James Patterson’s bestselling novel Zoo is set to become a series on CBS. The network’s greenlit the series, giving it a 13 episode order with an eye on airing the drama in the summer of 2015.
“Zoo further demonstrates our commitment to high-quality, year-round programming and to high-concept series that play to summer audiences in the U.S. as well as on a global scale,” said Nina Tassler, Chairman, CBS Entertainment. “With this #1 bestseller coming to television, we’re excited to give our viewers a thrill ride with another blockbuster summer event.”
Patterson, James Mangold, Cathy Konrad, Bill Robinson, Leopoldo Gout and Steve Bowen are on board as executive producers. Scott Rosenberg, Andre Nemec, Josh Appelbaum, and Jeff Pinkner are attached as writers and are also executive producing.
The Plot:
Zoo is a global thriller about a wave of violent animal attacks against humans across the planet. As the assaults become more cunning, coordinated and ferocious, a young renegade biologist is thrust into the race to unlock the pandemic’s mystery before there’s no place left for people to hide.
The Weinstein Co. has debuted the first full-length trailer for St. Vincent starring Melissa McCarthy, Bill Murray, Naomi Watts, and Chris O’Dowd. Directed by Ted Melfi, St. Vincent will be heading to theaters on October 24, 2014.
The Plot:
Maggie (McCarthy), a single mother, moves into a new home in Brooklyn with her 12-year old son, Oliver (Jaeden Lieberher). Forced to work long hours, she has no choice but to leave Oliver in the care of their new neighbor, Vincent (Murray), a retired curmudgeon with a penchant for alcohol and gambling. An odd friendship soon blossoms between the improbable pair. Together with a pregnant stripper named Daka (Watts), Vincent brings Oliver along on all the stops that make up his daily routine – the race track, a strip club, and the local dive bar. Vincent helps Oliver grow to become a man, while Oliver begins to see in Vincent something that no one else is able to: a misunderstood man with a good heart.
Bayan Olgii, Mongolia: Hazen Audel holding a female golden eagle. (Photo Credit: National Geographic Channels/Laurence Hamilton Baillie)
Wilderness Guide Hazen Audel stars in the new National Geographic Channel series Survive the Tribe arriving on July 24, 2014 at 10pm ET/PT. The new series finds Audel using all of his skills to try and survive after immersing himself in the culture of remote tribes and learning everything possible in just 10 days.
The Plot:
“When it comes to enduring dense Amazonian jungle or the unrelenting Kalahari Desert sun, it isn’t modern technology but ancient know-how that can mean the critical difference between life and death. Reading a single, broken blade of grass … echoing a subtle animal call — these are tribal survival skills refined over centuries and mastered over a lifetime. In places where survival depends on bonding with a majestic golden eagle or interpreting the movements of constantly shifting sea ice, it’s time to leave domesticated life behind to Survive the Tribe.
Survive the Tribe tracks wilderness guide and survival instructor Hazen Audel as he journeys to some of the world’s most remote and inhospitable places, immersing himself into local cultures to learn survival skills that have kept tribal people alive against the odds for thousands of years. He has 10 days to study each tribe’s skills before taking on the toughest tribal challenges that will force him to the very limit. In order to survive, Audel must rely on natural instinct, ancient wisdom and a high tolerance for drinking cow’s blood.
Along the way, Audel experiences firsthand the incredible perseverance, rugged beauty, and amazing fortitude that only come from living on the edge. In Survive the Tribe, he must build shelters, construct weapons and forge metal using the skills imparted to him from tribal elders before joining traditional hunts that have been an integral part of the tribes’ survival for generations.
In the Kalahari Desert, Audel joins an elite group of San Bushmen, hunting for game with bows and poison arrows. Braving sub-zero temperatures in Mongolia, Audel has only days to bond with a majestic golden eagle before tackling harsh mountains in search of prey for his Kazakh clan. And, embarking on an Inuit crash course in Arctic Canada, Audel must harvest for food beneath shifting sea ice while braving a barren landscape.”
