USA: Leonardo DiCaprio and Clint Eastwood talk about their new film 'J. Edgar' about the life of the first FBI director

Record ID: 813354

  • Title: USA: Leonardo DiCaprio and Clint Eastwood talk about their new film 'J. Edgar' about the life of the first FBI director
  • Date: 12th November 2011
  • Summary: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES (RECENT) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (English) LEONARDO DICAPRIO, ACTOR, ON J. EDGAR HOOVER, SAYING: "When somebody is that instinctive and they really trust their own gut to such an immense degree, its infectious because you begin to trust yourself as an actor and your own instincts and decisions you make. He's always this great baromete
  • Embargoed: 27th November 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Usa, Usa
  • Country: USA
  • Reuters ID: LVAB4JR8LMYBZZCB1N07BWSXPNS3
  • Story Text: Leonardo DiCaprio and Clint Eastwood shed new light on legendary Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) director J. Edgar Hoover with new biopic, "J. Edgar."
    DiCaprio, in the title role, takes on the historic and controversial person responsible for creating the crime-fighting agency, and who ran it for nearly 40 years.
    Hoover was the most revered and feared "top cop" in the U.S. for five decades, and was considered to be one of the most secretive men in government. He kept covert files on a range of powerful figures, including President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr.
    Director Eastwood shared his thoughts on the intensely private man.
    "I think he's an enigma in death. I think nobody will ever really know. There's a mystery quality to him, which is fun, it's certainly much more fun to speculate on somebody like that who had done so much. And, try to solve that mystery then to try to know everything about him, then it wouldn't even be worth telling as a story maybe."
    Eastwood, 81, grew up in the 1940s and 1950s. He said he recalls Hoover as a heroic figure and, like most, knew nothing about his personal life.
    The film addresses a long-standing speculation that Hoover -- who never married -- was secretly gay and had an intimate relationship with his longtime assistant Clyde Tolson, played by Armie Hammer in the motion picture.
    DiCaprio shared his thoughts on how the relationship between the two men was dictated by the era in which they lived.
    "What I did feel, and what I loved about Clint's attempt, and why I felt it was so classy," says DiCaprio. "It was about two men who were of service to their country. If they did have feelings for one another, if they were attracted to one another, it was unrequited, and it was suppressed. They weren't allowed to have personal lives. It would have destroyed their social status, their job, and would have ultimately destroyed their country, so they were men of service. It was a different time and a different era. I don't agree with his politics, but I feel I understand the man in that capacity."
    "J. Edgar" traces Hoover's life from childhood to his death in 1972, and hits many historical highlights -- Prohibition, the Lindbergh kidnapping, World War II, 1950s Communists, the civil rights era and the assassinations of King, Kennedy and his brother Robert F. Kennedy.
    DiCaprio praised Eastwood's work behind the camera.
    "When somebody is that instinctive and they really trust their own gut to such an immense degree, its infectious because you begin to trust yourself as an actor and your own instincts and decisions you make," explained DiCaprio, 37. "He's always this great barometer of truth always sitting on the sidelines watching with his steely eyes and you feel like you need to give him the truth in your performance every day. He doesn't have a lot of people around him, advising him, he's kind of a, you know, it's like, I call it an elite splinter-cell unit, he's got men that he's worked with, men and women that he's worked with for decades in this industry, but at the end of the day, it's always him that makes the final decision, and he trusts himself as an artist, and I think a lot of people should take note of that in our industry."
    As an FBI agent who liked the limelight when it came to arresting gangsters, DiCaprio's Hoover gets to point pistols and act tough. But the actor also engages in a homoerotic wrestling match with Hammer and kisses his co-star. In the film's most bizarre and moving scene, Hoover is shown wearing his mother's dress after her death.
    "J. Edgar" also stars Judi Dench, who portrayed his mother, and Helen Gandy, his faithful secretary of 54 years, a role brought to life by Naomi Watts.
    The film is now playing in theatres across North America.
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