Matt Damon & Director Gus Van Sant Revisit Their Cinematic Connection With 'Promised Land'
When Matt Damon was shooting The Adjustment Bureau a few years back, he befriended his co-star Emily Blunt's eventual husband, John Krasinski. Almost immediately, Damon recognized something special in the actor best known as Jim Halpert from TV's The Office. "Very early on John reminded me of the feeling that I got when I met George Clooney," begins Damon. "He wasn't just the guy from ER. He was phenomenally talented and could do all of these things and that's how I feel about John. He's a great writer and producer. The scope of his talent is vast and impressive and I immediately tried to find something we could do together". Thankfully Krasinski came up with an idea and it was about hydraulic fracturing.
"We had been talking about American identity and where we are in America right now. We wanted to take a snapshot of that and (fracking) was a perfect issue to use as a backdrop because the stakes are so high. It's so polarizing," explains Damon. At the time he was in Los Angeles shooting Cameron Crowe's We Bought a Zoo and Krasinski was busy shooting his NBC day job, which left the weekends as their only opportunities to write. "He just started showing up at my house. We'd work all day and he definitely had kids crawling all over him," Damon jokes. "If you walked in and saw what was going on, you would say there is no way a script could come out of this".
But it did and Damon was set to star as Steve Butler, a successful corporate salesman trying to persuade rural farmers to allow natural gas drilling on their properties. Steve's impeccable track record is immediately challenged by a local school teacher (Hal Holbrook) and a mysterious environmentalist (Krasinski). Promised Land was also supposed to mark the actor's directorial debut, until he realized that such a commitment would take him away from his family for an extended period of time. As Damon broke the news to Krasinski, Warner Bros. pulled their funding and the project was seemingly left in shambles. "The next morning, I was sitting on a plane feeling horrible and I emailed Gus (Van Sant) and told him everything that happened," says Damon. "Right before we switched our phones off, he emailed me back and said he loved my writing and would love to read it".
Acclaimed director and visionary Gus Van Sant had remained friends with Damon since 1997’s Good Will Hunting. "I remember reading somewhere that said Matt was going to direct a movie and I thought that if anything goes wrong maybe he'll call me and maybe I can help," Van Sant admits. When he received the plane-penned email out of the blue, his confidence in Damon almost led to an immediate yes, but then rational set in. "I thought I should read the script first," he laughs. With Van Sant at the helm, Focus Features stepped in with funding and filming completed in just 30 days, a feat attributed to the director's experience and ability to keep the production on budget.
Although 15 years has passed since Damon and Van Sant collaborated on Good Will Hunting, their experience on Promised Land remained familiar and comfortable thanks to the duo's counterbalanced work ethic. "Our style is kind of interesting. We're really at the opposite ends of the coin," explains Van Sant. "I'm super interested in the abstract and he's super interested in the literal. Together we recognize that and don't say much, we just do."
While Promised Land tackles a relevant and controversial subject matter, both Damon and Van Sant wanted to showcase all angles of the franking argument. "We talked to families that have been affected, politicians and even land men," says the actor. "There are people that say (franking) is ruining their lives and there are people who are now millionaires and are really happy." Adds Van Sant, "I didn't know about hydraulic fracturing a year ago. Everybody was just trying to learn about it and we always felt that our film was describing both sides rather than demonizing the process".
No matter where the audience may stand on the issue, in the end, Damon and company had only one goal in mind. "We wanted to end it with a message," he declares. "With hope".
Promised Land hits theaters January 4th.
"We had been talking about American identity and where we are in America right now. We wanted to take a snapshot of that and (fracking) was a perfect issue to use as a backdrop because the stakes are so high. It's so polarizing," explains Damon. At the time he was in Los Angeles shooting Cameron Crowe's We Bought a Zoo and Krasinski was busy shooting his NBC day job, which left the weekends as their only opportunities to write. "He just started showing up at my house. We'd work all day and he definitely had kids crawling all over him," Damon jokes. "If you walked in and saw what was going on, you would say there is no way a script could come out of this".
But it did and Damon was set to star as Steve Butler, a successful corporate salesman trying to persuade rural farmers to allow natural gas drilling on their properties. Steve's impeccable track record is immediately challenged by a local school teacher (Hal Holbrook) and a mysterious environmentalist (Krasinski). Promised Land was also supposed to mark the actor's directorial debut, until he realized that such a commitment would take him away from his family for an extended period of time. As Damon broke the news to Krasinski, Warner Bros. pulled their funding and the project was seemingly left in shambles. "The next morning, I was sitting on a plane feeling horrible and I emailed Gus (Van Sant) and told him everything that happened," says Damon. "Right before we switched our phones off, he emailed me back and said he loved my writing and would love to read it".
Acclaimed director and visionary Gus Van Sant had remained friends with Damon since 1997’s Good Will Hunting. "I remember reading somewhere that said Matt was going to direct a movie and I thought that if anything goes wrong maybe he'll call me and maybe I can help," Van Sant admits. When he received the plane-penned email out of the blue, his confidence in Damon almost led to an immediate yes, but then rational set in. "I thought I should read the script first," he laughs. With Van Sant at the helm, Focus Features stepped in with funding and filming completed in just 30 days, a feat attributed to the director's experience and ability to keep the production on budget.
Although 15 years has passed since Damon and Van Sant collaborated on Good Will Hunting, their experience on Promised Land remained familiar and comfortable thanks to the duo's counterbalanced work ethic. "Our style is kind of interesting. We're really at the opposite ends of the coin," explains Van Sant. "I'm super interested in the abstract and he's super interested in the literal. Together we recognize that and don't say much, we just do."
While Promised Land tackles a relevant and controversial subject matter, both Damon and Van Sant wanted to showcase all angles of the franking argument. "We talked to families that have been affected, politicians and even land men," says the actor. "There are people that say (franking) is ruining their lives and there are people who are now millionaires and are really happy." Adds Van Sant, "I didn't know about hydraulic fracturing a year ago. Everybody was just trying to learn about it and we always felt that our film was describing both sides rather than demonizing the process".
No matter where the audience may stand on the issue, in the end, Damon and company had only one goal in mind. "We wanted to end it with a message," he declares. "With hope".
Promised Land hits theaters January 4th.
Feed Source:
Gofobo Staff
Author:
Tristen Gacoscos
Date:
Array on
movie: Promised Land 2013
actor: Matt Damon