Adam Driver on Working with Francis Ford Coppola on MEGALOPOLIS - "One of the Best Shooting Experiences of My Life"
Adam Driver has wrapped shooting on Francis Ford Coppola’s upcoming epic film Megalopolis, and in a recent interview with Collider, he talks about the awesome experience he had working on it.
The film tells the story of an architect dreaming of a utopian version of New York City in the near future and his battle with the conservative mayor, who has other ideas about the city. Contained within the epic is a myriad of storylines and characters. “The fate of Rome haunts a modern world unable to solve its own social problems in this epic story of political ambition.”
There were a lot of rumors that the production of the film was a complete mess, but those rumors were quickly debunked by Coppola and Driver, who said that everything was going great! Now Driver is talking about what it was like for him to be a part of this film and to work with Coppola, saying:
“I just wrapped it last night, my part of it. I'm operating on two hours of sleep. I finished it, they’re still going. But it has been one of the best – without hyperbole – best shooting experiences of my life. Watching him work that crew, that design team, he has such a command over cinematic language and an archive in his mind of shots that are so beautiful. And doing something so ambitious, and on his own terms, that you would think that it would be dictatorial or really controlled, but he is the most warm, open, thoughtful, director who is just… He really – and this all sounds like being very general, but he really embodies this thing of like, ‘We're making this experiment and we're not interested in how it comes out. We're interested in the process of making it.’ And inevitably because of that, the thing that you make, there's no film reference for. I think what he's made is so unique and interesting. I couldn't be more proud to be a part of it.”
That’s so cool and exciting to hear! I seriously can’t wait to see how this project turns out! He goes on to say:
“Yeah, yeah. And you would think that it would be – and I had this experience before with another filmmaker that they wanted to make for a long time – you would think it would be, “I know what it is. Do this and go…” And that would have been fine, but that he gives you so much control and license to work with… not only disregarding the 35-year history to making the movie but being really open to what's happening now is really rare.I'm not finding all the right words because I'm over-tired, but it was incredible, and I think that what he's made is so visually stunning, but for such a big audience that it's hard to describe, which is what's exciting about his films.”
Coppola described the film as “a love story. A woman is divided between loyalties to two men. But not only two men. Each man comes with a philosophical principle. One is her father who raised her, who taught her Latin on his lap and is devoted to a much more classical view of society, the Marcus Aurelius kind of view. The other one, who is the lover, is the enemy of the father but is dedicated to a much more progressive ‘Let’s leap into the future, let’s leap over all of this garbage that has contaminated humanity for 10,000 years. Let’s find what we really are, which are an enlightened, friendly, joyous species.’”
Coppola also previously said of the film: "What would make me really happy? It's not winning a lot of Oscars because I already have a lot and maybe more than I deserve. And it's not that I make a lot of money, although I think over time it will make a lot of money because anything that the people keep looking at and finding new things, that makes money. So somewhere down the line, way after I'm gone, all I want is for them to discuss [Megalopolis] and, is the society we're living in the only one available to us? How can we make it better? Education, mental health? What the movie really is proposing is that utopia is not a place. It's how can we make everything better? Every year, come up with two, three or four ideas that make it better."
"I would be smiling in my grave if I thought something like that happened, because people talk about what movies really mean if you give them something. If you encouraged people to discuss marriage and education and health and justice and opportunities and freedom and all these wonderful things that human beings have conceived of. And ask the question, how can we make it even better? That would be great. Because I bet you they would make it better if they had that conversation."
The cast for the film also includes Shia LaBeouf, Forest Whitaker, Nathalie Emmanuel, Jon Voight, Aubrey Plaza, Jason Schwartzman, Laurence Fishburne, Grace VanderWaal, Kathryn Hunter, James Remar, Talia Shire. Dustin Hoffman, Chloe Fineman (Saturday Night Live), Isabelle Kusman (Licorice Pizza), D.B. Sweeney (Fire in the Sky), Bailey Ives, and Giancarlo Esposito.