Survive the Tribe July and August 2014 Episodes
Survive the Tribe: Blood Warriors (Kenya)
Thursday, July 24, 2014, 10:00 PM
Survival of the fittest takes on a whole new meaning as Hazen Audel embeds with the Samburu tribe and learns valuable lessons about thriving on the edge. In the arid Kenyan mountain and desert, the Samburu share space with some of the world’s most dangerous predators, and often rely on a diet of milk, meat — and blood.
Collecting cow’s blood requires patience, a steady hand and pinpoint accuracy, and Audel’s first attempt fails to deliver. He will need to pick this up fast; blood is his main food for the entire journey. In a culture that values stoic courage, Audel’s next challenge is to endure painful bites from ants and harvest honey from volatile bees. Before venturing out with the tribe’s precious livestock, Audel must build his own club to protect his cargo. Taking 70 cows to distant mountain pastures across leopard territory will be no small undertaking, but Audel is up for the challenge.
Survive the Tribe: Rainforest Masters (Ecuador)
Thursday, July 31, 2014, 10:00 PM
Forging through the dense jungles of the Ecuadorian Amazon, Hazen Audel joins the Waorani Tribe, where he must learn to live off nothing more than the invaluable tools found in nature. To survive the life-threatening dangers of the jungle — venomous snakes, stealth predators and the frighteningly real possibility of getting lost in the forest labyrinth — Audel must master the Waorani’s incredible ability to navigate this lush and treacherous land.
Along the way, he has close encounters of all kinds with the incredible creatures that call the Amazon home. Learning to manipulate plants into sharp knives, construct and shoot a blowgun with poisonous darts, and scale the thinnest trees with bound feet, Audel is ready to join the tribe on an extraordinary hunt from forest floor to canopy with a surprisingly emotional end.
Survive the Tribe: Eagle Assassins (Mongolia)
Thursday, August 7, 2014, 10:00 PM
In Mongolia’s stark Altai Mountains, Hazen Audel quickly learns that the greatest ally to a Kazakh hunter is another stealth predator: the golden eagle. For the Kazakhs, who raise the eagles from a young age and release mature birds back into the wild to breed, eagle hunting means survival. The birds take down wolves and foxes — vital food supplies for the Kazakhs who also use the fur as an essential tool for battling the long, harsh Mongolian winters.
Audel has 10 days to strengthen his bond with one spectacular bird, which requires spitting into the bird’s mouth to gain trust. Before heading out on his first hunt, Audel will need to master riding a semi-domesticated horse along the near-vertical mountain slopes … all while balancing a massive eagle on his arm in sub-zero temperatures. The feat proves to be one of his most difficult challenges yet, as he misses out on capturing prime prey. Can he perfect his skills, or will the tribe go home empty-handed?
Hot on the heels of the release of the trailer for The Prince comes the official theatrical poster for the thriller. Directed by Brian A. Miller, The Prince stars Bruce Willis, Jason Patric, and John Cusack with Jessica Lowndes, Gia Mantegna, and Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson in supporting roles.
The Prince opens in theaters and On Demand on August 22, 2014.
The Plot:
Jason Patric, Bruce Willis and John Cusack face off in this action-packed thriller. A retired assassin is drawn back into the life he gave up when his daughter is kidnapped. To rescue her, he must confront his former rival.
Please let this be as funny as Horrible Bosses #1… Warner Bros has just debuted the first trailer for Horrible Bosses 2 from director Sean Anders (the original movie was directed by Seth Gordon). Back for more R-rated fun are Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, and Jason Sudeikis as well as Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston, and Jamie Foxx. New to the world of horrible bosses are Star Trek‘s Chris Pine and Oscar winner Christoph Waltz.
Horrible Bosses 2 opens in theaters on November 26, 2014.
