John Travolta’s own Monet take featured in The Forger

JOHN TRAVOLTA was able to brush up on his painting skills while shooting new heist movie THE FORGER because the CLAUDE MONET replica featured onscreen was the actor’s own work.
In the film, the Grease star plays a petty thief who has to steal, forge and replace Monet’s Woman With a Parasol masterpiece to pay back the crime syndicate bosses who helped to organise his early release from prison so he can spend time with his terminally ill son.
Travolta reveals the project allowed him to marry his passions for art and acting and he even headed to China to study oil painting techniques as part of his research.
He explains, “Thirty years ago, I started doing (Edward) Hopper paintings in watercolour, which is not an easy thing, but for this role, I decided to take up oil, so I went to Hong Kong and studied with a master there.
“I had a professional with me on the set, from Texas, that worked with me and I did my own (version of Woman With a Parasol for the movie).”
He continues, “My grandfather was a painter and my father painted and my brother paints, and… it’s a gift… the family has, to some degree. I did it (the replica) through half the film, I was working on it. Maybe it was in order to be in character, to feel the real pressure to duplicate a famous painting and I just wanted to know what it felt like so I tested myself.”
The storyline of The Forger also hit close to home for Travolta as he lost his son Jett in 2009, when the teenager suffered a seizure while on a family vacation in the Bahamas.
Travolta adds, “You can’t help but have it reflect your own life. I try to separate my art from my life sometimes, when it’s that personal, but I believe it’s hard not to have it reflect.”