In Deep

t wasn’t hard to predict that Mystic River would be a frontrunner at this year’s Oscars. This drama about three friends whose lives are changed by a moment’s decision and are thrust together 25 years later by a tragic event, features a stellar cast.

Tribute spoke to Oscar-nominated director Clint Eastwood, Best Supporting Actor nominee Tim Robbins and Best Supporting Actress nominee Marcia Gay Harden about the film.

 Clint Eastwood

When the book Mystic River came out, you immediately lobbied to get the rights to make the movie. What was it about the story that moved you so much?
C.E. The whole book moved me. I loved all the characters and I loved the kind of gritty feeling of it and I loved the layering of the stories, the crossing over of trying to solve a case, and also this family and all the situations they were going through. It just intrigued me. The big trick was, how do we get a screenplay out of that, because naturally we’d have to knock down a certain amount of stuff. We wanted to make sure that we could show in the movie, what was in the book. It was a bit of a challenge, but I enjoyed doing it.

Casting is key. Did you have any of these actors in mind when you started thinking about getting the film rights?
C.E. Not at the very beginning. I refuse to put the cart before the horse. People would say to me, ‘Wouldn’t this be good for so and so,’ and Sean Penn’s name came up a few times, but I just kind of laid quiet on it until I had a script that I really liked. Brian [Helgeland ] got it all situated, and then I started thinking about it. Phyllis Huffman, who does casting for me, sat down with me and we just started going over it. The actors who we chose are all established, but one thing led to another and I finally ended up with what I call the dream cast.

Who really surprised me was Tim Robbins. He embodied this tortured soul. What impressed you most about him?
C.E. Some people said that Tim was a large man and asked, ‘Is he going to really be the right man for the role?’ But it just seemed like that was the way to go. It turned out that it was a good decision because he had a way of immersing himself in this part and staying there without going into a manic depressive thing. He managed to carry that luggage around with him, and fortunately we managed to do it in 39 days, so he didn’t have to carry it for too long.

You chose not to cast yourself in this film.
C.E. No, there was no role for me, although I suppose it would be very easy for me to play a 42 or 43 year old. [laughs] No, I needed a lot of actors in that age range, and these I think, are the best of that generation.

Is it less pressure on you to be behind the camera?
C.E. Yeah, it’s a lot less pressure, and a lot of fun. I think the days of doing both jobs, unless the acting job was just a cameo or something small, I think those days are kind of gone. It’s difficult. Back in the early ’90s when I did Unforgiven, it was a little easier because I played an important role in the picture, but I wasn’t in every shot. I had a lot of sequences with Morgan Freeman, Gene Hackman and other people, so I got breathers. That picture worked out O.K. that way, but most of them, if you are playing the protagonist, it’s a lot of work. As a younger man, I enjoyed doing it on occasion, but I have always threatened to move to the back side, so from here on in, I think I won’t do both jobs.

Your actors can’t praise you enough as a director. So what makes Clint Eastwood such a great director?
C.E. I don’t know what makes Clint Eastwood anything! That’s a hard one to answer. It’s very subjective. I think, the fact that I started out as an actor for quite a few years before I even started directing, and I’ve been directing for 33 years, so, it’s just time. I think, eventually you develop a comfort zone for people that maybe I didn’t have as a newcomer as a director. When I first started doing it, I think the sets were O.K. but I think now I’ve gotten into a groove where I keep everybody comfortable. It’s hard work doing a film and to keep your adrenaline level right where it should be — using it when you need it, but not having it spiked all day long by a lot of chaos — so I’ve eliminated the chaos. I always have a saying on the set that I don’t want to hear anyone’s voice but my own (laughs).

What, ultimately became your biggest challenge making Mystic River?
C.E. The greatest challenge was converting it to a screenplay, but Brian Helgeland did such a wonderful job, that once it was in the screenplay form, and we did some rewriting and tampering around, once it was where I liked it, it was just a great road map. There was really no problem, just to go ahead with this cast, pay attention to details and make sure that nothing slips under the rug.

