‘A Star Is Born’ still resonates for its stars
TORONTO — When Bradley Cooper saw Lady Gaga perform “La Vie en Rose” at a fundraiser at the home of entrepreneur Sean Parker, it wasn’t one of the important moments along the road to making “A Star Is Born.” It was, Cooper says, the moment.
“She demolished the room,” he recalled, still wide-eyed about it. “I knew that was plutonium.”
The next day, Cooper went to Gaga’s home in Malibu to confirm that what he had seen the night before was real. They felt a connection.
“Instantly,” Gaga said. “When I saw his eyes, when I opened the door.”
Within minutes, they were singing by Gaga’s piano and “A Star Is Born” was, well, born.
“And when I heard him sing! My God! I stopped playing the piano and I was like, ‘Bradley you can sing!’ ” said Gaga, sitting next to her co-star and director. “And he was like, ‘Really?’ And then he said, ‘Let’s film it.’ He started filming it on his phone.”
Cooper shakes his head. “It was nuts.”
The new “A Star Is Born” — the fourth or fifth version, depending on who’s counting, formally opens Friday — has been in development for about two decades at Warner Bros., at one point starring Beyoncé and Leonardo DiCaprio with Clint Eastwood directing. Cooper, who starred in Eastwood’s “American Sniper,” first discussed acting in the film for Eastwood before deciding to direct, too.
Cooper retailored the story and — he hopes — launched himself as a writer and director.
“He never quit on it, from beginning to end,” said Sam Elliott, who plays Cooper’s brother in the film. “It probably drove the studio nuts at some point that he wouldn’t quit on it.”
Cooper stars as Jackson Maine, a hard-drinking, country-rock star. (Maine’s band is played by Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real.) When Jackson ducks into a drag bar for a drink, he’s blown away by Ally (Gaga), who’s there singing — what else — “La Vie en Rose.”
She and Jackson fall in love, even as his drinking problem worsens, but not before they can together forge something honest and beautiful through music, catapulting Ally to stardom.
“When I’m watching it back, I see myself as a much younger girl, more like when I was 15 writing songs at the piano,” Gaga said. “What Jackson is trying to teach her is something that I still want to give more of in my music now and in the future. It’s the nakedness of talent.”