The unheralded squad bested better-funded schools to win Olympic Gold at the Berlin Games in 1936.
Clooney sure hopes we have room in our hearts to make this a success.
Your movie shows that we can rise to the occasion when necessary.
George ClooneyNeil P. Mockford/Getty Images
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CLOONEY: I tend to do things that I havent done before.
Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesnt.
This is a book Grant [Heslov] and I chased for years.
‘The Boys in the Boat’Everett
We lost out to a bunch of people, and then we went over to MGM.
They had this book, and a screenplay that we didnt even read.
We had this writer Mark L. Smith, who is terrific and we just love.
DEADLINE: He didThe Revenantand thenMidnight Skyfor you.
CLOONEY: Great writer, and I just love the book.
I grew up in a small town in Kentucky, my father and mother are Depression-era kids.
They talked about what it was like, three people sharing a bed and all that stuff.
That was how our kids in the Depression really had it.
The idea of this story is, were in this together and the only way this works is together.
You cant do it on your own.
That reminded me of so many other parts of American society.
We do consider ourselves still an underdog nation, which is funny, because were a superpower.
That wasnt necessarily the case in 1936.
I loveHoosiers, Rudy, going back toPride of the Yankeesand films like that.
But theres also, you ever watch those 30 for 30 films on ESPN?
DEADLINE: Seen em all.
CLOONEY: Theres one Ive seen 40 times I bet you, calledSurvive and Advance.
Its Jimmy Valvano and NC State.
Its the one I use as an example for this movie.
If youve done any research, you know the rowing team wins the Olympic Gold medal.
So its the coming together, the journey that matters.
The greatest era of college players, ever, and they beat all of them.
Greatest underdog sports story ever.
And thats what this felt like to me.
Theyre doing it to stay in school, to put a shelter over their heads.
DEADLINE: Were in an age of spectacle.
Is it just harder to get these kinds of films made now?
CLOONEY: I think it is.
Its not a big budget film.
It was a pretty fascinating process.
Some good came out of Amazon buying MGM that helped us.
We had to build these boats.
We had to train these kids, and shooting on the water always slows things down.
And this is not a Marvel film and there arent big stars in it.
They were like, heres what well spend.
Teaching them to row is hard.
Also, you cant row em for very long because theyll fall apart.
And we needed to keep training them.
They had to train for five months altogether to get to the place we needed them by the end.
Youve got short days in London in February.
We had to be so specific because Grant and I were on the hook for the overages.
We came in under budget and they gave us our money back eventually.
But it was really tricky to get it done.
CLOONEY: Well, its a funny thing.
It was kind of irritating, I will tell you, because we were screwed.
Wed already trained everybody.
Wed already hired everybody.
And we were a week before we were about to shoot.
So there was no way we werent going to shoot now.
And I said, all right, well, okay, well do that.
But I dont know, Ive done this a bunch.
So I dont mind doing that.
It is not about the money at that point.
Im lucky enough to have sold a tequila company, so Im able to afford it.
Then, the first week we started shooting, the whole cast and I got Covid.
DEADLINE: The Covid Boys in the Boat?
So Im shooting, Im directing from an iPad in my bedroom.
The only one who didnt get it was the lead, Callum.
And I would direct him, on an iPad.
DEADLINE: Everybody else in that boat was convalescing?
None of those guys rowed.
Fincher did about a minute of that, with the rowing inThe Social data pipe.
Thats just one of the most spectacular montages Ive ever seen in my life.
We were told by all the rowers, too.
We had to get that right.
We worked our way to that moment where the guys could really row.
Two months later wed come back and shoot the other side.
It was a real scheduling nightmare.
We were all inoculated, it was just bad luck.
It was the Delta one that came in the second round and nailed everybody.
Thank God we were inoculated.
I have asthma and I wouldve been properly in trouble; I was pretty sick just with it.
You got to pick your vices.
So yeah, listen, every movie has a complication.
For us, it was water for the most part.
