The Cast of HAIL, CAESAR! Talk About The Film's References, Working With The Coen Brothers, and More

Hail, Caesar!, the newest film from Joel and Ethan Coen, hits theaters tomorrow (read my review here). It’s a wonderfully fun and funny period piece that transports the audience back to 1950s Hollywood, showcasing a ton of different genre styles and delivering the kind of thematic resonance and hilarious characterizations we’ve come to expect from these writer/directors. Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to attend the film’s press junket, where a small group of writers spoke with stars George Clooney, Josh Brolin, Alden Ehrenreich, Jonah Hill, and Channing Tatum about their experiences coming on board the film, some of the movie’s references and shout-outs to old Hollywood films of the past, and Clooney’s thoughts on diversity in the Academy.

First up, Clooney and Brolin talk about how they joined the film:

Clooney: After finishing O Brother, Where Art Thou?, [the Coens] pitched me a movie about a fixer, but one of the characters was an idiot actor — I wonder why they thought of me (laughs) — who gets kidnapped by a bunch of [SPOILERS]. The only line they pitched was Alden’s line: “This is bad for movie stars everywhere,” which killed me. And then they never wrote the script. Every time I did press, I’d say, ‘I’m doing a Coen brothers movie next called Hail, Caesar!’ and Joel and Ethan would call me up and say, ‘Stop saying that! We haven’t written it!’ And then they called a couple of years ago and said, ‘OK, we’ve written it, so let’s go do it.’
Brolin: Since No Country, I would inject myself into their lives. And even other movies I wasn’t involved with, I’d watch them edit because I really enjoy watching them go through their process. It’s a very economical, educational process. I remember asking them when they were doing Llewyn Davis, what they were thinking about doing next, just out of curiosity. They mentioned this movie and [Clooney] would most likely be involved, even though they asked him about it ten years ago. I said, ‘Cool,’ obviously wanting to say, ‘Is there a part in there for me? I’d really enjoy working with you again. Maybe you could pay me more next time because you always pay me nothing.’ (laughs) And then I got a call and they said, ‘Hey, do you want to do this thing?’

Jump Street buddies Hill and Tatum chimed in:

Hill: We were on tour promoting a movie, and it was funny because we were both trying to humblebrag, like subtly brag to each other that we were going to be in a Coen brothers movie.
Tatum: (Slipping into a disaffected version of himself) Man, I just got, like, a Coen brothers e-mail. It’s weird.
Hill: (Adopting a similar manner) Yeah, that’s pretty cool. I think I’m gonna do it. Whatever. (Goes back to normal) And we were both trying to brag to each other, but it was the same movie, and of course, Channing’s part was quadruple the size of my part.
Tatum: I won. (laughs) But I didn’t know that, actually. We both thought we had kind of small parts. In the script, it only says, ‘Mannix walks into a big song and dance, then they dance, and [Tatum’s character Burt] does a knee slide into a bucket.’ So I thought you might see an eight count or something and then a knee slide into a bucket.
Hill: They wrote me an e-mail saying, ‘Are you interested in playing a bucket?’ (everyone laughs) I don’t want to brag, but I’m probably going to play the bucket… (laughs)
Tatum: They asked, ‘Do you know how to tap?’ and I was like, ‘No.’ ‘Well, we’re thinking about tapping. Do you think you could learn it?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, I’ll try!’ ‘Can you sing?’ ‘Nope, can’t do that.’ ‘Can you try?’ ‘Yeah, I’ll try!’ I was so scared that I was going to screw up this movie, just because I didn’t know how to do both of the things they were asking me to do. I’m sure they were like, ‘Oh, he can figure it out,’ and I was terrified of ruining it. Auto-tune is amazing.

Tatum and Clooney spoke about the way the film slips through different genres and all of the little references the Coens infused throughout the story:

Tatum: There’s so much in the movie you guys will probably never know about. In the boat, we weren’t actually in the ocean. It was all in a tank on the Esther Williams stage on the Sony lot, it was all painted backdrops…it’s just chock full of things because they love movies. It’s their dream walk right through a studio lot in the ‘50s. They probably never wanted to wake up.
Clooney: Almost every film they do has some homage. ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou’ was a line from Sullivan’s Travels. They actually used shots — the prison break — that were taken from that, and they’d take things from The Wizard of Oz, but they did it with Ku Klux Klan members. So they’re always referencing films, and I think that’s what’s really fun about this film in particular. This is one where they said, ‘OK, let’s put them all in.’

Tatum mentioned a movie called Applied Mathematics, a film that features a stellar tap dance routine from Singin’ in the Rain’s Donald O’Connor (looking super young), and how that scene was an influence on his standout dancing sequence in the movie. I tracked down a YouTube version of the scene he mentioned, and it’s pretty damn impressive:

A very fast and impressive semi-solo dance of Donald O'Connor's complete with amazing tapping and full-scale acrobatics from the 1948 musical "Are You With It?" The bar tender is played by Donald's actual tap teacher, Louis Da Pron, and the third dancer is Lew Parker.

Clooney also addressed the recent announcement that the Academy is changing some of its policies in the wake of #OscarsSoWhite in order to open up its membership to a more diverse group of artists:

I think it’s a very good idea. I think it’s smart to open up the Academy and make it more diverse. It’s long overdue. I also think that’s just the very end of a long process that needs to be looked at in terms of which studios, the list of names that the studios will green light pictures for, starting with agents, going through writers and directors and everything else. I think that needs to be re-examined for a multitude of reasons and ethnicities. But I do believe that it’s going to get a very good look at now, and I think that’s always good. Any time you open up any part of an industry to diversity, I’ve never seen it not be good.

Hail, Caesar! is in theaters this Friday, and I encourage you to check it out.

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