Open Thread & Roundtable Madness
Tuesday, December 16, 2014 at 9:37PM I have been comically beset by obstacles this year so even though I'm roughly three weeks behind, I have to laugh a little at the strange stumbles and ouchy falls and just go... okay, well then. This is an interesting view of the floor! (apologiez: Oscar chart editing functions are somewhat on the fritz. trying for workarounds to fix)
Angelina Jolie talking about directing plane crashes and visual effects. Mike Leigh, hilariously also in this shot.
One of the victims of this impossible season for me at least has been THR's roundtables. I literally haven't watched a single one of those sometimes highly enjoyable if aggravating celeb gatherings. Not even the Actress Roundtable! (I'm certain it was its vibe of "The Amy Adams Show: Episode 5" that killed my will to press play on the only day I had 50 minutes free on weeks ago. Important distinction: Amy Adams the actress is often very exciting to watch. Amy Adams the celebrity is like wallpaper.)
So consider this an open thread in which you can complain about all the Oscar stories we haven't covered this past couple of weeks (the charts WILL be updates tomorrow, damnit) and which exact minutes of these roundtables you would recommend that everyone including your host here must watch RIGHT NOW. The Hollywood Reporters six awards season roundtables to date follow. All five plus hours of them in case you've missed one. Or all six like me. Along with the videos after the jump are the single questions per roundtable that I am pretending they answered...
DIRECTORS ROUNDTABLE
Starring: Mike Leigh, Angelina Jolie, Chris Nolan, Bennett Miller, Morten Tyldum, and Richard Linklater.
Question To Pretend They All Answered Therein: Favorite Mike Leigh film?! The correct answer is Vera Drake (2004) though we'll allow any other title so long as you pay homage to that one as honorable mention.
ACTRESS ROUNDTABLE
Starring: Julianne Moore (Still Alice), Laura Dern (Wild), Patricia Arquette (Boyhood), Hilary Swank (The Homesman), Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything), Reese Witherspoon (Wild) and Amy Adams (Big Eyes)
Question To Pretend They All Answered Therein: "What is the single most awesome thing about Julianne Moore?" Hahahaha. Everyone is stumped because her awesomeness contains multitudes and it would require the whole 50 minutes to answer it.
ACTOR'S ROUNDTABLE
Starring: Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything), Ethan Hawke (Boyhood), Timothy Spall (Mr. Turner), Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game) Channing Tatum (Foxcatcher) and Michael Keaton (Birdman)
Question To Pretend They All Answered: Which of your leading ladies do you only wish your were as talented as? Redmayne answers Julianne Moore (Savage Grace), Spall name-checks Lesley Manville and begins weep-grunting (All or Nothing), Cumberbatch plays eenie-meenie-minie-mo with his August co-stars, Channing Tatum realizes he's one of the only A list male movie stars that has yet to really pair off with a major actress and vows to do better (what's that about?), and Keaton simply meows which says it all.
WRITERS ROUNTABLE
Starring: Anthony McCarten (The Theory of Everything), Jon Favreau (Chef), Gillian Flynn (Gone Girl), Jonathan Nolan (Interstellar), Chris Rock (Top Five), and Graham Moore (The Imitation Game)
Question To Pretend They All Answered: Which actor totally played a line opposite of how you dreamed it would be played and have you recovered yet?
CINEMATOGRAPHER'S ROUNDTABLE
Starring: Roger Deakins (Unbroken), Dion Beebe (Into the Woods), Jeff Cronenweth (Gone Girl), Benoit Delhomme (The Theory of Everything), Matthew Libatique (Noah), and Dick Pope (Mr. Turner)
Question To Pretend They All Answered: What's with the gold filter on Theory of Everything? Does it take place in Smaug's lair?
ANIMATION ROUNDTABLE
Starring: Bonnie Arnold (How To Train Your Dragon 2), Jorge Gutierrez (The Book of Life), Travis Knight (The Boxtrolls), Tomm Moore (Song of the Sea), Dan Lin (The Lego Movie) and Don Hall (Big Hero 6).
Question To Pretend They All Answered: It really sucks that How to Train Your Dragon 2 didn't have the guts to make Astrid chieftain of the village instead of Hiccup, right? Play to your strengths, village!
Reader Comments (36)
If nothing else, read the Actor's version on the site. Timothy Spall talking poop on stage is hysterical....and.......uh........shiitty. (G)
Chris Rock was by far the best part of the writers roundtable; always funny and fiercely intelligent.