As you know, waters a big deterrent for doing films.
I didPerfect Storm20 years ago.
DEADLINE: I remember how hard you said that was.
What was the challenge here?
CLOONEY: Go out, jump in your pool and just attempt to run.
Everything just slows down.
You cant get close to the boats youre in.
Weve got eight or nine motorboats around.
We have to stay behind them because if we get in front of them, we capsize their boats.
I cant get close to em because the oars are there and because the boats are so long.
And theres historical accuracy every time you hear em go, well, theyre coming up on Hungary.
We have to see to it that were behind the Hungarian boat as we come up.
So theres an advantage when its factual.
You know exactly what you have to do, but the disadvantage is you cant cheat it.
The rowing sequences, its 600 cuts.
I mean, the whole filmGravityI think was 450 cuts.
Im a sports film dude too.
And this is a film that we really want people to check out.
We just had a packed house for an Academy screening, and the whole audience was just…rowing.
And thats what we wanted.
The specter of WWII hung heavy in the air.
You didnt go there so much; your film is more a wholly American underdog story.
CLOONEY: Its a tricky thing, how we tell stories.
We have to look at what was known and when they knew it.
We suspected Hitler was a pretty shitty autocrat, and some people had better knowledge.
Some had read Mein Kampf.
But we couldnt be as smart as we were by 1942 or 43 or 44.
There were great things.
The Americans didnt salute Hitler, they didnt do the Nazi salute when everybody else did.
What more do you need?
And it really messes me up because now I feel like I dont even know him.
He did the American accent on the set.
Theres a bunch of qualities that made him the right guy.
Lets forget the athleticism, which he has.
And hes a big kid, 6 2.
Hes got a Gary Cooper quality about him.
He needs to be a guy who didnt talk about their feelings.
Thats why we like old war films.
They dont sit around and go, man, I love you, man.
Theres stoicism to these guys.
We had the same thing with Joel Edgerton, who plays the coach.
We dont have the big rousing speech at the end.
He just says, Im proud of you.
These great things you never forget.
DEADLINE: You took a punch or two from a coach?
I played basketball, baseball in school and had two tryouts with the Cincinnati Reds.
DEADLINE: Did you tear something?
CLOONEY: No, I just lacked skill.
I had everything else.
I had a good hat, I had a good uniform.
I just lacked the ability to play the game.
DEADLINE: Vexed by the curveball?
CLOONEY: Curveball got me.
I remember I went out and basically they just care about speed and arm.
They can teach you how to hit.
Its a minor league pitcher, and hes throwing me 82 mile an hour fastballs, down the middle.
Ive got a little 32-inch Louisville slugger.
I was a leadoff hitter and Im just poking those pitched all over the field.
And I was like, Im going to be playing with the Cincinnati Reds man.
And this guys looking at me like Im an idiot.
And Im thinking, this is it, man.
He throws an 82 mile an hour curveball, at my head.
The sound it made and the movement on the ball, from a minor league pitcher…
I was like, oh dude, Im not going to be a professional baseball player.
This is a different level.
I didnt understand that until right then.
But sports are so important to me.
This business has been through the ringer.
What is your feeling about the strike and where it leaves the picture business?
CLOONEY: I dont think anybody really knows.
Ill say theres a couple of things.
I like that idea for the film, and thats why we really thought it was a Christmas film.
So I think theres that.
Talking about the strike, its an interesting time.
When I looked at the strike, I thought about the great issues.
One of em is obviously healthcare, which is a big part of it.
It still takes you nine months to do it.
So it was getting to be, when you look at it, unfair.
Its a pretty large number.
If youre talking about background actors, I meanGone with the Windused dummies.
Weve used these things called sprites, for years.
Weve all been supplementing that.
You shoot plates and tile people in, thats something weve done for a long period of time.
I think where its really plays out is in voice actors.
you’re free to steal a lot.
I have friends of mine who do Walla Walla work, all the filling in of background noises.
It feels like its going to just get cataloged and used in any way they want.
