| |
Bruce Greenwood's most widely-seen promotional interview for Thirteen Days was on The View, a madly popular syndicated talk show, on which he appeared the same day the movie opened. He chatted (just a trifle self-consciously) with four of the five resident divas (Barbara Walters was on assignment), who clearly loved the movie along with Bruce's performance. He was surprised and touched by their reception and the audience's standing ovation. The four gracious ladies conducting the interview were Star Jones, Joy Behar, Meredith Vieira and Lisa Ling. Their opening comments to him concern the previous guest, an author purporting that women should be more submissive in their marriages.
 |  |  |  |
Bruce's Segment
Introduction:
SJ: He was so good at being bad in the mega-hit, Double Jeopardy that we all hated his guts. I remember that, and now Bruce Greenwood is switching gears and playing one of America’s most beloved figures, John F. Kennedy in the new movie, Thirteen Days, an intense and chilling look back at the Cuban Missile Crisis.....take a look..... Film Clip
The scene shown was the "They'll do something, General, I can promise you that" speech to Gen. Harding LeMaySJ: Boy, is it intense and it’s my favorite movie of the season. Please welcome Bruce Greenwood. Bruce's Entrance & Interview
 |  |  |  |
BG [Says hello to all of them.] Hi how are you doing? Hi Joy, Hi Lisa. [Looks up at audience] Wow! [in response to ovation.] SJ Before we get to Thirteen Days, which we loved, - all of us we went together - do you want a "surrendered wife"? BG: [non-plussed] Well, on occasion. Yeah. SJ: Especially that sex part right? BG: Well..... [stops, looks at Star with look of mock shock, being above this sort of talk] SJ: I’m just asking... BG: No I think, I mean really if she surrendered everything to me we’d be broke. You know. Forget about it. JB: That’s the point we were trying to get to. MV: Exactly. Now you play JFK. What an incredible role to have to take on, to play JFK, but how did you transform yourself? Can you show everybody, because you became him. BG: Well, it’s not like, you know, sticking a tab of attitude here [points to his side] and it’s not, I don’t really think of it as a transformation. It’s just....I submerged myself in all the archival material and I just kind of gave it up to instinct really.
 |  |  |  |
JB: You worked on the accent? BG: Oh yeah, yeah. JB: How did you do that? BG: Listening to tape, watching file footage. MV: You also, got the walk.... SJ: And the stature. I mean you did the President thing. I believed it. I forgot Bruce Greenwood and started thinking JFK. BG: Well, they helped me a little bit. You know, I’d walk on the set and they’d address me as "Good morning, Mr. President." MV: Oh, they did? Mr. President? BG: Yeah. [nodding] MV: Did they really? BG: It stopped when I got home. JB: Do you miss it? BG: Yeah, I do. JB: Kevin Costner was also in the movie. He was wonderful in the movie, also. We just love this film. I was saying to you back stage how serious you are as John Kennedy because it’s such a serious subject. But I heard that off camera you two were wacky. Do you remember this one incident? BG: Well, there were a lot of guitars on the set and the Brothers Kennedy would play guitar when they weren’t saving the world, which was kind of fun. JB: Didn't you hold up a placard in one scene?
 |  |  |  |  |
Bruce tells the story about joining extras during a filmed demonstration | ||||
BG: Well there is a scene - for those of you who haven’t seen the movie it’s been out in just a couple cities. But there’s a scene where Kevin’s walking to and fro in front of the White House and there’s a bunch of guys with placards saying, "Give the missiles back that are in Turkey." I’d finished early that day so I went and painted up a sign that said "Take the Gonzales kid back to Cuba"..........[demonstrates with hands and body movement marching with a placard] ....Marching back and forth......... The director’s like watching, [bends forward and puts hands to face like he's looking into a monitor] looking in the monitor, and he’s watching Kevin, and finally prints it. And you know, it’s a lot of people and it’s expensive and everything. And he finally says [using Roger Donaldson's broad Australian accent with loud authority] "Right! And moving on!"...... [very quietly, conspiratorily] and he hadn’t noticed it.... JB: That there’s a "Free Elian" in there? BG: And everyone, everybody else on the set is like....[makes nervous face, exaggeratedly crosses leg and covers mouth with hand in horror].... So somebody else comes up and goes, [he leans over and conspiratorily talks to Star] "Look, look, one more time at the monitor" and he watches - and he sees it - and just kinda lost it. LL: I hope you got another take of that? BG: [Using his Donaldson voice again, loud and angry] It costs a lot of money to make a movie. Christ, what are you doing? SJ: You should have said to him, "No one addresses the President like that." BG: [Makes silly face] Yeah, right. I tried that early on. LL: By the way, Kevin Costner is actually coming on our show next Friday. But I want to ask you about this research that you did. BG: [Makes big groan] LL: Yeah, I know. You said you immersed yourself in research about JFK. Was there anything that surprised you about him?
 |  |  |  |
BG: I had no idea what a voracious intellect he had. He read incessantly, and he loved poets. And on occasion he would pull a quote from an obscure poet into a meeting discussing some kind of, some political situation. LL: Nuclear disarmament..... (she laughs) BG: Whatever. But he would pull in this obscure quote that would.....recontextualize what they were talking about, so mixing art and........... JB: Well, we’re not going to see the likes of that again. BG: Not in the near future anyway. JB: More like Mother Goose, I think. BG: [Laughs loudly] SJ: Kennedy and Sorensen together. I mean that’s when you felt like you were talking to the President. You really were. Actually, we felt like we were talking to the President, thanks to Bruce Greenwood. You did a fantastic job. BG: Thanks. SJ: Thirteen Days opens today in theaters everywhere. You know, we recommend some movies, but this one you will not be disappointed. Trust me.
 Thirteen Days Television Interviews |