By Debra Wallace

Julianne Moore has learned many life lessons at home and at work.

In addition to a rich life as an actress, Julianne says that family life is equally important to her and she keeps her work close to home as a result. She, her husband, director Bart Freundlich, and their children, Liv, 11, and Caleb, make their home in New York.

During a recent spring chat Moore was friendly, charming and eager to talk about her latest movie. The English Teacher, which opens on Friday, May 17.

The well-written and expertly acted indie movie, which was featured at the recent Tribeca Film Festival, is about Linda Sinclair, a 40-year-old unmarried high school English teacher in the small town of Kingston, Pennsylvania. Linda is so immersed in her collection of great literature and her students that she has no close personal relationships aside from those she has with her favorite authors.

Linda’s life is far less complicated than the dramas on the page, and she is comfortable with the status quo – a nice quiet apartment, two Siamese cats, and a predictable routine.

Linda’s simple life turns an unexpected page when her former star pupil Jason Sherwood (Michael Angarano), returns to Kingston High School after trying to make it as a playwright in Manhattan. Now in his 20s, Jason wants to abandon his art and is pressured to go to law school by his overbearing father Dr. Tom Sherwood (Greg Kinnear). Not wanting Jason to give up his dreams, Linda figures out a way for the high school drama department, led by flamboyant teacher Carl Kapinas (Nathan Lane), to stage a production of his play.

With Linda out of her comfort zone, The English Teacher is a page turner on film – funny, touching, charming, dramatic, clever and well-written – everything you want a film to be.

Have you shared this movie, The English Teacher, with your family, or your children, yet?

JULIANNE MOORE: No, but my kids have never seen anything that I’ve done. I don’t really show it to them. They don’t have an understanding of this. It’s kind of something that’s separate. It’s my job. I’m just their mother. My husband sees stuff. He saw it. But the kids, I kind of don’t do that.

Do your kids affect your choice of film roles?

JM: Absolutely. If there’s something that they wanted to see or they wanted me to be in, that would be great, great to be able to do something like that.

What are your personal challenges in doing this film and in general being an actor?

JM: Everyone has this issue, it’s not just actors – everyone wants, as Freud says, you need love and work, that’s what you need. So you want to have a relationship and a family and a personal life and that’s a rich life that way. And you want to have a rich and interesting creative and work life. And trying to have that, for all of us, it’s the balance that you want to create. But it’s great to have those options, we’re so lucky to have those opportunities. But I think that’s the day-to-day challenge.

Will your character of Linda have that?

JM: I think she does, and that’s Linda’s story. She’s someone who’s only been in the book. She’s only been in the narrative and she hasn’t stepped out of it. She’s kept her choices very restricted, and she sort of blows it open at the end by making all these mistakes and kind of being present in the real world.

This was a terrific ensemble with Nathan Lane, Leo Norbert Butz, Jim Breuer and John Hodgeman, more like a stage play than a movie.

JM: That’s right. It was a pretty extraordinary cast, actually. They were great, really, really, great people. Jim Breuer I had already done SNL with. My son was two months old, so that was 15 years ago. We had a great cast.

One of the things about this movie is that everybody does something they should apologize for. But not everybody apologized. Please talk about that.

JM: I think one of the nice things about the movie is that people don’t apologize. They all do some things…it’s kind of one of those cause and effect things, where at the end of the day, a lot of people are very shamed, but there’s a kind of forgiveness that they all offer one another, and looking the other way… Maybe they weren’t all their best selves at that moment, but they had the best intentions. There’s a humanity; I think, to their recovery that’s very nice. In the sense that your mother always told you – just let time go by. It’s true, they all let a little time go by and it all settles down again.

I found your character to be inherently sweet. Is that something that you did for that character?

JM: I love Linda. I was like Linda, I was the kid that read all the time and went to the library and won the summer reading contest and ended up in the drama club after school. I wasn’t athletic, I couldn’t do anything else, and it was sort of another extension of reading. I feel like it would be very easy for me to have been Linda if I didn’t have a high-school English teacher who told me I could be an actress. So I found her incredibly relatable, and I loved her. I loved her [that] she’s sort of innocent, and I thought she was really endearing, actually.

Can you talk about the sex scene? Because I think it’s so sweet and funny. It’s funny. Talk about how you worked on that.

JM: I’ve had a lot of experience with them, so – you know – Michael was more, I guess we do this, than we do this?

Tell me more.