The Plot:
Fed up with answering to higher-ups, Nick (Bateman), Dale (Day) and Kurt (Sudeikis) decide to become their own bosses by launching their own business in Horrible Bosses 2. But a slick investor soon pulls the rug out from under them. Outplayed and desperate, and with no legal recourse, the three would-be entrepreneurs hatch a misguided plan to kidnap the investor’s adult son and ransom him to regain control of their company.
Jennifer Love Hewitt has signed on as a regular on CBS’s popular series Criminal Minds. Hewitt will be joining the show with the premiere of season 10 on October 1, 2014, playing a character named Kate Callahan.
According to CBS, Callahan is “a seasoned undercover agent whose stellar work at the FBI has landed her a coveted position with the Behavioral Analysis Unit.”
“We’re thrilled to introduce a new special agent by adding the very talented Jennifer Love Hewitt to our amazing cast,” said Erica Messer, Executive Producer/Showrunner. “Many of us on the show have enjoyed working with her over the years and look forward to again. We have exciting storylines planned for her character and the entire BAU team as we head into our 10th season.”
Hewitt’s TV credits include starring roles in Party of Five, Ghost Whisperer, The Client List, The Lost Valentine, and The Audrey Hepburn Story. She’s also starred in the feature films I Know What You Did Last Summer, I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, Heartbreakers, The Tuxedo, Garfield, Garfield 2: A Tale of Two Kitties, The Truth About Love, and If Only.
Diane Kruger as Sonya Cross in ‘The Bridge (Photo by Kurt Iswarienko/Copyright 2014, FX Networks. All rights reserved. )
Diane Kruger took a brief break from a busy day on the set of season two of The Bridge to take part in a conference call and provide the scoop (minus any spoilers) on what fans of the critically acclaimed FX series can expect from this upcoming season. The Bridge season two will premiere on Wednesday, July 9, 2014 at 10pm ET/PT, kicking off 13 brand new episodes starring Kruger, Demian Bichir, Ted Levine, and Matthew Lillard.
The Season 2 Plot:
In Season 2, Marco (Bichir), reeling from the death of his son, is still dealing with corrupt cops and the demands of the cartel. Sonya (Kruger) meets an unexpected man with connections to her past who threatens to come between her and her boss, Lieutenant Hank Wade (Levine). The case quickly pulls them all into a complex web of money laundering, police corruption, and the Juarez Drug War which infiltrates the suburban streets of El Paso.
El Paso Times reporters Daniel Frye (Lillard) and Adriana Mendez (Emily Rios) continue to follow the Millie Quintana Money House, a path that will eventually cross that of Marco and Sonya. Charlotte Millwright (Annabeth Gish) will have to make the impossible choice between the two worlds that have a grasp on her: the US government and the Mexican cartel. Meanwhile, Steven Linder (Thomas M. Wright) tries to do right by his Mexican Immigrant love and ends up seeking justice the only way he knows how.
Diane Kruger The Bridge Interview
How do you take such an emotionally-stoic role and make it personally satisfying as an actor?
Diane Kruger: “It’s been a real challenge, not just for me but I think also for the writers, for Elwood [Reid] and the writing team to continue to evolve her character and to give her storylines where she can show emotion and nuance. Obviously, people who have Asperger’s have emotions; it is just that they are delayed and come out in the most unexpected moments. Season 2, we will get to see a lot of Sonya’s personal life and her relationship with Ted Levine’s character and Demian’s character, obviously, tested. It’s a very dark and quite emotional season for her, so it’s been very satisfying.”
Do you know why they didn’t mention her condition specifically in Season 1?
Diane Kruger: “That was part of, I think, what they learned from the Scandinavian original show. They never mentioned it either, and I think it was a great decision because I think just because she has Asperger’s, people don’t go around telling people, you know, ‘I’m Sonya Cross. I have Asperger’s.’ It was just a way of peaking, hopefully, everyone’s interest and sort of making that assumption and diagnosis for themselves.”
What personal relationships or cultural dynamics are you most interested in exploring in the show?
