A glimpse into the personality of Director, David O. Russell

“THE WRITER KURT Vonnegut once said, ‘We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.’ If I pretended to cry for you right now, I could actually start crying about real stuff.”
Sat outside the Al Qasr Hotel’s Koubba Bar, director David O. Russell exudes an odd mix of skittishness and brash self-confidence (imagine Woody Allen had played sports and listened to The Ramones, and you’d be in the right ballpark).

The talkative New Yorker – who was in town on Saturday for the Dubai International Film Festival’s closing day – is currently one of Hollywood’s hottest filmmakers.

He last two movies, The Fighter (2010) and Silver Linings Playbook (2012), picked up a combined 15 Oscar nominations – with Christian Bale and Melissa Leo winning awards for their supporting turns in for the former, and Jennifer Lawrence scooping Best Actress for the latter.

Russell’s most recent work, American Hustle, may turn out to be the crown jewel of the three. Critics have been dazzled by the tale, which reunites Bale and Amy Adams from The Fighter as well as Lawrence, Bradley Cooper and Robert DeNiro from Silver Linings Playbook. Also joining the cast are Jeremy Renner, Michael Pena and comedian Louis CK.

Set in the 1970s, American Hustle draws loose inspiration from the real-life ABSCAM sting operation, which exposed political corruption in the US Congress. Bale packs on 40 pounds of flab and employs a hopeless combover to play Irving Rosenfeld, a skilled conman who falls in love with New York newbie Sydney Prosser (Adams) despite being locked in an unhappy marriage with hot mess Rosalyn (Lawrence).

Though Irving and Sydney excel together as grifters, they are caught out by volatile FBI agent Richie DiMaso (Cooper) and forced to use their talents in a scam to trap public officials looking to handle dirty money. Pena plays a ‘fake sheikh’, purportedly from Abu Dhabi despite his Mexican heritage, to hook potential participants in the sting, with targets including smalltown New Jersey mayor Carmine Polito (Renner).

“The actual guy who played the sheikh wasn’t even Latin-American,” says Russell with a grin. “It was an agent who was the brother of Brian Dennehy (a veteran actor who appeared in Cocoon) – a white guy who put on make-up, so what they did was even stupider.”

Despite the multiple scams and cons that continue to unfold, Russell refutes the notion that the story is, as one critic called it, “a sincere meditation on insincerity”.

“That’s overly simplistic for me,” he says. “The characters are not just insincere. Irving and Sydney sincerely love each other, and Irving sincerely loves his son and his wife – even though he wants to kill her. He can’t live with her. I know what that’s like, I’ve been married to a woman I loved but I just couldn’t live with her anymore, so I got divorced.”

Instead, the 55-year-old – who also wrote the screenplay with Eric Singer (The International) – sees his tale as a meditation on people’s ability to reinvent themselves. He points out that Adams’ character alone switches between three personas: a naïve girl from New Mexico, her feisty British alter ego Lady Edith Greensly “and the one in the middle who’s figuring out who to take a chance on”.

“It’s not just about rip-off artists,” he continues, “I like to feel the passion that these people feel for life, even if they’ve made terrible mistakes and are having to reckon with them. I love that they love somebody or something. It’s very vulnerable and human to me.”

Russell harked back to his own youth, particularly the confusing transition from childhood to adolescence, while exploring the theme of choosing one’s personality.

“As a kid, you’re on the floor with all these toys and then…what am I supposed to do now? It’s sad, and I remember it was a very empty feeling to me. I was kind of depressed for a few years. I would stay in my room reading and not calling anyone, with my mother asking what was wrong with me.”

Remembering lines
Born David Owen Russell, the future filmmaker grew up in a comfortable middle-class New York family. His father, a book salesman, sported a combover much like Christian Bale’s character in American Hustle (“there’s something very endearing about it to me”, he tells us).

Russell’s love of movies led him to memorise lengthy segments of his favourite films verbatim.

“That’s how I learnt filmmaking,” he says. “I could tell you 20 minutes of Chinatown right now, beat for beat, or It’s A Wonderful Life or The Lady Eve. And that’s very comforting. So if I’m having a bad day, I start doing that scene to myself or with a friend and it’s like taking a drug. It’ll change my whole mood.”

This sense of escapism through entertainment is etched into the script of American Hustle – such as when Sydney and Irving first meet and bond over a shared love of Duke Ellington.

Adams’ character claims that the jazz pianist “saved my life many times”, before they listen to his instrumental 1956 piece Jeep’s Blues.

“That’s my favourite Duke Ellington track,” says Russell. “I gave Christian and Amy record players and said, ‘This song is the foundation of your love, and it tells you everything about each other.’

“Movies have saved my life many times,” he adds – explaining that the fierce intensity of the filmmaking process keeps him from fully retreating into the idle comforts of cynicism or pessimism.

Russell’s career began with the controversial 1994 comedy Spanking the Monkey, before cementing his reputation with features including acclaimed 1996 war film Three Kings and oddball 2004 comedy I Heart Huckabees.

But after enduring a personal and professional funk, which included his divorce in 2007 from producer Janet Grillo and problems raising his bipolar son, Russell reemerged stronger than ever three years ago with The Fighter. The movie saw the director reunited with his Three Kings star Mark Wahlberg in a biographical tale about Massachusetts boxer Micky Ward. The film grossed more than five times its $25 million budget amid glowing reviews.

Russell’s follow-up, Silver Linings Playbook (based on the novel by Matthew Quick), saw Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence play unbalanced romantic prospects. Again it received a rapturous response – grossing $236 million from a $21 million budget and wowing critics.

So to what does Russell attribute his return to the top?

“By being humbled, by being brought to my knees,” he replies. “It was like hanging over a cliff and being given a last chance to tell a story, or else get dropped off.

“Ten years ago, I never would have made The Fighter,” he continues. “I would have said, ‘I don’t get it, it seems like a story that’s been told before, it’s like Rocky, I don’t know, who cares...’

“This time I looked closer at the people, which was interesting for me. You’ve got to believe in what you’re doing, even if it’s just to survive through something.”

Awards and rewards
Russell also took a leaf from the book of Duke Ellington, who coined the term “beyond category” to describe his work. The filmmaker decided to tell stories that defy easy pigeonholing by ignoring the limitations of genre flicks, instead focusing his attention wholly on the characters and their complexities.

“I didn’t see The Fighter as a boxing movie,” he says, “and I would never call Silver Linings Playbook a romantic comedy. When people said that, my head snapped. I said, ‘Wash your mouth out with soap!’”

He hesitates to use the term ‘comedy’ for American Hustle as well, although the tale undoubtedly pays homage to screwball farces of yesteryear such as Some Like it Hot.

“It is funny but it’s also heartbreaking,” he says. “It’s an opera to me. I’m only thinking about the people: what would they wear, what house would they live in, what music would they like, what food would they eat…”

Despite the multitude of awards heaped on his last two films, Russell is cautious when it comes to discussing American Hustle’s prospects at next year’s Oscars (where he hopes to win the Best Director gong at the third attempt).

Released in the States just days ago, the film has already been hoovering accolades including seven Golden Globe nominations and two nods at the Screen Actors Guild Awards.

“You have to go into these things expecting nothing,” he says. “And it’s always very exciting and emotional if you do get acknowledged. But as soon as you start to expect anything, you’re f***ed.

“It’s humbling to make a movie at all. You should kiss the ground just to have the chance. Cherish it and get your head out of your ***.”