The director Leonardo DiCaprio called impeccable: “He trusts his gut”
Leonardo DiCaprio has worked with some of the greatest directors to have ever lived. He’s a favourite of Martin Scorsese, having worked for him on projects such as The Aviator, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Killers of the Flower Moon. Baz Luhrmann and James Cameron helped him achieve global superstardom with Romeo + Juliet and Titanic, respectively, and he’s set to team up with Paul Thomas Anderson for the director’s upcoming crime thriller, The Battle of Baktan Cross.
Considering the pool of talent DiCaprio has swum in, his praise for any particular director is definitely worth paying attention to. In 2011, he appeared in J Edgar, a biopic of the infamous FBI director that was helmed by somebody equally historic, Clint Eastwood. While promoting the film, the star spoke highly of working alongside the legendary cowboy.
“Eastwood’s process is impeccable because he trusts his own instincts, he trusts his gut,” DiCaprio told Female. “There’s a beautiful simplicity to the way he works; he has one vision, which made it easier to do my job. He’s really like a corner man. It was like going into the ring and having your coach there, backing you up. And I think that confidence and support are evident on the screen.”
DiCaprio starred as Hoover himself, the man responsible for establishing the modern Bureau and for implementing some of its seedier practices. The film also goes into detail regarding Hoover’s complex personal life; his controversial relationship with second-in-command and probable lover Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer) is covered in great detail against a backdrop of discrimination and close-mindedness that Hoover himself helped to foster. It doesn’t include every aspect of the man’s life, but it does a decent job in hitting the main points of an extraordinary life.
“This was one of the most challenging characters I’d ever seen on the page,” DiCaprio revealed, praising scriptwriter Dustin Lance Black for condensing decades worth of information into a two-hour experience. “Communism was almost like a terrorist movement in Hoover’s eyes, and he battled it and other perceived enemies throughout his career. Dustin Lance Black analysed him as a young man and an old man, critiquing him in every possible way.”
Black, who had previously worked on the script for Milk, was keen to explore another historical figure. “To me, he seemed the very opposite of Milk,” he said. “A man with tremendous political power, but intensely closeted when it came to his personal life.”
By the end of their time working together, Eastwood also became a fan of the man who’d been chosen to lead his project. “Leonardo DiCaprio’s very bright, and he likes doing offbeat parts that stretch his imagination,” Eastwood asserted. “I knew this one would be tough, both mentally and physically, but he was very dedicated, and I think that really shows in his performance.”
Since the success of J. Edgar, for which DiCaprio received widespread acclaim, he and Eastwood have yet to properly collaborate on another film. The closest they’ve come is the 2019 picture Richard Jewell, the story of a security guard who, after finding a bomb at the site of the 1996 Olympic Games, is arrested and accused of planting it himself. Eastwood directed the movie, while DiCaprio served as one of the producers. He was originally going to play Watson Bryant, the lawyer who defended Jewell, but that part eventually went to Sam Rockwell.
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