie?”
Ethan Coen: “You know, we don’t relate one movie to the other, or any of our movies. Why would we? We are into whatever movie we are working on. They are different movies, they feel different I guess, to the extent that they feel very different. That’s good. Certainly it’s an ambition that you change from movie to movie. You don’t want to repeat yourself. As for the meaningfulness or meaninglessness of each of those two movies, I don’t know what to say to that…The characters are probably leading lives that don’t have a whole lot of meaning. They can still be interesting characters and actors in an interesting story.
Joel Coen on using Dermot Mulroney as a running joke throughout the film:
“Dermot is a good friend of ours, someone we’ve known for a long time. We just asked him and he was incredibly gracious, and a good sport to come out and do that little piece in the movie within the movie.”
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Tilda Swinton on Katie’s hairdo:
“We had a competition on the set going about who had the most ridiculous hair. I think [Brad] might have won that, but we were all going for the Javier Bardem prize.”
On working on a Coen brothers movie:
Brad Pitt: “Short days.”
Tilda Swinton: “So easy, really short days. Lots of laughing, uniquely, my experience laughing throughout the takes, but that’s all credits to Peter [Kurland], the sound guy on set. [Everyone] honking like donkeys [on their] own sound track. That’s fantastic. I think it’s your confidence that the audience will be laughing [and won’t hear it].”
Joel Coen: “There is a scene in Fargo where Steve Buscemi was slugging through the snow trying to bury this money and he kept sinking up to his waist. I think even in the finished movie you can hear me laughing at him.”
Ethan Coen: “We left it in because we thought ‘Well, it kind sounds like Steve breathing.’”
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Brad Pitt on having the Coen brothers cast him as a fool:
“I’m surprised at that too. I don’t understand [laughs]. No, I’ve been knocking on the Coen brothers’ door for a few years, so I was really happy that they called. Then I read the piece and I was a little upset at them [laughs].”
The Coens on whether their consistent use of knuckleheads setting off catastrophic events is related to politics or George W. Bush:
Ethan Coen: “It’s not a comment about other people; it’s just a part of ourselves that we would disavow. It’s certainly not about George Bush or anything specific politically, or other people we’re laughing at, or find amusing. We’ve all got the inner knucklehead. It’s again good fodder for stories.”
Joel Coen: “As Ethan was saying before, we think about these things so specifically. It’s such a narrow context. You sit down, write the story, come up with a story, and start thinking about the characters. It’s all circumscribed by the story. There isn’t a lot, or any really discussion about extrapolating any of it out of the context of the story.”
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John Malkovich on dropping the f bomb:
“Profanity, most specifically the f bomb, is not as expressive as doo doo, but it’s an incredibly expressive word. It can really mean anything or nothing, and everything in between. It’s always fun to draw on that.”
Tilda Swinton on adlibbing:
“One of the most fantastic things about working with [the Coens] is that there is a script, which is so rock solid, mean machine, clean thing to work with that playful is what everybody is. You just all rock up and play with it, then you go home again, the script is absolutely written down on paper…how could you possibly improve it? It feels like the invitation to play with them is exactly that, it’s come and lets all amuse ourselves with this script.
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*Spoiler Alert*
Joel Coen on the inspiration behind the machine Harry’s building in his garage:
“The machine, there were two inspirations for it. One was a machine I saw that a key grip made once. The other was a machine that is in the Museum of Sex, in New York City. We actually at one point said to George, ‘We’ll show you the machine if you want, it’s down at 23rd street and Madison.’ George said ‘That’s all I need is to be seen coming out of the Museum of Sex.’”
Burn After Reading opens in theaters Sept. 12, 2008