So theres going to be a big hit to the industry, slowly.
But I dont think it is what the grand panic was.
I think that that was just one of the talking points.
I dont know how the pool of money is going to work.
I think thats going to be a trickier thing.
And I feel like were in a fairly good place in terms of everybodys back to work.
I worry about how many shows have been canceled and how few have been picked up.
And I feel like thats a sign of how much damage went through six months of people being unemployed.
And I think after every strike like this, it takes a year to get back on your feet.
And thats what it feels like to me.
But Im also pretty optimistic that people need content.
I understand AI for writers is a very different thing.
But the created by credit suddenly goes away, which is how people make a good living.
Have you felt that at all in your business?
I suppose it expedites things, but you need people in journalism.
Hustle, character, skepticism, empathy, judgment, are all human traits.
CLOONEY: I look at technology.
I am the son of a journalist.
Is that a standing offer?
And why wasnt it embraced immediately?
But you adjust things.
That wasnt the only thing.
We thought it was a pretty good plan, and would be very helpful.
Fran and the team had other ideas.
I mean, we were just trying to help out.
We didnt want to be part of the people sitting on the sidelines.
We all gave a million dollars to the SAG Foundation.
We all wanted to help out, to check that that we were part of the solution.
And so we just wanted to keep the urgency going.
We are offering ideas.
Thats all we could do.
It is a union.
We are still part of it.
You dont get to start the clock on us only when things worked out.
I had no insurance for nine years, so I know what its like to struggle.
And so we all wanted to be part of the participation.
DEADLINE:Matthew Perrys death must have hit you hard.
ER andFriendslaunched the same year.
Both Warner Bros, NBC shows, on the same and Thursday night.
Each a huge hit.
CLOONEY: We were side by side on the soundstage.
And for the 10 oclock hour show to be doing those kinds of numbers that quickly?
We had 40 million people watching us.
It was a real, and hourlong shows tend to peak about year three.
It starts to run out of storylines and then you start to repeat em a little bit.
And then the next show to come in to do that wasThe Sopranos.
There was a big difference in the way we told stories at the speed we were telling it.
And thenFriends.Theres a thing about really good sitcoms, going back to Jack Benny.
The really good sitcoms get better with age.
Felix Unger walks into a filthy room and you just start laughing.
And anything after that didnt matter.
You could watch it.
AndFriends, man, that was a fun time to watch those guys.
We were all really close.
We were at the Upfronts in 1994 in New York.
DEADLINE: That must have been something.
Hard to believe next year will be the 30th anniversary.
CLOONEY: They brought us up.
Those were the Cradle of Love time slots becauseSeinfeldwas there and we knew it.
We all knew it.
We were backstage and there were six of them and six of us.
They were the two people who everybody knew, and the rest of us were kind of unknowns.
They showed a trailer for both shows.
And then we came out on stage.
And I remember at that moment thinking, this is a really special moment.
It ended up being one of those crazy, I cant explain it things.
Two weeks after we debuted, we were on the cover of Newsweek.
Everything changed for us after that.
DEADLINE: Sounds like a little fraternity there, and Matthew was first to die.
CLOONEY: I knew Matt when he was 16 years old.
We used to play paddle tennis together.
Hes about 10 years younger than me.
And he was a great, funny, funny, funny kid.
I just want to get on a regular sitcom and I would be the happiest man on earth.
And he got on probably one of the best ever.
It didnt bring him joy or happiness or peace.
You have to be happy with yourself and your life.
DEADLINE: Youd been on so many pilots and short lived shows.
How much did that help when success did happen for you?
CLOONEY: Two things, Mike.
First is that when the show hit, Id already been on seven series, seven.
Id done 12 pilots.
They gave that toHomicideand switched us at the last minute.
They did a test screening.
Thats a true story.
They were like, what did you do with our money, our two and a half million dollars?
Then they tested it, and then they didnt believe the testing.
So they brought in a Jay Leno audience and tested it again and it tested off the charts.