Diane Kruger: “Well, you know, Sonya herself is a very complex character to play and the real challenge is to give a really nuanced performance and really pushing, not just the radars, but also pushing myself to make sure that we see a very complete picture of a woman living with Asperger’s. And yet I’m, of course, always intrigued; I learn so much from the show about storylines that actually happen on the border. A lot of our stories are inspired by real-life events, and it’s a very volatile area, as you know. The stories that I read about and learn about are often discussed, not just on set, but when we get sort of the pitches for the next upcoming episodes. So, I’m always intrigued by that. It’s been a very satisfying experience working on a show that is politically relevant and quite timey.”
What do you think sets your character apart from some of the other roles that you’ve played in the past?
Diane Kruger: “Hopefully, every character that I take on as I grow older becomes more interesting, and, obviously, as I grow older, I have more to bring to the table and more experiences that I’ve lived myself so I’m hoping that I can color my characters more and more. Sonya’s certainly been very challenging and continues to be so, and it’s been a very satisfying season so far. I feel like we really get to learn a lot about her.”
How did you go about getting the nuances of someone with Asperger’s? It seems it would be a real challenge to not go over the top with the portrayal.
Diane Kruger: “Yes, that continues to be really daunting for me, you know? The research on it was really intense before we started Season 1, and then being able to be around someone who has Asperger’s for a long time, very high functioning, but it was very interesting to be able to just observe his limitations sometimes. He has evolved enough that I could ask him when he comes to certain limits what is going through his mind, why he’s behaving certain ways, and what is it that makes him uncomfortable right now. So I felt like whenever I’m do stemming or certain takes or I have to say lines that are kind of awkward, that they are informed.
Then, now I feel like in Season 2 because I know the character better and I just know so much more and have met so many more people who have Asperger’s, I feel like I can make it my own a little bit because, as I’m sure you know, not everybody is the same who has Asperger’s and [it manifests] very differently in different people. I’m really comfortable now also to push Sonya because I think she wants to learn and be better socially. She’s not a child anymore. I think the writers have been really, really good this season about giving me the opportunity to branch out and to show how she evolves, yet still obviously having Asperger’s, but like where she’s trying to be different.”
Do you ever come across any moments that make you uncomfortable but you know that’s what a person with Asperger’s would do?
Diane Kruger: “Yes. Here’s the thing: sometimes I have to fight or I find myself being very protective of her because I think it’s natural for the directors or even for people who observe a scene while it’s being filmed to want something that is a little safer, let’s say. For example, we did a scene where somebody dies. You know, it’s a very beautiful sort of teary-eyed scene. Then, somebody touches my character, like it’s on the shoulder, and in that moment, as you know they feel out of control or helpless, they can be really overreacting. One of the notes that I got from my Asperger’s advisor was like she would completely overreact in this situation and probably scream at this person, so I did the scene and it was quite extreme. My writer, who was on set the day, was like, ‘Well, maybe we should do one where she’s not so angry,’ and I kept saying, ‘No, no. We have to have it this way.’ So I find myself really trying to protect the integrity that we have, even though I know it’s going to make people uncomfortable. We’re just going to have to be okay with that.”
How do you think this season will differ in tone from the first?
Diane Kruger: “I think it’s a very different show in many ways. We don’t really have a classic serial killer storyline. You know, we were following the original Scandinavian show in Season 1 and now we’re completely on our own and have our own stories. As you know, Meredith Stiehm went back to Homeland and it’s just Elwood Reid the show runner on the main voice of the show. His vision for the show is darker for sure, but also more complex. There’s not just one storyline per se, so our personal lives get involved in what is happening on the border. There are many different storylines that sort of happen at the same time and, seemingly, are not connected, and the American involvement in the cartels plays a big part. You know, it’s a very grey show.”
Will Sonya have a different dynamic with one of the villains this year given that it’s a female?
