Adrien Brody sits down to guess lines from some of his most memorable movies and TV shows. He discusses the "gift" of being in 'King Kong', the unexpected connection between 'Summer of Sam' and his mother's photography, and what 'The Brutalist' taught him about the immigrant experience.
Category
✨
PeopleTranscript
00:00It's pretty easy, it's pretty easy. I think I'm gonna probably know all I said this line
00:15You want to win you got to be like this tight Pat Riley and winning time you want to win
00:23You got to be like this
00:25tight
00:27And I proceeded to punch a chalkboard which they had tethered to the ground with a lot of sandbags
00:33So it wouldn't go flying and it didn't move
00:38Practically broke my knuckles sort of the double we both ended up with like ice packs. It was kind of the
00:44invention and birth of
00:46Celebrity athletes and the power that they had and the allure that they had and the cultural
00:52Significance of that and how it's shaped a lot of how athletes are idolized today. It was a wild time
00:59You know, there's a much more wild time a much freer time. So definitely very entertaining
01:06Good legs
01:08See legs. I wonder how I delivered that. I'm curious, but it's a funny line. It was something like that. Is this from King Kong?
01:15It's been a while good legs
01:18See legs, it was such a gift to work with Peter Jackson and at the time I think it was Universal's biggest
01:26Movie wonderful cast and of course the lore of King Kong. I loved that movie
01:32I knew the significance of it to Peter and it was the movie that made him want to be a filmmaker and
01:37he had all the success off of Lord of the Rings and I had never done a
01:43Proper studio film like that and and yet it was very much like a large-scale independent movie
01:50He had complete kind of auteur creative
01:54autonomy, he just had more toys and material and
01:59Technology and time which was very interesting. It was a nine-month endeavor the more
02:05complexity and depth in the characters and the more room there is for an actor to
02:11Exhibit truth and frailty and flaws human
02:16characteristics
02:18in a world with
02:20monsters
02:21supernatural
02:22Superheroes the more it seems relatable to me if it doesn't possess that I'm not that interested somehow
02:30Personally, but I can see how they're
02:33vastly entertaining. Oh
02:36Oh
02:39That's nice
02:41You stop neglecting his needs or I'll start fucking with yours. That's from Detachment
02:48My character was Henry Barthes. I believe he was talking to someone in the old age home about not caring for his father
02:57You stop neglecting his needs or I will start fucking with yours. My father
03:03Was a public school teacher so I grew up product of public school
03:07But I also seeing how much my father had given how thoughtful he was and he was a great great teacher and his students loved
03:13him and spoke to me to kind of honor the sacrifice and the
03:18Patience to be a good teacher and to be there to help guide
03:23the many kids who kind of need guidance some people are really willing to help and be thoughtful and
03:31Help them align with an understanding of self and that they have opportunities ahead of them
03:39It's pretty obvious. I'll play the piano again on Polish radio
03:45hmm
03:46King of the Hill
03:49Okay, the pianist did I say that in Polish in the movie? Oh, that's interesting
03:55Not these days
04:00In life you you make choices and then you don't know why I had been offered an
04:06Opportunity to do quite a big studio film in a supporting role
04:12and didn't quite relate to
04:14The role and didn't have any other work lined up and I had passed and had I had taken that film in retrospect
04:20I wouldn't have been available to have done the pianist
04:22I was definitely right for it
04:24but there are many people that were vying for this role and life-changing opportunity and
04:29a remarkable thing to be a part of celebrating the survival of the human spirit and also acknowledging the enormity of
04:37Suffering that's existed and during the Holocaust and that time in history
04:45Okay
04:48Francis here's your belt
04:52Wes Anderson's
04:58Darjeeling limited I throw my belt that Owen Wilson
05:03Francis yeah, here's your belt
05:08Wes is a very precise
05:11Unique filmmaker. He has a real clear vision of what he wants and knows it Wes will now create
05:18Animatics, it's kind of moving storyboards so that everyone
05:22clearly understands the specificity the detail that
05:26fits within the world that he's trying to create and then we all figure out how we can
05:31Conform to that and also come alive and it's lots of fun. It's quite
05:37precise work I
05:39said this line in a movie
05:42hmm, I
05:43Don't remember evil spelled backwards is live
05:48That's a good line. What was it? Oh
05:53That's great, I don't remember this line I haven't seen
05:57Summer of Sam I have not seen this film in a very long time. I love this movie evil spelled backwards is live
06:02I thought you would give me if you were gonna give me summer of Sam you give me something like it's all in the attitude
