The most disappointing moment of George Clooney’s directing career: “That’s where you get screwed”
The evolution from in front of the camera to behind is a natural progression for many actors once they reach a certain stature. Taking on the role of producer or director is a rite of passage for those who hope to prove themselves worthy against some of the great multihyphenates. But it’s no easy feat, and many have struggled to combine the roles.
One actor who seems to have mastered the career transition is George Clooney, whose filmmaker and producer catalogue includes critically acclaimed films like the Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), The Ides of March (2011) and The Monuments Men (2014).
But there’s one film Clooney directed that struggled to hook audiences. While many of us are familiar with his phenomenal performance in the 2013 film Gravity, the actor also donned a spacesuit for a similar role seven years later in a film he directed and starred in.
The Midnight Sky, a post-apocalyptic sci-fi drama, follows Augustine, a lonely scientist in the Arctic played by George Clooney, who desperately tries to contact a returning crew of astronauts to warn them of a global catastrophe on Earth.
Clooney’s directorial adaptation of Lily Brooks-Dalton’s novel Good Morning, Midnight had a budget of around $100million, allowing for visually stunning cinematography and an immersive feel intended to be experienced at IMAX cinemas. But the film’s release during the pandemic cut the dream short, with the actor later saying that the reception would have “been a very different outcome had we been able to open on the big screen”.
George Clooney’s most troubled directing project
As is often the case with disappointment, The Midnight Sky was ushered to streaming through Netflix in the run-up to Christmas at the height of the lockdown in the US and the UK, but was met with mixed reviews from critics and the public, with the actor attributing the reviews partly to the pandemic, arguing that the film was intended to be seen on a big screen, not by people “sitting at home on their couch”.
Ticket sales in the first few weeks of a film’s cinema run can be indicative of its success and ability to break even, especially if the film has gone over budget, something Clooney’s team had to adapt to, with the actor revealing that the pandemic doubled Midnight Sky’s budget.
But the impact of the pandemic changed how films were released, and with cinemas and movie theatres closed across the world in 2020, streaming platforms saw a significant increase in popularity.
Speaking to Deadline about the film in 2021, Clooney spoke candidly about the film’s reception. “When we did Midnight Sky, it was designed with large landscapes,” he said. “We really worked hard to make it a big film release, we had a date for it, a two or three-week window where we first came out in the theatres.”
But this plan “fell apart” when the pandemic forced cinemas to close in 2020. “That’s where you get screwed with that, right, but that was the pandemic that really took us out,” the actor reflected.
George Clooney is due to star in Jay Kelley, a “heartbreaking comedy” written and directed by Noah Baumbach, expected to be released later this year. It’s already causing a stir among critics, perhaps a sign that the actor is back on course to step onto the Oscars red carpet once more.