Diane Kruger: “Yes. She’s not the only villain, even though she clearly is one villain of the show. There are other characters that play big roles that are being introduced. It’s a very cool character. Elwood’s dark little heart. Yes, I think so. When our characters finally meet, I think Eleanor is so odd and so different that on some level Sonya is fascinated by that, but also feels like she is moving in to her, not just by following leads, but she’s trying to get into her psyche. I think that will really happen is those two women [will] do this little dance around each other.”
What will Sonya’s greatest personal struggles be this season? How her character will develop?
Diane Kruger: “There’s a lot of personal hardship for her. Some great joys in the beginning of the season and then it’s pretty dark for Sonya. Yet, at the same time, it’s a great year, a season of personal maturity. You know, she had this sort of daughter father-figure relationship with Ted’s character and as that relationship gets tested and tried, I think she comes out of it as a much stronger independent woman. She’s also starting to realize that things are not quite as black and white and sometimes you have to sort of make a concession which has been, for Sonya, completely unimaginable.”
Can you talk a little bit about what you know about this type of TV series that maybe you didn’t know before? Why does skill set work so well in it and has it improved your acting?
Diane Kruger: “Well, I don’t know anything about television. I’d never done it before. Initially, it was quite daunting to take on so much challenge and so much time with it. I think it is a great outlet for an actress because you really have 13 hours to bring a character to life, so much more than in the film, and you have the luxury of time to tell a story and to really color a character. I’m not sure that this kind of character would’ve been offered to me in a movie because people with Asperger’s are not necessarily the lead in a film. They’re often sort of used as comic relief or they’d be the odd guy that shows up every once in a while.
That’s the other thing; television is a great tool for women. As you know the best female roles, I think, are often on television, so it’s a very exciting time. I’ve really embraced it. I think I said it last year, the pace is great and then also not so great sometimes because you feel like I have to make sure I have to pay attention at all times to not let anything slip through. The change of directors, for me, was very difficult to grasp in Season 1. I’m getting better this season because we have a lot of directors returning from last year, so there’s not this getting to know period as much and I enjoy it. I have a great time. I love my costars. I feel like you lean on them heavily. You lean heavily on crew much more than you would do in a film. It really does feel like you’re in this like boat together and you all have to keep the ship running.”
What are some of the darkest places you’ve allowed yourself to go to do a scene and dive into your character’s psyche?
Diane Kruger: “Well, for me, my character is so obsessed with dead people. I think she gets along better with dead people than she does living creatures. That part hasn’t been so difficult for me to shoot up. I think because she is such an emotionally-restrained character, whenever there is a scene where I show emotion, it is truly heartbreaking to see someone who is seemingly a bit aloof or nothing really shocks her or touches her and then having some scene where you just see the loneliness of this person. Those are sometimes really hard scenes. It’s weird even for the crew sometimes when I have to do a scene—it catches them off guard because often they are in moments that are not what a person without Asperger’s would be emotional at.”
What’s ahead for Sonya and Marco’s relationship this season?
Diane Kruger: “Without giving too much away, but it is getting tested a bit. Sonya has reason to believe that Marco is compromised and she distrusts him quite a bit, and there’s a big fallout over whether or not she believes that he’s taken too many steps into that darkness, you know, into that grey zone where she learns about his dealings with the bad guys basically.”
Great news for fans of Neil Gaiman’s critically acclaimed bestselling novel American Gods: The FremantleMedia North America adaptation of the fantasy novel has been acquired in a “script to series development” deal by Starz. FremantleMedia North America’s Thom Beers, Craig Cegielski and Stefanie Berk along with author Neil Gaiman, Bryan Fuller and Michael Green are executive producing. Fuller (Hannibal, Pushing Daisies) and Michael Green (Kings, The River) are working on the pilot script and are on board as showrunners.
“American Gods is a project that deserves to be made. With our partners at FremantleMedia and with Bryan, Michael and Neil, we believe we can create a series that honors the book and does right by the fans and viewers,” said Starz Managing Director Carmi Zlotnik.