Tim Robbins

From the very first second I saw you on screen, my first reaction was, — damaged goods. How did you approach playing Dave?
T.R. This is a guy who is carrying an awful weight on his shoulders. The weight of a memory of abuse, of betrayal, and he’s from a working class area. There’s not an awful lot of touchy feely stuff going on either, with the parents, so he never really dealt with it. In the book, it talks about his parents ignoring it, as if it would go away and never talking to him about it. When you combine that, with staying in the same neighborhood where you are forever defined as, ‘The boy who...’ When the movie opens, it’s like one of those pressure cookers, where the water is boiling underneath and the lid’s about to blow. That’s the image I had of him, that he was desperately trying to be a good father and good husband, but there’s just a tempest brewing.

How much did being a dad yourself play into this performance?
T.R. I guess it gave me a shorthand with the kid who is playing my son. More so, it reminded me of my childhood and being a boy in Greenwich Village. My friends were like these guys. This was my childhood. Not the abuse part, but the hanging out, the street hockey and the working class friends. So, I’ve been wanting to play this kind of guy for a long time. I’ve had an accent in my head since I was a child, and I got to do it once in Five Corners (1988), but it’s real, it’s there. I would come home talking like that, and my father, who was an actor from California, would always correct my speech (laughs).

As a director yourself (Dead Man Walking) what did you take from Clint?
T.R. I want to be Clint at some point. I want to be able to have that efficiency and professionalism and warmth on a set. We had eight-hour days. That was our longest day. So what you get, is an idea of what it was like to work with professionalism and efficiency and old Hollywood where people would actually go home and raise their children at night. We have a crazy situation in filmmaking now where we’re not supposed to question working 16-hour days. And if you think about it, we’re maybe the only industry where that happens.

I don’t think you could have asked for a better ensemble cast. What was it like being on set with this phenomenal group of people?
T.R. It was great. You’d wake up in the morning and really look forward to going to work. It was like, I get to play with Sean Penn today, or I get to play with Laurence Fishburne and Kevin Bacon . You just knew they were going to be giving good stuff. You knew you could get your teeth into their performances and give back to them. There wasn’t going to be any slouching. No slackers there. It’s like playing music. When you play with a good musician, it makes you better.


Marcia Gay Harden

My heart was completely breaking for your character Celeste. What an emotional roller coaster it must have been to play this woman.
M.G.H. My heart just broke for her too. She’s kind of tragic in a very human way because she is not lofty or elevated or grand, she is just like a lot of people we know. She’s not super sophisticated and she is faced with a decision that is almost unbearable for her. At the end of the film we see that she loses so much, based on having followed her emotions.

How did you like working with Tim Robbins?
M.G.H. He’s gorgeous and the depth of his character just made it easier for me because then you could just go, ‘Oh this is who we are.’ Two slightly unsophisticated people who can’t articulate their needs to each other and then tragedy ensues.

What about Sean Penn?
M.G.H. He is generous to beat the band. He is an acute listener and for our big scene together we both kind of lived in our characters pretty much that day. When you are in the moment, you are not waiting for the character to show up, he is just there doing it. He made my job super easy.

You have worked with Clint Eastwood before on Space Cowboys. What is it about this man that makes him such a unique and great director?
M.G.H. Clint is extremely elegant and he is extremely efficient. He has great respect for the actor, so I think that he cast people who have a bit of commitment to the process. Even though you may not be going through the process with him, we come really ready to work.

Was Celeste a hard character to shake off?
M.G.H. No, because at the end of the day on set I’d take my wig off, so I’d literally leave it behind. Maybe there are little parts of the vulnerability of the character that might stay with you all the time, but it doesn’t dominate the household, thank goodness!

—Bonnie Laufer-Krebs