A Feast of Film
Robert Benton on Actors, Storytelling and Where We Go from Here

Academy Award-winning writer/director Robert Benton has always relied upon the right actors to get his words across. From Bonnie and Clyde to Bad Company, from Kramer vs. Kramer to Places in the Heart, from Superman to Nobody’s Fool, if the casting wasn’t spot-on to perfection the no matter what the overall consensus to the picture was for him it would still be regarded as nothing more than a failure.

Morgan Freeman, Greg Kinnear and director Robert Benton on the set of MGM's Feast of Love

Benton’s latest Feast of Love, based on the best selling novel by Charles Baxter, is certainly no exception. He could give his actors all the right places to stand and feed them the best words in the world but if they hadn’t fit their characters perfectly none of what he wanted to do would have made a lick of difference. “I’ve enjoyed the casting on this picture more than anything I’ve ever done,” stated the director succinctly. “Once you have Morgan [Freeman], your obligation is to only get heavyweights around him. And that’s a big challenge. A good challenge, a fantastic challenge, but a big challenge all the same.”

I had the honor to sit down with the legendary Hollywood filmmaker while he was flying through Seattle for an extremely brief tour, and while our time was short listening to him speak about his life, career, the studio system and of his current motion picture might have just been the highlight of my entire year. I was, almost to my embarrassment, in awe of the man, the feeling only magnifying as we sat together at the Hotel 1000 to talk.

“When you’re dealing with the range of [characters] we were dealing with casting is hugely important,” continued Benton. “We saw and talked to people and saw and talked and saw and talked over and over and over. It was terrific, and I think we got it right.”

A sentiment I couldn’t help but agree with. At the same time, I couldn’t help but point out that, as good as it was, many of his choices weren’t exactly ones most people would have necessarily expected. But then that’s been a hallmark of all of Benton’s films, the director using actors like Jeff Bridges (Bad Company), Bruce Willis (Nobody’s Fool) and Reese Witherspoon (Twilight) in roles most people never would have thought they would see them in.

The filmmaker can’t help but chuckle at this statement. “It’s interesting that you bring that up,” he interjects with a smile. “I knew when I saw Reese she was going to be a major actor. I’d seen her work and I liked it but there was just something about her that made me think she would really shine [in Twilight]. But, I knew back then she was going to be a star.”

And what of Greg Kinnear here? Did Benton know he was going to be absolutely perfect as constantly love-struck coffee shop owner Bradley? “I think he’s great,” he answers immediately. “If this era has a Jack Lemmon than he is it. He’s a comic and he can break your heart and he has that quiet unassuming quality. He’s a spectacular actor. We were talking to a bunch of people and he was very high on my list [for Bradley]. I was just waiting for him to walk into the room, and when he did there was no question that he was it. He’s magnificent.”

But Feast of Love isn’t just about a couple of men played by Freeman and Kinnear. It is, much like many (but not all) of the director’s previous efforts, an ensemble piece, and it makes sense that Benton cast with a constant eye towards trying to figure out who could work best together under those circumstances.

“I try to stay away from actors who act alone,” he says matter-of-factly. “Let me [talk] about Morgan. Morgan is a great actor. One of the reasons he’s a great actor, or one of the signs he’s a great actor, is because he listens. I don’t mean because he listens to the director I mean he listens to the other characters. He doesn’t wait for his lines. He listens. And he doesn’t ‘act’ listening. He actually listens.”

“I have a friend who is a therapist and we’re sitting at dinner talking and he’s acting listening, and I know this. As a therapist, he’s always sitting there across from you but he always has to nodding his head and letting you know he’s listening to you so I told him to not do that to me. With Morgan, he really listens. It’s that hardest thing, listening, for an actor to do.”

Morgan Freeman and Alexa Davalos in MGM's Feast of Love

“Actors don’t think acting is being still. What I like for in actors is that they know what they’re doing, and you know that not from their reading but by their sense of themselves, and that they can be still, that they are not busy actors. And I’ve been very lucky. The actors I have worked with I have been incredibly lucky, luckier than almost anybody.”

And that luck has translated to seven Oscar nominations (most recently for his screenplay to Nobody’s Fool) and three wins (his last coming in 1985 for Places in the Heart). And is that way so many great actors like Freeman, Bridges, Paul Newman, Sally Field, Warren Beatty, Art Carney, Susan Sarandon, Anthony Hopkins and Gene Hackman have chosen to spend their time working with him?

“I think [Robert] Altman taught me to listen to and to trust actors,” answers Benton. “One of the smartest things [he] ever said to me was, ‘There is a moment in a picture where an actor is going to know the character better than you know it and then you’ve got a watch, you’ve got to listen to what they do.’ And that statement changed my life. I think since then I’ve done my best to listen to and trust actors and I think they know that, they know they can risk all kinds of things with me and I’ll do all I can to protect them. I’ll let them go off on a limb if they want to and still know that we’ll both be okay.”

“Acting is the hardest job I know. If you want to make a good picture you have to listen to your actors, you really do. Be careful who you hire and then listen. Listen above all else.”

And Benton should know. In four-plus decades he helped change the way movies are rated with Bonnie and Clyde, helped birth the comic book event picture with Superman and gave Nicole Kidman one of her first starring roles with Billy Bathgate. And how have things changed?

“It’s been forty years since Bonnie and Clyde,” he answers. “Now, count back forty years before that. That was silent films. Think how much we changed in that forty years. Now think about the modern day. What’s changed now? Two things. One is that corporations took over movie studios and they are no longer run by entrepreneurs. They have a different business plan then they used to have meaning the entire economic structure of the distribution and the making of movies has changed radically and the dust there has not settled yet.”

“The second is that the interne is completely going to revolutionize any notion we have about film. You’re going to be able to have twelve hour films made now. You’re going to be able to have five minute films now. Films will not cease being audience group participation events but there will be another kind of movies, a thousand kinds of movies. Movies will be just one form of a visual narrative entertainment that you have and new things will happen that we cannot dream about. You will have complete freedom to do whatever you want to do.”

Greg Kinnear and Radha Mitchell in MGM's Feast of Love

And what does that mean? “People will stop making conventional movies,” answers Benton emphatically. “I don’t mean conventional movies will disappear, but other kinds of movies will start showing up which will have enormous impact on conventional movies. Innovations in narrative, innovations in storytelling, all of this is going to start happening. This is a great time, a great moment to be a young person involved in whatever it is we mean when we say film. My son is forty years old and I think he is so lucky. It is a great time.”

Additional Links:

-  Feast of Love Review by Sara Michelle Fetters
-  Feast of Love Theatrical Trailer