“When you create something like American Gods, which attracts fans and obsessives and people who tattoo quotes from it on themselves or each other, and who all, tattooed or not, just care about it deeply, it’s really important to pick your team carefully: you don’t want to let the fans down, or the people who care and have been casting it online since the dawn of recorded history,” stated Neil Gaiman. “What I love most about the team who I trust to take it out to the world, is that they are the same kind of fanatics that American Gods has attracted since the start. I haven’t actually checked Bryan Fuller or Michael Green for quote tattoos, but I would not be surprised if they have them. The people at Fremantle are the kinds of people who have copies of American Gods in the bottom of their backpacks after going around the world, and who press them on their friends. And the team at Starz have been quite certain that they wanted to give Shadow, Wednesday and Laura a home since they first heard that the book was out there. I can’t wait to see what they do to bring the story to the widest possible audience able to cope with it.”
Thom Beers, CEO, FremantleMedia North America said, “Neil Gaiman’s American Gods is pure genius and we couldn’t be more thrilled to bring this classic to life on screen. Craig Cegielski and Stefanie Berk have put together a dream team with Fuller and Green joining Gaiman on this amazing journey. Coupled with Starz’ shared passion for this project, we’re confident this combination will raise the bar for drama.”
And Bryan Fuller added, “Neil Gaiman has created the holiest of holy toy boxes with American Gods and filled it with all manner of magical thing, born of new gods and old. Michael Green and I are thrilled to crack this toy box wide open and unleash the fantastical titans of heaven and earth and Neil’s vividly prolific imagination.”
The Plot:
The plot posits a war brewing between old and new gods: the traditional gods of biblical and mythological roots from around the world steadily losing believers to an upstart pantheon of gods reflecting society’s modern love of money, technology, media, celebrity and drugs. Its protagonist, Shadow Moon, is an ex-con who becomes bodyguard and traveling partner to Mr. Wednesday, a conman but in reality one of the older gods, on a cross-country mission to gather his forces in preparation to battle the new deities.
Chris Evans and Tilda Swinton in Snowpiercer (Photo Courtesy of Radius TWC)
Snowpiercer, based on the graphic novel Le Transperceneige, is set in a world in which our planet has been plunged into a new ice age following a failed global-warming experiment, with the few survivors that exist confined to a train. Co-written and directed by Bong Joon Ho, the film stars Chris Evans (Captain America: The Winter Soldier) as a leader of the lower class of survivors who lives at the back of the train which is separated by classes and who stirs up a rebellion against those residing in the upper-class section of the train. Tilda Swinton plays a member of the upper class named Minister Mason, a character written for a male but transformed into a part for a female because director Boon wanted Swinton involved in the project.
At the LA press day for the thriller, Swinton explained the evolution and look of the character and why she chooses such unusual roles.
On creating the character:
Tilda Swinton: “Well, this was really good fun because the script…I knew director Bong anyway and he told me about Snowpiercer and then when I read it. I went, ‘There is no [woman] there. There is Octavia Spencer obviously, and the woman with the yellow dress and there is nobody else.’ He said, ‘Yeah, it’s true. Let us think about something in the future.’ And then a few weeks later he wrote to me and said, ‘You see Minister Mason who is described as a mild mannered-man in a suit?’ – and is still described that way, we never updated it – ‘What do you reckon?’ And so I thought, ‘Okay, how much fun can I have with it?’ And he said, ‘Try me,’ basically.
So we just built up a clown. I wanted to make a clown out of this politician, this really sinister, corrupt individual. Apart from the fact that I think there are so many wonderful corrupt clowns in cinema, from Dr Strangelove to The Great Dictator, in life you switch on the news and there will be somebody posturing and making an idiot of themselves and people voting them in because they want a soap opera. So that was really sort of the key. We tried to push it as far as we could.”
On the freedom allowed playing Mason:
Tilda Swinton: “It is very interesting to try and analyze how director Bong and I were able to work together, because it feels as if we made every decision together from the very beginning when we first met. We first met and we became friends [snaps fingers] instantly, and we knew we wanted to work together. Then when we decided to try to make something with Minister Mason, which was director Bong’s idea, it was like a challenge. He put down a glove [slaps table]. He said, ‘What do you think?’ And then we kind of dared each other.