Everybody pickedChicago Hopeto just destroy us.
They said that they would double us and instead we doubled them.
It was just one of those surprising things that doesnt happen very often in your life.
I was lucky, I was lucky that Id failed in all those other ones.
I wouldnt have gotten toERif they were moderately successful, andERchanged my career.
Thats not because of my brilliant acting.
It is because I was part of something that is a little bit likeBoys in the Boat.
And I knew it immediately and was able to appreciate it.
I remember Noah Wyle, we were doing 40 shares and Noahs like, is that good?
And I was like, yeah, thats good.
you’ve got the option to buy that car you want.
I also said, youll never have that again, which was true.
I didnt know that all the numbers would change so drastically.
I also had another advantage.
I had an aunt named Rosemary Clooney, who was a big star.
I didnt really know her very well.
He came to Kentucky to do a movie.
My aunt was the biggest singer in the business in 1950.
And female singers, I think they made up about seven of the top 10 singers at the time.
And then rock and roll came in.
She was on the road and she believed it when everybody told her how brilliant she was.
And shes like, what are you talking about?
Ive been working the whole time.
But now, rock and roll was a male dominated sport.
And she was done.
For 20 years she did a lot of drugs and a lot of drinking.
Of course, she didnt do any of those things.
And so I had a good example of what not to buy into.
So I know what Matt Perry had, and maybe part of it is what he didnt.
There are down moments, and struggles.
And then it comes back up and you got to ride it all out.
And it was heavily marketed and dispensed so aggressively.
Weve had these horrible, addictive moments going back to morphine after the Civil War.
Are you kidding me?
DEADLINE: A question about streaming series.
You did all those series and kept afloat until you hit with ER.
Now, good shows get scrapped all the time.
In this course correction moment, what ought to happen?
CLOONEY: I dont know because Im obviously not well enough versed on all of it now.
You would always get some really shitty residual checks.
I mean, that was part of it, but they were in cycles.
That was a way you could make money to pay for insurance because insurance was a really big deal.
Thats what it was for me.
Now, I dont know about howOrange Is The New Blackworked.
Theyre paying the residual in the front end as opposed to the backend.
But I dont think that that necessarily was fixing the problem.
Thats how you could continue your insurance.
Maybe its a little bit more money in the beginning, but thatll solve the problem for that year.
You have to make a certain amount of money to get the insurance and that price has gone up.
Its a tricky thing and I dont know what the solutions are for it.
Because when youre doing 22 episodes for nine months of work, its a very different pay scale.
It probably wouldnt be a very popular thing.
And Im sure theres a million reasons why thats a bad idea.
But I see people really getting messed with.
My buddy Richard Kind does series work still, all the time.
And its not because Im being paid less, its because were doing less shows.
All the traditional distributors wanted it and Sony will give it a big theatrical.
The ones that premiere directly on places like Netflix dont create that kind of awareness.
Is this the solution?
CLOONEY: I think that was the mistake that everyone was making.
They were like, this is our direct to video thing.
Grant and I have a deal over at Warner Brothers.
And it actually changes how many people watch it in streaming.
I think Netflix is considering buying theaters even, Im not sure.
And we were like, dont do that.
Because first of all, this is a movie you want to see with other people.
You dont want to see it just at home.
you might, its fine, but at least give it a chance with other people.
You also want to see it on a big screen.
You want to spend the holidays going out, doing something fun like that.
And then after a couple of months, put it out on streaming.
It works out fine for everybody.
It was a great shoot and Jon is an extraordinarily talented guy whos also really joyful.
He loves what he does.
We had a blast doing it and weve seen it.
Its an off the charts great film and its fun to work with Brad again.
We had a really good time.
DEADLINE: Last question.
CLOONEY: Not really.
I mean, you dont have time anymore, youre so busy on a film like this.
They say, let me see and start eating it.
That just brings the house down and they love getting a laugh.
My evil thoughts are still alive, Im just living them vicariously through my two children.
