Joseph Gordon-Levitt on FLORA AND SON and his passion for music
SUCOPRESS/Raquel Laguna. Actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars in the movie FLORA AND SON, directed by John Carney. In this interview, Joseph talks about his character in the film and working with actress Eve Hewson. Gordon-Levitt also talks about his love for music. In FLORA AND SON, single mom Flora (Eve Hewson) is at a loss about what to do with her rebellious teenage son, Max (Orén Kinlan). Encouraged by the police to find Max a hobby, Flora tries to occupy him with a beat-up acoustic guitar. With the help of a washed-up LA musician (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Flora and Max discover the transformative power of music. From the musical mind of John Carney, FLORA AND SON explores the bond between a mother and son on a journey toward a new harmony.
Transcript
00:00 Finally, you get to play music in a movie.
00:04 Is that what attracted you the most to this project?
00:10 Yeah, that's definitely one of the things.
00:13 You're right, I've always wanted to be in a musical.
00:16 And I love movie musicals.
00:19 But, the truth is, most movie musicals, I don't like so much.
00:25 And John Carney, the writer and director of this movie, "Flora and Son,"
00:30 he makes a very special kind of musical that feel...
00:35 All of his movies, they feel real.
00:38 They feel like you're watching real human beings feeling real feelings.
00:42 So when I saw one of his scripts come across my desk, I was thrilled.
00:47 I was like, "Yes, please let me be in a John Carney movie."
00:52 And what did you like the most about Jeff, your character,
00:55 and this special relationship with Flora?
00:59 I love a love story that's through music.
01:04 This isn't just a musical where the characters all of a sudden start singing.
01:09 This is a story about a woman who's kind of lost in life
01:15 and disconnected from her son and who starts to learn the guitar.
01:20 And through learning music, finds herself again and reconnects with her son.
01:25 And I'm playing this online guitar teacher who's teaching her the guitar
01:29 that's kind of opening up her life.
01:32 I love that idea of bonding over music.
01:37 So many movies, characters fall in love. Why?
01:42 Because they're good-looking or something?
01:44 Or because there's some kind of other cute coincidence
01:47 or something that makes them fall in love?
01:49 This isn't that.
01:50 Because that's not how life really is,
01:53 or that's not how you build a really beautiful and profound love with another person.
01:56 There should be substance to what you both care about and what you both share.
02:01 And so I love this love story that centers around music.
02:06 And was it challenging to shoot those scenes about the Zoom conversations?
02:13 We've all gotten so used to talking on Zoom nowadays through the pandemic.
02:18 And so it felt very normal and natural.
02:21 Plus, I've done lots of creativity online, even way before the pandemic.
02:25 I was doing this online community called Hit Record,
02:28 where lots of people from all over the world were using the internet to make art together.
02:32 So that felt very natural to me as well.
02:35 Music is like your thing in life? Better than acting?
02:39 I love them both.
02:42 When I very, very, very first started acting when I was a little kid,
02:46 it was because of a music teacher, actually.
02:49 My music teacher was named Miss Karen.
02:52 And I was in a choir, and she also taught piano lessons.
02:57 And then she also started doing these musical theater productions.
03:01 And I was in these kids' community theater shows of Guys and Dolls and Peter Pan and Grease and The Music Man and things like that with Miss Karen.
03:14 And so, yeah, music was sort of the way that I got into acting when I was very small.
03:19 And I've always loved music.
03:23 And like I said, I've always wanted to do music in a movie, and now I finally, finally got to.