The idiotic Coen brothers role that Brad Pitt claimed he couldn’t play: “You’ll be fine”
Brad Pitt has played his fair share of fiercely intelligent characters in his storied career. He’s also played a lot of characters who mightn’t be book-smart, but have a streetwise sensibility that helps them excel. Heck, he’s even played the occasional lovable slacker whose smarts might have been up for debate, but they couldn’t truly be classified as idiots. In truth, the only time Pitt portrayed a bona fide dolt – a man with nothing but air between his ears – he wasn’t entirely sure he knew how to play the part. Amusingly, his directors, the Coen brothers, reassured him he was the man for the job. Luckily, he chose not to take offence.
In truth, the Coens have made a career out of hiring exceedingly famous actors to play extraordinarily stupid people. The quirky, quick-witted duo have a habit of mixing oddball comedy with noirish tales of dangerous people making bad decisions, and they often populate those movies with characters of, shall we say, questionable intelligence. In fact, George Clooney – one of the most famous and respected actors in the world – played dimwitted fools the first three times he worked with the brothers.
“I’ve done three films with them, and they call it my trilogy of idiots,” Clooney chuckled in 2008. In fact, when the shoot wrapped on Burn After Reading, Clooney’s third go-around with the Coens, Joel claimed the Out of Sight star told him, “OK, I’ve played my last idiot” To that, the wry director deadpanned, “So, I guess he won’t be working with us again.”
Interestingly, though, with Burn After Reading, the brothers wanted to expand their idiotic horizons by telling a tale of, as they put it, “duelling idiots.” To play a mind-bogglingly dopey gym instructor opposite Clooney’s twitchy, nervous, yet no less dopey federal marshal, the Coens sought out Clooney’s pal and Ocean’s Eleven co-star Pitt.
“After reading the part, which they said was hand-written for myself, I was not sure if I should be flattered or insulted,” Pitt joked. His worries weren’t exactly alleviated when Joel confirmed they only envisioned Pitt as this particular “knucklehead.”
Clooney, though, who was used to being made to look like a buffoon by the Coens, admitted that the script made him “howl” when he read it, and joked, “This one might end two careers in one shot” with the level of brainlessness displayed by two of Hollywood’s most enduring heartthrobs.
However, even thought Clooney and Pitt had a great time ribbing each other with quips like, “It’s a real stretch. George and I each play a loser in our own minds,” Pitt also admitted to feeling some hesitation when he signed up for the role. After all, he wasn’t quite sure how to go about playing a man with a number of brain cells that could be counted on one hand. In fact, he was so unsure that he voiced his concerns to the Coens.
“I said to them, ‘I don’t know how to play this, I mean, he’s such an idiot.'” With impeccable comic timing, though, he revealed the brothers simply paused, considered what they were going to say, and then mused, “You’ll be fine.” And thus, the bouffant, buff, and charmingly dumb Chad Feldheimer was born.
