The director Cate Blanchett called “pretty close to perfect”
Not all actors are going to get on with their directors, for one thing, actors quite often have pretty big egos, and that’s never going to mix well with someone telling them what to do constantly and pointing out every little thing they’d like changed. We hear plenty about when they fall out, but not as often about when they get on royally, rather like Cate Blanchett did with Ron Howard.
When you think about it, perhaps it’s not that much of a surprise, after all, we’re talking about the man who was Richie Cunningham in Happy Days, surely he’s not going to be some kind of cinematic despot, hurling expletive-laden directions through a megaphone at cowering actors before he throws his beret to the ground and storms off to his trailer? No, apparently not. Although Howard does have something of an opposite side, he generally seems to be a sound enough chap with a mild disposition.
Blanchett has worked under an awful lot of directors in her very nearly thirty years of making movies, and so it says something that Howard stood out for her when they teamed up for the 2003 western-thriller The Missing with Tommy Lee Jones, an experience that the Australian actor described as “pretty close to perfect for me”.
She told Blackfilm, “(He) has complete and utter understanding of what it takes to craft an exciting and engaging film that takes an audience along with it. But he never sacrifices the detailed moments, the human moments… he’s the most uncomplicated, frank person I’ve ever met in my life and so you always know where you stand with him.”
High praise indeed, especially when you consider Howard also had to direct Tommy Lee Jones, who is not exactly known as the friendliest presence to have on set. The film itself was not the hit they might have hoped for. Unfortunately, the story of a female doctor in the late 1800s whose daughter is kidnapped by an Apache sorcerer simply didn’t land with audiences, and it bombed heavily, costing the studio tens of millions in losses.
But Blanchett continued to wax lyrical about Howard nevertheless, adding, “Everyone just wants to do everything they possibly can for him because he respects the people he’s working with and he’s very collaborative… He’s truly an extraordinary not only director, but a person.”
Perhaps Ron slipped her twenty quid at the wrap party; we’ll never know, but they haven’t worked again in the past twenty-three years, so maybe the feeling wasn’t quite as mutual. That’s unlikely, though, because both Howard and Blanchette continue to be at the top of their respective professions, Blanchette picking up eight career Academy Award nominations, winning two and Howard almost matching her with two Oscars and four nods, for A Beautiful Mind and Frost/Nixon, respectively.
Most recently, Blanchett was all kinds of stylish and sophisticated as an intelligence officer in Stephen Soderbergh’s classy thriller Black Bag, and she’s quite likely to have more success with the upcoming sci-fi Alpha Gang alongside Riley Keough and Dave Bautista, an adventure comedy about a group of aliens who disguise themselves as 1950s bikers. Howard, meanwhile, has just finished filming with Adam Driver and Anne Hathaway on Alone at Dawn, the modern war tale of a Medal of Honour winner.
