‘Cherry’ picking
Russos take Marvel break for real-life chaos with Apple TV+ drama
After their four consecutive Marvel blockbusters climaxed with “Avengers: End Game” (2019), the biggest box-office hit in history, Anthony and Joe Russo could do anything they wanted.
“Cherry,” streaming Friday on Apple TV+, takes the siblings away from Marvel for a film unafraid to be socially conscious.
Led by Tom Holland’s sex, drugs and angst transition to adult roles, “Cherry” features horrifying carnage in Afghanistan, the opioid crisis and drug addiction back home and a berserk bankrobbing spree.
“Definitely that part of the human experience is what we’re exploring and sharing,” Anthony, 51, said on a phone call with Joe, 49.
“We’re looking at the people who are feeling left out. People for whom the system is failing. The people who are even being intentionally manipulated by the system.”
That comes from growing up in Cleveland, where they had a front-row seat to a community in crisis and a father who was a judge.
“Before he was a judge, he was a Cleveland city councilman, the youngest city councilman ever elected, and then he actually ran for mayor.
“That was a time (1978) where Cleveland became the first major city in America to go bankrupt since the Great Depression.
“It was a difficult time and we remember very vividly those experiences — people suffering, people losing jobs, the economy was terrible — and our dad was very much an activist on the part of the poor and the working class.
“So, the conflict and the drama left a big impression on us. We saw a lot of very high human emotion, playing out in front of children’s eyes. That experience was very intense.”
Their Hollywood career from unknown to A-list is marked by amazing luck. Who else is “discovered” by Steven Soderbergh with their first low-budget, virtually unseen film, “Pieces” (‘97)?
Their first Marvel hit, “Captain America: Winter’s Soldier” (2014), was similar.
“Again, that,” Anthony recalled, “came out of nowhere. We just got a call from our agent: ‘Marvel’s got a list of 10 directors about the next Captain America movie and you guys are on it.’”
After “a couple of months’ conversation with Marvel,” they were hired. Part of the fun of ‘Winter Soldier’ for us was we were bringing a lot of creative energy with us, things that we couldn’t explore during our (just ended) decade on TV.
“When we did that feature we really brought a lot of the thinking we’d been doing over the years about various things.
“And that movie,” he added in a mighty understatement, “worked so well for us.”