And I forgot to mention how much I enjoyed Graham Moore acting as the de facto moderator for the writers roundtable. He asked a lot of interesting questions that I felt opened up the other writers and in turn allow them to ask questions of each other as well.
THR's actress roundtable was a bit of a bore this year. Or maybe I'm just tired of them asking the same questions? The Epix Channel did their own roundtable with Emily Blunt, Jennifer Aniston, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Shailene Woodley and Jessica Chastain and it was a much more engaging piece. They actually seemed to like the moderators.
thefilmjunkie: I totally agree. I only read the piece, but no one came off as very interesting, especially Adams. Most just seemed to be there to plug their individual film.
I would just like to reiterate what I've been saying for a solid month and a half now - that Nightcrawler is totally happening. I am almost assured that it will be nominated for Best Picture and Jake Gyllenhaal is getting nominated for Best Actor.
Did Melissa Leo end her career by dropping the f-bomb at the Oscars?
Kathy Bates initially saw Harry's Law as her retirement. Since its cancellation she's fearful of being unemployed. Despite a recent Emmy win, a Globe nomination, and Xavier Dolan casting.
I beginning to warm to Meryl Streep. Happened to like her in Prime (2005). And I loved her in Julie & Julia.
I echo thefilmjunkie and Henry's thoughts about THR's Actress roundtable. I thought Patricia Arquette gave very thoughtful, interesting answers, Laura Dern was her usual sweet self, and I admired Reese Witherspoon's love for Julianne Moore. But, overall, it was pretty boring and they desperately needed someone funny.
The LA Times Actress (and especially Supporting Actress) roundtable was much better, I think.
I read the print version of the writer's roundtable and thought it was really excellent - all the writers had really insightful things to say about the business, their processes, etc. Rock came off especially well, very honest about past failings, where he's at now, etc. Haven't seen Top Five, wasn't really feeling that compelled to, but now I kind of feel like I have to. Want to see where he's at as a filmmaker, after kind of liking (but also being kinda frustrated by) his last film (I THink I Love My Wife).
And Gillian Flynn says she gave Nick in Gone Girl her background/attitude/world view, which I thought was super interesting.
Jolie sounds like Madonna (click on the 6 minute mark). The one Madonna with that accent, that is.
Sadly there's not enough of Julianne in the Actress roundtable. She's too polite to dominate. I look forward to watching the Actor one though, to see how Channing fits in.
this is a little off topic but can someone reassure me the acting races (excluding actor which still seems fairly open) have some suspense left in them.... Or are Moore, Arquette, Simmons on a their way to sweeps of the majors already (I'm onboard for Moore, but would love to see some variety in the supporting awards)....?
DrG, I have been convinced of Simmons' victory since seeing Whiplash, but I just saw Birdman and I think Norton is definitely a possibility. He's been racking up some critics' prizes too. It's funny you don't mention Keaton, because I think he's more of a sure thing than Moore or Arquette, especially if pitted against the two Brit boys, Carrell and any of the possible number fives.
LOL at "everything eventually comes back to Laura Dern" thing, they all love her!
Epix Channel Actress Roundtable was much more interesting and entertaining. The ladies all have charisma and seem that they want to be there and are excited to talk about things. THR asks the same questions every year, and seriously need to stop inviting Amy.
Angie, dear, this whole "Now I only want to be considered a director" phase is pretty laughable. Try to get a decent filmography as an actress first! Do I sound like Scott Rudin?
Watched the actresses one and it was ok. Patricia Arquette had very interesting things to say, no bullshit. The rest of them are very sweet though. And also watched the actors one which was a bit more interesting but I HATE the interviewer, he keeps interrupting everyone.
Amy Adams the actress is like wallpaper, the celebrity is like wallpaper covered in goo.
A lazy actress with no charisma that constantly needs to ride her co-stars coattails to accolades. I mean, not even BFCA Actress in a Comedy for her first leading role since Enchanted? Tragic.
I would have definitely included non-THR roundtables in this if they were as accessible. From my understanding the Epix one is behind a paywall and i searched and searched for the LA times one on their site but i'm guessing due to internal messiness or improper tagging it came up blank. It always only brought up recent Emmy roundtables.
THR really needs to find new moderators; without strong personalities like Oprah, Helen Hunt or Emma Thompson, you can really feel the way their questions both bore the actresses and elicit limp, unengaging answers. There was a fascinating conversation to be had about, for example, the lack of actresses interacting with one another (which Moore, Arquette and Dern touch on) but the moderators went nowhere with it, wanting instead to know how they juggle family and blah blah... Always such a waste when you have insightful people (I'd recommend Baldwin's Here's the Thing interview with Moore or Todd Haynes' latest interview with The Film Stage to get some insight into her process: very illuminating. Much more so than this).
