Francis Ford Coppola was in town last week to take in the reactions to his new film “Tetro” at a packed house of film buffs as part of the Seattle International Film Festival.
That's Mr. Coppola in the middle. Can't you tell?
While the movie was a gorgeous black and white masterwork of cinematography, sound, and character, the most interesting part of the evening came at the end of the show when Coppola and his his young start Alden Ehrenreich went onstage to answer audience questions. When Ehrenreich was asked about what it was like to work with Coppola, he spoke about Francis allowing the actors (and the entire staff) a space for play throughout rehearsal and even during shooting.
It was clear through both their answers that Francis values the creativity of his artists, that he is a true collaborator, interested more in getting the best from his team than in getting drones to execute his vision.
Alden told about how playful rehearsals were for the 2 weeks prior to filming, how they were encouraged to go off-script, and how it all culminated in a masquerade ball prior to shooting. Everyone attending the ball came in character, wearing masquerade garb, and carrying note cards with assignments from Coppola, small tasks to complete throughout the night’s festivities. While neither Francis or Alden got into specifics, apparently this was one wild party with lots going. People were disappearing into corners, fights were breaking out, and Francis was shooting everything he could get the whole time. When the cast got into shooting though, these sorts of exercise allowed actors the freedom to tell Coppola, “you know what? I don’t think my character would react as happily to such and such” and Coppola could let his actors respond spontaneously to what they were feeling because they’d worked together to develop the characters and film.
I had never heard of acting exercises such as this, although I’m no actor so it could be quite common for all I know. What I do know, however, is that I’d love to check out the tape from that night and that I left with far more respect for what Coppola is doing in film. Here’s to hoping we see a lot more films from him of this quality.
Does anybody know about Coppola’s process or have any pointers on where I can find about what happens behind the scenes on a Coppola set? Come on, give me the dirt!