JM: I just kissed him because I wanted him to feel comfortable, like he didn’t have to be afraid. We were just going to do it. You’re always doing it [comedic] as well, so a little bit of the onus is off. You know you’re going to play with the props and throw some things around. I took my hair down, took my glasses off. All of those really silly things, and it was funny to go from that, ‘oh, you poor kid, your dad is so bad to you’ – to a love scene. It was fun.

Have you ever had anybody who you knew years earlier come back to you, and say you’ve influenced me…?

JM: Not yet! But I’ve had someone who has influenced me greatly.

Who was that?

JM: My high school drama teacher, Roble Taylor, was the one who said to me – you can be an actor. I was in plays, but I’d never met an actor, I’d never seen a real play, I didn’t think you could make a living doing it, I didn’t know anything about the theater. And she said – here’s a copy of Dramatics Magazine, and here are different schools that you can go to, and I was like, oh, okay. Had I not met her, I don’t think I would have done that. She changed my life, and she knows that, I told her. I met her years later when I was in LA for a while, and she was in Arizona. She altered the course of my life.

How do you juggle your career and family life? It’s always been a bit of an issue for women can you have it all… What do you think about that?

JM: It’s that thing that everybody says – yeah, you can have it all; you just can’t have it at the same time. You can’t. There’s going to be compromises somewhere. There are some jobs you’re not going to do. I don’t go to Australia and work, I can’t shoot the film in Romania, I can’t do that kind of stuff, it’s just too far away. So, if I shoot a movie, I shoot here in town, or in the summertime, they can come with me or they’re at camp or something. Or we break it up into little pieces. You figure it out.

By Debra Wallace

Pierce Brosnan learned more than 20 years ago that when life gives you lemons, you quickly learn how to make gallons of lemonade.

Starting with Remington Steel, continuing with James Bond and the many romantic comedies along the way, Brosnan has the witty sense of humor and handsome good looks to sweep women of all ages off their feet – and he still doing just that.

Such is certainly the case in his latest film, Love Is All You Need, a charming romantic comedy, filled with family drama and great heart from Sony Pictures Classics.

As he nears his 60^th birthday (May 16), the Irish born actor and father of five is just as charming and dapper as in his earlier James Bond days.
Wearing a perfectly fitting black suit, crisp white shirt open at the collar and a wide smile on a cool spring day in Manhattan – he was eager to chat about family, movies, surviving the death of his first wife, Cassandra in 1991, becoming a single parent, his lovely second marriage and more.

His character is a widower, Philip, who still blames the world for the loss of his wife many years before. Brosnan’s character is estranged from his son, a workaholic who is cranky to his employees, and unwilling to see the beauty around him…until he has a second chance at love.

That chance comes from a hairdresser, Ida, played by award-winning Danish actress Trine Dyrholm, who has lost her hair to cancer, finds out her husband is having an affair, travels to picturesque Sorrento, Italy, for her daughter’s wedding.

Love Is All You Need, a beautiful and charming film written and directed by Susanne Bier, opens on Friday, May 3.

Q: So what was the allure of this movie?

PIERCE BROSNAN: A film like Love is All You Need is, you know, like a warm embrace of a film. It has such warmth and heart.

Q: Speaking of which, you’re a married man. So, when you really get into a character like this who has the hots for a woman other than your wife, do you feel a little guilty?

PB: Ha! My wife, Keely, calls it legal cheating! She said that at a dinner party one night. As I nearly choked on my shrimp! What can I say? I’m a lucky guy. I don’t know. Women are beautiful, and it’s just a great job that I have. You know, to be able to fall in love. And play out the romance of life, the sexuality of life.

Q: But is it part of the job?

PB: Yes. If I were to go down that avenue, I wouldn’t be here. I’m not good at such a job, of going out there and leading such a life. I want to have my cake and eat it, so to speak! So it’s lovely being out there, with whatever leading lady. To make movies, and to make romance. But I like to have the stability of one woman. And the continuity and meaning of that.

Q: So is it better playing a guy smitten by love and getting all emotional, like your character Philip in this movie, than being James Bond?

PB: Oh, absolutely. It’s just delightful to play this kind of role. Action films can be like…watching paint dry!

Q: How come?

PB: You know; you can just die in the trailer, waiting for them to set up the shot. And then you go out and you have an hour or so, of endurance testing. However! I love making movies. But I love them all – action movies, dramas, and comedies. I’m an actor. Always have been, always will be. It’s what I do. So the joy of watching action movies, I have the patience to do it. And the want and the desire to do it. And I’m about to go off to Serbia and do it. My own spy movie.

