Robert Pattinson on High Life & Working With Claire Denis
The career arc that took actor Robert Pattinson from teen heartthrob vampire Edward Cullen in five Twilight movies to one of independent cinema’s most adventurous actors has few parallels — except perhaps for his Twilight costar Kristen Stewart. Like Stewart, Pattinson has reinvented himself since the blockbuster Twilight franchise as a go-to actor for ambitious ...
Fear & Grieving With Pet Sematary Breakout Star Amy Seimetz
Pet Sematary star Amy Seimetz remembers reading Stephen King’s novel when she was just eight years old. “I was too young but my parents were great—being a parent was different in the ‘80s,” she says. “They were happy that I was a voracious reader and they were present to answer questions. I went from [children’s ...
Taraji P. Henson & the Team Behind The Best of Enemies on Crafting History
The Best of Enemies is based on the true story of an African-American activist named Ann Atwater and a KKK official named C.P. Ellis who were forced to work together in a fight over school desegregation in 1971. In an interview with The Credits, star Taraji P. Henson, who plays Ann, writer/director Robin Bissell, and ...
Esmé Creed-Miles on Becoming Hanna in Amazon’s new Series
When F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, in his Hollywood novel The Last Tycoon, that “there are no second acts in American lives,” he either hadn’t considered international lives. Nor had he considered the advent of streaming television. Thus Amazon brings us Hanna, a reboot, reconsideration, and expansion of 2011’s feature film of the same name. British ...
Celebrating The Little Mermaid‘s 30th Anniversary With Ariel
Thirty years ago, The Little Mermaid initiated the second golden age of Disney animated features, with a spectacular score, including what star Jodi Benson calls the “I dream” opening number that introduces us to the title character, “Part of Your World.” The young mermaid princess sings about wanting to explore the human world. “I want ...
Oscar Watch: If Beale Street Could Talk’s KiKi Layne on Love, Stillness, & Working With Barry Jenkins
KiKi Layne stars as Tish Rivers in Barry Jenkins’s adaptation of the novel by James Baldwin. A beautiful love story layered in social commentary, as relevant now as it was when the novel was originally released in 1974, Layne draws the viewer in with one of the best performances of the year, making you feel ...
Black Lightning Star Cress Williams on TV’s Most Human Superhero
The CW has been delivering the superhero goods on the small screen for years now, but things have gotten really interesting since 2014. That was the year the network began airing a yearly crossover event that involved many of the stars from their live-action series. The event, called the “Arrowverse,” connects the superheroes from Arrow, ...
Going Deep With ABC’s A Million Little Things‘ Rising Star Christina Ochoa
A few short years ago, A Million Little Things star Christina Ochoa was driving for Uber in Los Angeles, wondering whether or not she should go back to Spain. The grand-niece of the 1959 Noble Prize winner Severo Ochoa (a physician and biochemist who secured the prize for his work on the synthesis of RNA) ...
How Russell Hornsby Prepared for Emotional Role of Starr’s Dad in The Hate U Give
The Hate U Give takes no time to build up to the powerful message it delivers. The film opens on one of its most important and intimate scenes. A father, tough and terrified, lectures his seemingly too young kids on how to interact with police officers. Their mother tries to temper his tone, but he ...
Rosamund Pike & Director Matthew Heineman on Their Riveting Biopic A Private War
A Private War is the story of the intrepid journalist Marie Colvin, who endured terrible trauma including the loss of an eye and post-traumatic stress disorder before being killed in Syria during the siege of Homs. Rosamund Pike, who plays Colvin, and director Matthew Heineman talked to The Credits about blending documentary and narrative and ...
SCAD Savannah Film Fest: Jitters Writer, Director & Star Otoja Abit
Actor Otoja Abit had an idea for a short. It was a simple idea that concealed a depth of feeling; what if we got to see a young man, moments before his wedding ceremony, question whether or not he was making the right choice. Abit, who has acted on TV (The Defenders, The Night Of), ...
Roma Actress Yalitza Aparicio on Carrying Alfonso Cuarón’s Astonishing Film
Roma, the opening night film at Middleburg Film Festival, played to a sold-out crowd of film lovers. As the end credits rolled, it was greeted with rapturous applause. The film is leaving an indelible impression and gathering accolades from audiences and critics alike. Winning the Golden Lion Award for Best Film at the Venice Film ...
Green Book‘s Viggo Mortensen on the Power of a Great Script
The much-anticipated new release from director and co-screenwriter Peter Farrelly, Green Book, was just given the Audience Award for Best Narrative Film at the Middleburg Film Festival. The film has been received with equal enthusiasm at all its screenings, garnering, among others, the Grolsch People’s Choice Award at the Toronto International Film Festival. The story, which is based ...
The Mid90s Cast on Skating & Sticking to the Script in Jonah Hill’s Directorial Debut
Sunny Suljic, the young, breakout star of Mid90s, says most audiences don’t even know that he’s a proficient skater in real life. But for Suljic that’s proof that he did a convincing job playing a novice skateboarder in Jonah Hill’s directing debut. Truth is, the pint-sized Suljic, at just 13, is as adept at extreme ...
Rupert Everett on Writing, Directing & Starring in his Oscar Wilde Biopic The Happy Prince
Fans of both Rupert Everett and literary great Oscar Wilde have been patiently waiting for the release of the new film The Happy Prince, which has been 10 years in the making. The film Everett wrote, directed, and stars in is an unvarnished look at Wilde’s last few years, following his decline after release from a ...
Ike Barinholtz on his Funny/Terrifying Directorial Debut The Oath
In a future that seems as if it could arrive tomorrow, American citizens are instructed to pledge their loyalty not to their country, but to the president. That’s the premise of The Oath, the first feature directed by Ike Barinholtz. The comic actor, known from such series as madTV and The Mindy Project, also wrote ...
TIFF 2018: First Man Actor Skyler Bible on Working on Damien Chazelle’s Revelatory Space Drama
First Man represents the first time we’re getting a full-blown biopic about the legendary astronaut Neil Armstrong. Academy-award winning director Damien Chazelle‘s film, scripted by Spotlight and The Post‘s Academy-award winning scribe Josh Singer (based on the book by James R. Hansen) tells the story behind the first manned mission to the moon, with the focus squarely on Armstrong (Ryan Gosling). ...
American Horror Story: Cult‘s Emmy-Nominated Actress Adina Porter on Playing in the Dark
Bronx born and raised with theater roots, Adina Porter’s path to her first ever Emmy-nomination has taken her from the boards to the small screen in some of TV’s most demanding yet delicious roles. Before she became one of Ryan Murphy’s American Horror regulars, you may have seen her Alan Ball’s True Blood on HBO ...
Bo Burnham and Elsie Fisher Discuss the Social Media Influences that Shaped Eighth Grade
When writer-director Bo Burnham set out to make Eighth Grade, his acclaimed new account of middle-school anxiety, he had plenty of reasons to be anxious himself. He’d never directed a feature film before, and his subject was a 13-year-old girl, something he’d never been. But any apprehension was balanced by his relief at not being ...
Ben Foster on his Moving Portrait of Fatherhood in Leave no Trace
In Leave No Trace, Ben Foster plays a man who’s fled American society, carrying just a few things with him — most significantly his teenage daughter, Tom (Thomasin McKenzie). Foster’s Will is apparently a military veteran, but writer-director Debra Granik never tells his story. The character seems a bit like a post-traumatic version of the ...