I had these fantasies about this clown, which was based originally on one photograph that we found married with a character that I knew – a real person from my childhood. And then we kind of mixed in all the crazy clown megalomaniac cowards that the news channels show us every day. Yeah, we just kept throwing in elements.
The wonderful thing is that Dooho [Choi, producer] and director Bong and our wonderful costume designer [Catherine George] came to visit me in Scotland, and I had a pie for lunch. I picked them up at the airport, put the pie in the oven, and said, ‘Okay, we have 20 minutes before the pie is warm.’ We went into the drawing room and we played. We dressed up with bits of children’s costumes and ribbons and we made fake medals and had some glasses and we kind of got it 20 minutes [later] and then we ate the pie. So it took 20 minutes, really.
But, it was so wonderful. As we were playing we had these ideas, like a fantastic pendulous breast. We just said that, and when I arrived in Prague there they were. And Jamie Bell loved wearing them of course. We have a picture of him. Our crew picture involves Jamie Bell wearing Mason’s breasts.”
On the appeal of visually dynamic, chameleonic roles:
Tilda Swinton: “For me, it is all about dressing up and playing. For me that is the fun of it, which does not mean that it is not interesting to work with a finer tooth comb with something more delicate in something like I Am Love or even Orlando, where I am using a face that looks more like my own. But I do love working with these shapes; making shapes is kind of what I do. It is such fun. Also, it means I have done my work before we start shooting. If I do my work, we start shooting and then I play.”
On her character’s teeth:
Tilda Swinton: “I don’t know, there is always meaning with teeth, isn’t there? I am sure a Freudian will tell us what it all meant. They were, again as with the breasts and the wig that we never glued down, just part of the package. It is really tricky to work out how this all happened, it just all came about and the teeth were always going to be there. The nose was one of the first things, I think that was almost the first thing I said to [director Boon]. I always wanted to play a character with a nose… When we were waiting for the pie to warm, I went and got some cello tape and we cello taped my nose up like that.”
On working on such an international production:
Tilda Swinton: “We were kind of in, as on most really inspired sets, we were in the nation of cinema. I think most filmmakers really love that fact that when you are on a set that is really kind of hopping and really humming everybody is kind of in that nation as it’s kind of nation free.”
On what’s up next:
Tilda Swinton: “I had just been shooting with Jude Apatow and Amy Schumer, funnily enough a film called Trainwreck. That will probably come out next I imagine, but not till next summer.”
The Dog is a behind-the-scenes look at John Wojtowicz, the man who inspired Al Pacino’s character in Dog Day Afternoon. Based on Wojtowicz’ true story and directed by Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren, The Dog will be opening in theaters on August 8, 2014 followed by a release On Demand on August 15th.
The Plot:
Coming of age in the 1960s, John Wojtowicz took pride in being a pervert. His libido was excessive even by the libertine standards of the era, with multiple wives and lovers, both women and men.
In August, 1972, he attempted to rob a Brooklyn bank to finance his lover’s sex reassignment surgery. The attempted heist resulted in a fourteen-hour hostage situation that was broadcast on TV. Three years later, Pacino portrayed his character instigating the unforgettable crime on the big screen. The award-winning film had a profound influence on Wojtowicz, and when he emerged from prison six years later, he became known as “The Dog.”
Filmed over the course of a ten-year period by co-directors Allison Berg and Frank Keraudren, and interweaving extraordinary archival footage on the robbery, 70s era interviews and the early gay liberation movement in which “The Dog” played an active role, the documentary captures the many sides of John Wojtowicz’s larger- than-life persona: he is by turns lover, husband, soldier, lover, activist, New Yorker, mama’s boy and bank robber.
Watch the trailer:
Poster for ‘The Dog’ (Photo Courtesy of Drafhouse Films)