Paul, good point about Keaton... Not sure what me me made me drop him from my list (I typed his name too before deleting it)... I just always dread that point in a season when things switch from excitingly open to completely predictable... Hopefully I'm just being paranoid.
Manuel--I agree. When I want really good, longform interviews about the craft of acting, or screenwriting, or movie making in general, I go to other sources and interviewers like Elvis Mitchell, Kim Masters, David Poland, and yes, even Alec Baldwin. These guys don't waste the interviewees' time with dumb questions like "what's it like to be you?"
for me the best thing that came out of the directors roundtable was this photograph: http://andreii-tarkovsky.tumblr.com/post/105044373974/mike-leigh-gets-it
That said, Nathaniel asks pretty good questions too, so let's see if we can get him to moderate a roundtable!!!
I'm wondering if Birdman could be the first and only other film since Tom Jones to score three nominations for Supporting Actress.
Even though I've never been big fan of Chris Nolan's movies, I really enjoyed watching him on this roundtable and wanted to see more of just him, Linklater and Leigh talking about their craft (without the boring Miller and Imitation guy, the completely rude moderator who kept interrupting the natural flow of the discussion, and poor Angelina Jolie who was out of her depth and knew it with those defensive statements: "I learned how to direct while doing this movie! I swear!") The admiration that Nolan and Leigh had for Linklater's 12 year achievement was also wonderfully palpable.
I feel I must stick up a little for Amy Adams at the HR roundtable. First of all I love her as an actress, and I too groaned at her inclusion yet again this year. However Hilary Swank thanks her for sending her a letter after the last roundtable. I love good manners and that small detail was a nice moment. The honest gratitude to Laura Dern for some small gestures is real also.
There is nothing dynamic about the roundtable but I put that down to the moderator. Whenever I see these same actresses on "The Graham Norton Show" they can be loose and interesting.
This format needs shaking up, it's not the fault of the actresses.
Pam - I second your suggestion... "the film experience round table" - yes please!!
I completely agree with what others have said about the interviewers not being good. It was especially grating in the Actor's Roundtable. At one point, Ethan Hawke is giving a very heartfelt account of how Michael Keaton inspired him early in his career, and the interviewer flat-out cuts him off before he's finished to ask another question. I was really happy that Michael Keaton later made it a point to thank Ethan Hawke before answering the next question. I got the sense that he was sort of calling the interviewer out on interrupting Ethan too, because he did state that he didn't get a chance to do it earlier (you know, when Ethan was actually talking about it), and he told the interviewer something along the lines of, "I know you're not comfortable with emotion." I was really glad he did that, because interrupting Ethan Hawke during that really sincere moment was just blatantly rude, and he deserved to be called out on it, even if only subtly.
The other thing noteworthy about this year's roundtables was that the directors were all fawning over Richard Linklater's work on Boyhood</> (especially Leigh and Nolan). Last year, the directors were all fawning over Alfonso Cuaron's work on Gravity. Somehow I can't help but feel this firmly cements Linklater's status as the Oscar frontrunner.
Nathaniel, have you seen the Variety "Actors on Actors" series, which has two actors interviewing or conversing with each other? I've only seen two of those, the one with Edward Norton and Benedict Cumberbatch and the one with Patricia Arquette and Jake Gyllenhaal, but it's a much more pleasurable and informative format than the roundtable. As others here have noted, the HR moderators leave much to be desired. I find the British guy especially grating, an odd mixture of limpness and undue assertiveness. He really failed to engage Linklater, who is not shy but is very unassuming.
Agree with someone above, the actress roundtable that Variety/Epix did was far better.
Mike Leigh was very bitchy toward Angelina though! And Chris Nolan seemed to adore her.
Nat - if you go on the Envelope website and scroll down forever until you reach December 8th, you will find a post with the actresses roundtables. I don't know about the other ones. Took me a while to find it too.
Brookesboy, I don't think it will happen, but I wouldn't be mad if it did. Riseborough is awesome in Birdman.
Have you been following the Sony leak? It's fascinating:
http://sonyhack.gawker.com/
I loved how Travis Knight of Boxtrolls gave such an articulate, impassioned argument against sequels/prequels/regurgitated product, even with other filmmakers in the room who obviously don't have a problem with that.
The Epix/LA Times actress roundtable:
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/envelope/la-et-mn-envelope-round-table-lead-actresses-20141115-story.html
(The video quality isn't as good as THR though)