George Clooney - Ocean´s Eleven
Interviewed by Ben Falk
updated 14th February 2002
George Clooney plays ringleader Danny Ocean, in the remake
of The Rat Pack's "Ocean's Eleven". Clooney also produced the
film through his company Section Eight, which he co-founded
with director Steven Soderbergh.
Did you feel like the
original Rat Pack?
We never really thought of it that
way. It is such a different film. I don't know if you've ever
seen the original, but it's not great. There wasn't really the
ghost of Frank, Dean, and Sammy over us, because they're just
too cool. We can't play on that basketball court.
Is it true that you were the cast's ringleader?
I
was kind of the ringleader. We went and got the cast in a
similar way to the way the movie unfolds. Steven and I went
about recruiting the biggest names in showbusiness.
And you looked like you were having a good
time.
Brad, Matt, and I were talking about it. It will
never be better than this. No one went to their trailers. We
just sat around the set and laughed and told stories.
It must have been pretty amazing to get a cast of this
magnitude in the same room?
It is unprecedented these
days. You can get a small, independent film with a lot of
stars in it, but you can't do it with a studio film. The only
way to do this was for all of us to sit down and go, "Look, if
this is ever going to work, we all have to cut our salaries
and make the film we want to make."
You seem to be a star that doesn't care about being in
the 20 million dollar club?
I did "
O Brother, Where Art Thou?" and "Three Kings" for next to
nothing, literally next to nothing. I take a back end and
sometimes you see some money, sometimes you don't. But if you
get to make the movies you want to make, it's worth the whole
thing.
