-Happy birthday.
It was yesterday, yeah? -Oh, yeah, yesterday.
-Congratulations. -Yeah, thank you. I made it. [ Cheers and applause ] -Been quite a year. Oscar nomination
for "BlacKkKlansman." A Tony nomination
for "Burn This." Got a bunch of movies
coming out. "Star Wars," of course,
coming, as well. How you feeling,
a little overwhelmed? -It's good. I'm good. -Alright, good.
-Yeah. -If you weren't good now,
I feel like, maybe never. -Yeah, right, right. -This film is getting
wonderful responses. It's about a divorce.
It's about custody. It seems very intense. Was it an emotional film to do? -It was, but, I mean,
I don't mean to make it sound more challenging
than what it is. It's the what -- The subject
matter is intense, yeah. But if anything, that was
a testament to the good writing. -Yeah.
-Usually, there's like one scene that you know is in the schedule that seems -- that you are
trying to avoid, you know, 'cause it's emotionally
challenging or it's, like, physical or you just are aware of it
in the schedule, but all of the scenes
in this movie seemed too early in the schedule
for them to be happening, which is again I think why
what Noah wrote is really great. -You've --
This is Noah Baumbach. I believe this is
your fourth film with him. -Yeah, fourth time.
-So you must have an expectation when you -- when he sends you a
script for something like this. You were probably looking
forward to reading it. Did this feel different?
Like as soon as you started going through, were you like,
"Oh, this is exceptional"? -Well, we had been talking about
it for months leading up to it, if not a year at that point. So I knew things
that were going to be in it. We talked a lot about structure. He really wanted to make a movie that played with
audience's allegiances, that kind of starts
with one character, and maybe, you know, you switch. So, there were structural things
that we talked about. We talked about -- You know,
we know each other. We're friends, so we meet
at dinner all the time, and we bring
our personal things to dinner and talk about it there. So, I think what I was most, um,
impressed by was after -- And he had just
been talking to me. He'd been talking to Laura Dern.
He'd been talking to Scarlett. He'd been talking to lawyers,
you know? So, by the time
I actually read it, how he had taken
all of those ideas and kind of made
this one document that seamlessly did all of it -- you know, had all these
interesting structures, but didn't sacrifice, you know,
blood that was happening in the scene. So, I just -- I think as soon as I read it,
I'm like, "Oh, I'll never get anything
like this again." -One thing you do in the film
is, you sing a song from Stephen Sondheim's
"Company." -Yeah.
-"Being Alive." So, that was something
that you guys had discussed and talked about wanting to do? -Yeah. At one point, we thought
about doing a movie of "Company" 'cause, you know, if you know
the musical, it seems like maybe it'd lend itself to a film.
It's kind of abstract. -And so, that didn't happen,
but you still sang this song. Was this a song -- Was this
something that you then wanted? You, basically
in the discussion, were like, "I'd really love
to sing this song"? -He put it in. He -- if I remember correctly,
and where he puts it in, which I don't want
to give anything away, but I thought was just
a beautiful, you know, piece of writing. You know, and similar
to great musical theater, it's not just a song
for the sake of it. Hopefully, you learn something
about the character. You know, by the end, he's
transformed into something else. -Uh, you have a history
of musicals. You were in a high school
production of "Oklahoma"? -"History" is loose,
but yeah, yeah. -What was your role
in "Oklahoma"? The lead, I'm assuming? -No, no. I was a chorus member. I had a line that --
How did you find that? that, I said, "Check his heart."
That was my line. -That was your one line,
was, "Check his heart?" -Yeah, Curly gets shot, right,
I think at the end, and then there's, like,
all the chorus guys come, and they're like,
"What happened?" And I say, "Check his heart," which is not really
a good line, right? -Yeah.
-I just saw this guy get shot. -Right. It also
seems like somebody who's, like, not a doctor
but maybe met one once. -Right, right, right. Yeah.
-Yeah. -"I think I know the next thing
you do is check his heart. That's key."
-Right. -Totally different in tone
and especially from, like, you know, this is --
-"Oklahoma?" -"Oklahoma" totally different
from "Marriage Story," but also "The Report,"
which is another film you have. -Oh, yeah, yeah. -So, this is
an incredible source material to write a screenplay of. This is actually a report that was written basically
about the CIA torture programs. -Yeah.
-And you're playing the guy who wrote that report. So that must be weird, I mean, 'cause I'm assuming
you don't, in the beginning, read this sort of 600-page
torture report. -Yeah, over 6,000-page --
Well, no one has. Well, not no one. People have. It just hasn't been released. It's been heavily redacted. There is a version
that you can buy on Amazon, which I hate to say, 'cause
it sounds like an Amazon plug. but -- 'Cause the movie
is released by Amazon. But I guess that's my job
is to say it. But it is easy to get on Amazon.
[ Laughter ] A heavily redacted version
of the script and even -- Or of the report.
And just reading that, even just reading the opening,
you know, findings and conclusions section,
it's pretty harrowing.
