ROBERT REDFORD RIDES INTO THE SUNSET
In “The Old Man and the Gun,” elderly bank robber Forrest Tucker, played by Robert Redford, walks up to a bank teller, smiles, says a few words in a kindly manner, and collects a heap of money. Later, when the teller is interviewed by the police, she’ll sound a little bewildered describing the encounter. “He was a gentleman.”
Redford, now 82, has for six decades been leaving us similarly charmed. Who wouldn’t hand over whatever Robert Redford asked for? But David Lowery’s “The Old Man and the Gun” may be his last heist. Redford has said the movie, which Fox Searchlight will release Sept. 28, will be his final one as an actor. The news, with palpable affection, ricocheted around the world.
“I didn’t expect that kind of response,” Redford chuckles, speaking by phone from his house in Santa Fe, N.M. “Now I can’t say I was just kidding!”
“But I did say, ‘Never say never,’ ” he adds, giving himself an out. “I just figure that I’ve had a long career that I’m very pleased with. It’s been so long, ever since I was 21. I figure now, as I’m getting into my 80s, it’s maybe time to move toward retirement and spend more time with my wife and family.”
That Redford might be hanging it up has the unmistakable feel of an era passing. For many, his face — from sandy-haired California boy to weathered mountain man — has charted half a century of something intrinsically American. His Sundance Kid, his Jeremiah Johnson, his Bob Woodward are figures of rigorous self-determination. From the young CIA agent in “Three Days of the Condor” to the aged sailor in “All Is Lost,” they are smooth-sailing romantics whose quiet ways are violently capsized.
“For me, the word to be underscored is ‘independence,’ ” says Redford. “I’ve always believed in that word. That’s what led to me eventually wanting to create a category that supported independent artists who weren’t given a chance to be heard. The industry was pretty well controlled by the mainstream, which I was a part of. But I saw other stories out there that weren’t having a chance to be told, and I thought, ‘Well, maybe I can commit my energies to giving those people a chance.’ As I look back on it, I feel very good about that.”
And as a capstone for Redford, the ’70s-set “The Old Man and the Gun” is indeed poignant. It bears much of the spirit and twinkle of some Redford classics, like “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” and “The Sting,” only as filtered through Lowery’s lyrical naturalism. And Redford is again on the other side of the law.
“The idea of the outlaw has always been very appealing to me. If you look at some of the films, it’s usually having to do with the outlaw sensibility, which I think has probably been my sensibility. I think I was just born with it,” says Redford. “From the time I was just a kid, I was always trying to break free of the bounds that I was stuck with, and always wanted to go outside.”