Q: You said you were attracted to the role of Philip because you saw yourself in other circumstances of your life. Can you please elaborate on that?

PB: I think my life is fairly well documented in the sense that I spoke about the loss of my wife Cassandra and the endurance of going through and the rigors of losing her to ovarian cancer so I knew something about that loss and I knew something about being a father and a single parent so it goes back to that script finding me at a good time in my life so I could have enough distance and comfort of heart and courage. Being able to surrender to playing that kind of role.

Q: Your many fans will be thrilled to see you in such a substantive part to chew on.

PB: I’ve just always been making a living at this game and getting away with it one way or another. What can I say, I love what I do. Sometimes I should have probably challenged myself more and sought material with more substance. I might have taken the easy way out. I supposed also this script found me at the right time in my life. I’m in my middle years and now pushing towards 60. There comes a time to show yourself as a man and let the veil down. You hope that you have the material to substantiate those emotions and feelings and desires. This found me at the right time and Susanne found me at the right time and the right place and it seemed to make sense with my own personal life and story and bit of talent I’ve gone.

Q: What’s your next movie all about?

PB: Finally I have the director I want, in Roger Donaldson. And I’m going to do a piece called November Man. So, I shall jump back into that arena.

Q: How do you think the public usually perceives you?

PB: I’m the Irish James Bond! [he laughed].

Q: What kind of relationship do you have with your wife Keely?

PB: I’m the shlepper. She tells me what to do, basically! She gardens; we grow our own fruits and vegetables. We have a little orchard at our house in Hawaii. But I just like to paint. And kind of just sit and look at the ocean. And do nothing!

Q: How did you get inside Philip’s head?

PB: It wasn’t a great stretch! Particularly. You know, I use so much of myself in the work that I do. And I think every actor does. Because you know you’ve got tricks up your sleeve. And this is a character who has been mangled by life. You have to, because you have nobody else to go to, but yourself. And your own imagination. And in this film, there are so many emblems of my own life.

Q: How so?

PB: I know what it’s like to be a widower. And a father, and single parent. So those ingredients were part of my own psyche. And that makes you real. And then you just try to keep it as simple as possible. Play the moment. And you try not to premeditate, because you don’t know anybody else until you get there.

Q: Have your kids gotten into film-making?

PB: All of them. And my little guy who is 12, he makes his own videos. Spy movies! You know with guns and dark glasses. It’s in the blood!

Q: Do you want to discourage them?

PB: No. As long as the grades are good! And my wife keeps their feet to the coals. She really does. But they get away with murder, with me.

Q: Will you be doing any films in Ireland?

PB: Yes. And my son Sean will be in it. It’s called Last Man Out. It’s a hard story. And Terry Loane is a Belfast director that I wanted to work with. It’s about a man who is the last one out of Long Kesh. And it’s about the ghosts that he lives with. And the flashbacks to his younger life. And they’re flashbacks to me as a young man. So I was like, my son Sean, why not. Not just a pretty face! So yeah. It’s a whole new world, as it should be.

Q: What else are you up to right now?

PB: The next one is Love Punch with Emma Thompson, in Paris. And then the Nick Hornby one in London, A Long Way Down. And the next job after that is in Belgrade. And we have a lovely actress, Olga Kurylenko. Who seems to be going through leading men like…hot dinners! She’s a gorgeous actress, beautiful woman. But you’ll be sick of me by the end of the year!

By Debra Wallace

Ryan Gosling mentioned recently that he might want to take some time off from Hollywood and the collective fan backlash could literally be heard around the world.

Gosling’s admirers are certain that he is a daring actor who can be a wild and emotional force to be reckoned with on the silver screen.

It is certainly the case for the 32-year-old Canadian born actor in his latest drama, The Place Beyond The Pines. The film from Focus Features from Blue Valentine director Derek Cianfrance opens around the nation on Friday, April 12.

During a recent chat at a posh Manhattan hotel on a chilly early spring day, one can easily say why fans want Ryan to stick around. With a white, purple and red graphic music T-shirt, beige khaki pants, and a black jacket he resembles a modern-day James Dean.

In The Pines Gosling plays Luke, a damaged, dark and wounded guy, a man who is covered in tattoos and pain. He is a guy, who has no real skills to be a father, and once he finds out his past fling Romina, played by Eva Mendes, has had a baby boy, his son, he tries to find meaning in his life – but he is misguided and suffers the consequences.

Luke is a flawed guy, a high-wire carnival motorcycle stunt driver, who believes he can pull off the perfect crime, so he illogically becomes a bank robber to provide for his new family.

