Blonde filmmaker Andrew Dominik has credited his pal Brad Pitt with saving him from “director jail” – admitting the movie star helps him out whenever he has a project that’s stalled.
Brad Pitt saved Blonde filmmaker Andrew Dominik from “director jail”.
The 61-year-old actor starred in Dominik’s 2007 Western The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and 2012 movie Killing Them Softly, as well as producing his Marilyn Monroe biopic Blonde – and Dominik has now credited his longtime friend with helping him out whenever one of his film projects stalls.
During an interview at the Marrakech Film Festival in Morocco, Dominik explained: ” Brad is the reason I’ve worked. It’s like, I make a film and then they put me in director jail.
“And then Brad comes down to the parole board and says: ‘Look, he’s learned his lesson. He’s going to make something a bit more user-friendly this time’.
“He protects me … I’m really lucky to have a friendship like that.”
Dominik went on to talk about casting Ana de Armas as Marilyn Monroe in his 2022 film Blonde – admitting the actress as a “certain magic to her”.
He said: “She had a heavy Latino accent, but her face … she had these little jowls here and the wide-set eyes and the nose. I thought: ‘That girl could be Marilyn’ …
“[She was] very worried about her accent [ but] she was amazing. There’s a certain magic to her …
“Blonde did not come to life until Ana de Armas came along. Because when you saw a little screen test of her as Marilyn, you could see the whole film.”
The part landed Ana an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress but the film didn’t land well with film fans and Dominik admits he was baffled by the negative reaction from audiences.
He said: “I don’t understand … [I was] surprised by the reaction … It’s kind of a horror film, and I guess that’s what people didn’t expect. But I like it.”
The director went on to explain he would often prefer to cast unknown actors in his films but he’s often under pressure to land star names.
He said: “You would always cast unknown actors if you could, right? It’s so great when you see a movie and you don’t know any of the actors, because you just accept them as the characters.
“The reality of making films is, until you have an actor that is bankable, nobody’s going to pay for that movie. It’s not like you have a choice. Often you have to miscast a movie to get it made.”
Brad Pitt saved Andrew Dominik from ‘director jail’
