Eternal optimist
Spielberg infuses new Cold War drama with hope,
In a time of social media shaming and side-swipes of snark, oftentimes directed at Hollywood, Steven Spielberg says an audacious thing during our interview: he is an optimist.
That spirit infuses all of his films, says the Oscarwinning director, including his latest, Cold War spyswap drama Bridge of Spies, which opened Friday.
“I feel optimism offers hope and I don’t like making movies where people walk out of the film in deep despair with a great sense of hopelessness about the future,” Spielberg says.
“I like making movies that give people hope that, with more conversation and less confrontation, there’s a chance to make this a better world,” he continues. “I’ve always felt that way and I don’t think that’s a Pollyanna point of view. I think that is who I am as a person and what I like to say in my films.”
Like many of the movies made by the two-time Academy Award winner and eight-time Best Picture nominee, Bridge
of Spies comes from a place of strong personal connection for this child of Ukrainian immigrants, who grew up in the midst of the postwar anti-Communist red scare.
In fact, he decided to make the film after British playwright Matt Charman pitched the story because it “felt like it was from my DNA.”
Based on true events, Tom Hanks stars as Brooklyn insurance lawyer James Donovan, reluctantly pressed into defending suspected Soviet spy Rudolf Abel ( Wolf Hall’s Mark Rylance) in 1957.
Donovan was determined to ensure Abel got a fair shake in the courtroom, although the outcome was never in question. The spy was convicted, spared the death penalty thanks to Donovan’s in- tervention and, a few years later, used as leverage to free two Americans in a deal brokered in East Berlin by the lawyer.
Donovan refused to back down on his two-for-one plan: Abel for a downed U-2 spy plane pilot captured on a covert CIA surveillance mission, along with an academic trapped in communist territory behind the newly completed Berlin Wall.
Spielberg’s spirit of optimism comes via Hanks’ portrayal of Donovan, who risked becoming “the second-most hated man in America” to ensure most-hated man Abel had a fair trial.
It marks the fourth time they’ve worked together as actor-director, starting with Saving Private Ryan in 1998.
“I immediately went to Tom because I thought (he) could fill the shoes of James B. Donovan, who did some great things . . . a principled, ethical, moral individual.”
While history often forms the spine of Spielberg’s films ( Lincoln and Amistad among them), he insists, “I never set out to teach anybody anything. I don’t feel I am a director-teacher. I feel that I’m a storyteller with a deep abiding interest in American history and world history.”
But there are parallels between the true story behind Bridge of Spies and the present, Spielberg says, “not in the least of which is the U-2 overflights in the ’50s (being) not unlike the drone program of today.”
He points to how the Cold War “atmosphere of distrust and fear and rage between this country and the Soviet Union has returned in a kind of cool regard between (U.S. President Barak) Obama and (Russian President Vladimir) Putin.” In a wide-ranging interview from his New York office, Spielberg talked about his childhood, the thrill of winning an Oscar, celebrating his upcoming wedding anniversary with wife Kate Capshaw, his love of watching Turner Classic Movies on his iPad and what it means to finally be an empty nester with child No. 7, daughter Destry, off at university.
As the director of more than 50 films, does Spielberg mind that people tend to associate him with a marooned alien?
“I’m so proud of that film ( E.T.) and you can associate me with that film as long as you like,” he says, sounding genuinely delighted. “I never get tired of being reminded that I was the daddy of that movie and for a while, I was the surrogate daddy (and also godfather) of Drew (Barrymore). She grew up right in front of me and she was my first experience with raising a kid.”
In fact, spending time working with young E.T. stars “for the first time made me recognize the urge to be a father and so, three years after E.T., I had my first child (with ex-wife Amy Irving) and I don’t know if that would have happened had I not made E.T.”
He maintains that film and 1993’s Schindler’s List are the “only two that changed my life,” the latter showing him “that a film can do more work for the world on the afterthought . . . it opened a door for me into the world of public service and philanthropy.”