06:07It's all in the attitude. You want to know something really crazy the
06:12Costume designer brought me in for a fitting and we started looking at her
06:17look book and
06:19ideas
06:20for the character and she had my mom's book my mom's photographer and she had her book red light which has
06:29Images of punk and that my mother had photographed as a reference to dress me and I said
06:34I'm 24 years old. You got my mom dressing me funny still, but she did it was really interesting
06:45It's a quite ornate
06:47Sentence structure if I learn you ever once laid a finger on my mother's body living or dead. I swear to God
06:53I'll cut your throat. Oh, this is another Wes Anderson film. This is Grand Budapest Hotel. It took me a second
07:00I learned you ever once laid a finger on my mother's body living or dead. I swear to God. I'll cut your throat
07:05No, I love that film so much. It's really kind of timeless movie full of wonderful moments and
07:11People and the experience of making it was really special. Um, it's probably one of my favorite films of Wes's all-time. Yeah
07:22Everything that is ugly cruel
07:25stupid but most important ugly
07:29Everything is your fault. This is from The Brutalist
07:34My character Laszlo is speaking to the foreman on a construction site and basically telling him off
07:43He's you
07:45We look back fondly at the 50s and the lens is somewhat nostalgic
07:49But it was a it was a very difficult challenging time
07:52I think especially I guess the immigrant perspective of coming to America and
07:58Disconnect between how one's dreams of seeking safe haven and the freedoms and hopes and dreams of what the American
08:06Dream may provide and then the harsh reality of that and the oppressive nature of the hardships that people endured at that time
08:14I think this it became very
08:17Something I became very conscious of my friend
08:21Owns the Marble Quarry
08:23So I helped with securing a vast location for the film and the storytelling that's it's really so beautiful
08:30It's like a seven-year ongoing endeavor for Brady and Mona his wife and creative partner
08:35It's an amazing amazing script and he made an even more amazing film out of it
08:42Okay
08:45That's good, I don't remember saying this so much I know what you want even before you say it
08:53I
08:58Know what you want even before you say it. Yeah, give me a hint a TV series. Oh
09:04Depends on how you say it. I got you
09:07It's from Peaky Blinders
09:10Luca chan Greta I
09:12Know what you want even before you say it see now. I remember the line. I
09:18Know what you want
09:20Even before you say it I kind of
09:24Yearn to play a character like that my whole life. I grew up in a neighborhood in Queens with a lot of Italian Americans who?
09:33idolized gangster mafia lore filmed and a
09:38number of them were affiliated with
09:44Some degree of criminal
09:47You know, there are lots of people in this world that are
09:52Affiliated to some extent and I feel it's life imitating art because it is
09:59Somewhat glamorized in some of the great films of the 70s. And of course, there's something wonderfully
10:06Powerful about those characters and
10:09There is something alluring to them especially in a working-class community and I'd like to do
10:16Several movies like that. I mean, it's really fun. It's like it's a great part
10:21I don't know. It's great to emulate in real life, but it sure is fun to play in a film
10:29This planet is a game preserved
10:32And we're the game yeah, it's easy
10:35That was a blast. That was Royce in predators. This planet is a game preserve
10:43I'm ready to game that was a movie
10:46I grew up loving like I remember cutting school and sitting with my friends in the front row watching
10:53Schwarzenegger and predator and interestingly when they came to me with this
10:57They didn't want me to put not interesting, but they didn't want me to play Royce
10:59They wanted me to play another part and I advocated for why?
11:04I'm right to play Royce and why?
11:07soldiers don't often look like
11:10Schwarzenegger and it's more about an emotional hardness and a military tactical awareness and
11:16Intelligence and that ultimately was what defeated the predator even in Schwarzenegger's film. Not his brawn. I
11:23I
11:25Do remember this line this was many years ago. This is like in
11:301996
11:31Or jeez, I guess no matter how many times you hear that song play in the Major League Stadium on a warm afternoon
11:40It's still emotionally evocative
11:44Well, that's Danny hammerling a baseball player and angels in the outfield
11:53Stadium on a warm afternoon
11:55still emotionally evocative just like my
11:59one break that allowed me to stay in LA and not go back to
12:05University and stay and pursue my career because I didn't have the resources to do that and I made a
12:12Promise to myself that if I didn't get work within
12:16that window
12:18Which I did cheat a little on I would come back and it saved me
12:24or at least allowed me to keep pursuing my dreams of
12:29being an actor
12:40You