One of the ways a celebrity or noted filmmaker will show respect to a journalist, at least in my experience, is to toss out a friendly “fuck you.” They would never say this if they thought you were some kind of easy-to offend asshat. Profanity conveys man-trust.
22 years ago in Cannes I was part of a round-table group speaking to George Clooney, who was promoting O Brother, Where Art Thou?. I began with a compliment about George’s performance in From Dusk ‘Til Dawn. I explained that I thought he had a certain edge and intensity in that 1996 Robert Rodriguez film that I quite liked. I didn’t mean that he was flat in the films he’d made after that (One Fine Day, Batman and Robin, Out of Sight, Three Kings) but that I really enjoyed what he was putting out in in Dusk to Dawn and that I kind of missed it.
Clooney frowned a bit, looked down, thought it over for four or five seconds, glanced in my direction and said “fuck you.” Laughter all around. I’ve liked him enormously ever since. Good fellow.
Two days ago I ran into James Gray, director-writer of the widely praised Armageddon Time (Focus, 10.28), at the annual Telluride brunch. We were talking about Flushing, Queens, which is where his new film takes place, and also the culture of Forest Hills. I told him I saw the Beatles perform at the Forest Hills stadium in August ’64. “You saw the Beatles in Forest Hills?,” he replied. Gray worshipped the Fab Four as a kid, he explained, and so the idea of a Connecticut guy scoring tickets to a Beatles concert right in his backyard provoked mock indignation, expressed by a hale and hearty “fuck you.”
I quickly added that I also saw the Beatles at Shea Stadium in August ’65, and so Gray gave me another “fuck you” to grow on.