Q: Did you have much rehearsal with your co-star Eva Mendes?

RYAN GOSLING: I don’t think there was any rehearsal. For the most part Derek has you live the lives as much as you can of those characters – not by working on the scenes but sort of you coming to know the character by living their life.

Q: You seem to be moving more and more towards these characters who have a touch of danger to them.

RG: Well, I’m just trying to keep it interesting.

Q: Have you ridden motorcycles before like you did in the movie? Did they have to train you for stunt work?

RG: Yes. I did get a lot of training. Because it was in the nature of the way Derek wanted to shoot the film. A lot of things were in one take. Especially, the bank robberies he wanted them all to be shot all in one take. That meant riding from down the street in front of the bank, running in, robbing it and then the get-a-way. So, I had to do more then I probably would have to do on a regular film.

Q: This was an intense movie – so how did you shake it off emotionally and physically?

RG: I don’t know. I think it’s still with me to a certain degree. I learned a lot from making this film.

Q: Do you find it hard to play a character who even though he tries to get redemption, he doesn’t accomplish it. It always leaves you with a melancholy taste in your mouth, so was it difficult for you?

RG: No, I really thought that it was interesting – coming from Gangster Squad where millions of bullets fly and no one gets hurt and there is no consequences for your actions and everything is fine at the end of the day, I was impressed that Derek was trying to make a film that was just the opposite of what’s so popular right now.

Q: Talk about how realistic everything was in this movie?

RG: Sometimes it back fired like in the bank robberies. I got to the place and I am there and looked down and everyone is smiling and had their cell phones out [Laughed]. And just having a good time. That was rough. Because I thought ‘Oh no, what are we going to do?’ and Derek was blaming me, saying ‘you are not being scary enough.’

Q: Talk about your character Luke in this movie.

RG: He’s a superficial person, without any real depth.

Q: What about those face tattoos?

RG: Those face tattoos, too much. And I regretted it. And I went to Derek and said, ‘I can’t do this, it’s ridiculous.’

Q: And what did he say?

RG: He was like, ‘well, this movie is about consequences. So you have to pay for what you’ve done, you know? And have it for the whole movie.’ I was so ashamed, that I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror. I just felt embarrassed. And I think that was like something that I couldn’t have acted. And something that became a very important past of the character. You know, it was this sense of shame. Of regret. Of becoming something that you couldn’t, that now you couldn’t change.

Q: How did you get into the head of a bandit?

RG: Well before that, I had this delusion that I could get away with robbing a bank. And I had a plan that if I wasn’t afraid of jail, that’s how I would do it. But I guess that meant I didn’t have a lot of confidence in my plan! So I told Derek about it and he said, ‘that’s crazy. I just wrote a movie about that!’ So’ it seemed like we should make that film. Both of us thought it was our idea, but then we realized that this guy in Tel Aviv has been doing it for years! And he was doing it with great results.

Q: Talk about the scene when you dropped the [money] bag?

RG: That was amazing, I had weighted the bag, because I thought, this lady was just tossing it over and there was no money in it, so we had done like 10 takes, and I asked them to weight the bag, and they over weighted it, and so this lady had to throw it over, but it just couldn’t make it over the top, and then it got stuck on the top of it and we loved it because it was just like everything that could go wrong, did.

Q: Do you try to balance out some of your darker roles with lighter ones so you don’t destroy yourself emotionally over and over again? Anything coming up that is more popcorn fare?

RG: I hope that all of them are popcorn fare. I’d like to say I had a good time making a comedy, but I just loved working with Steve Carrel, I’d like to do that again. That was great.

Q: Any genre you want to do that you haven’t done before?

RG: No, I feel like. I’d like to do more comedies. Drama is so subjective. It works or it doesn’t for someone, comedy is either funny or it’s not. They laugh or they don’t, you can tell if it’s working or not. When you do drama it dissipates out into the ether, you never quite know if it’s is resonating.

Q: Tell me about your next movie, How to Catch A Monster, that you are directing with Christina Hendricks.
 
RG: We start in a couple of months. I was nervous until I had my cast, but now that I have this cast I am excited. You can’t really go wrong, they are on the best. I’ve been on the other side of a scene with most of them so I know how great they are, and I just like them all so much and I just can’t wait to see them in a movie together.

Q: How difficult is it to find complex roles and do you think there is a shortage of roles for adults?

RG: No, I think it’s a great time because anyone can make a movie. You are going to start to see very personal films. They might not necessarily need me anymore, but that’s okay. But, I guess that means I can do the same thing.