George Clooney interview in Cincinnati Enquirer Oct 2011

Thanks Laetval for the link, and again, I'd be very happy if someone could scan the print interview if it doesn't turn up online and post it here (or email it to me: clooneysopenhouse at gmail dot com):

From cincinnati.com

Watch For George Clooney Interview Sunday

Oct 1, 2011 | Written by jkiesewetter

By George, I got him! I spoke to George Clooney on the phone for a half-hour about making “The Ides of March” here, and my story — and my “Ides” review — will be printed in Sunday’s Cincinnati Enquirer.

Clooney tells me about why he’s wanted to shoot the movie here for three years…. and how his roots here shaped not just all the Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky places you’ll see in the film’s background – but also how it shaped the words in the script and the dark, cynical view of the presidential election process.

This I can say: George is very proud of the film, and says they made the movie they wanted. He was pleased that so many of you came out to watch him film with Ryan Gosling, Paul Giamatti, Maria Tomei and Philip Seymour Hoffman — and thanked you for being “good grownups” to allow them to work without hassles or interruptions all around downtown, on campus at Xavier and Miami, and in Covington, Newport and Newport.

He sounded like the good ol’ George I’ve known for 25+ years. One of my first big stories when I took over the TV beat in 1985 was about George Clooney on “The Facts of Life.” And then I spoke to him regularly when he did various TV shows: “Roseanne,” “Baby Talk,” “Bodies of Evidence,” “Sisters” and “ER,” where I spent a day with him on the set… and for his movies “Fail-Safe” and “Leatherheads.”

He’s one of the most influential people in Hollywood, and when he came on the phone and I asked him “How’s it going?,” he says:

“I’m groovy, buddy, how ya doing? How’s life?”

Same old George.

On the A&E cover you’ll find my “The Ides of March” review. Is it a good movie — or just a good Cincinnati movie? I answer that question in Sunday’s paper too.

Two more things: Watch for George on PBS’ “Charlie Rose” Tuesday, which should be mostly about the movie (Charlie Rose appears in the film, along with CNN’s John King and MSNBC’s Chris Matthews and Rachel Maddow)…. and watch for George on “David Letterman” Wednesday. The film opens Friday.

When they post my stories online, I’ll add the links to this blog.

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George Clooney tapped his Cincinnati roots to make 'Ides of March'
ENQUIRER EXCLUSIVE

It's not just the local landmarks - Fountain Square, Riverside Drive, Memorial Hall - that George Clooney brings to the big screen in "The Ides of March," which opens here and nationally on Friday.

The film's cynical view of U.S. politics (inspired by father Nick Clooney's 2004 run for Congress), some of the candidates' comments (lifted from dad's columns) and a desire to make a great film like the classics he watched as a child with his family all can be traced to Clooney's Ohio-Kentucky roots.

"It's part of who I am," said Clooney, 50, in his first local interview since directing the thriller in February.

The 1979 Augusta High School graduate and his business partner, Grant Heslov, rewrote a play called "Farragut North" about presidential campaign dirty tricks in Iowa. But they moved it to the Ohio Democratic primary.

"Ohio has always been the key state. I put it in Cincinnati because I know it really well, and I thought it would be fun to shoot in my hometown," said Clooney, who grew up in Fort Mitchell, Mason and Augusta with parents Nick and Nina and sister Ada.

"Ides" has generated early Oscar buzz for Clooney and Ryan Gosling ("Drive," "The Notebook"), who stars as Stephen Myers, the idealistic press secretary for candidate Mike Morris (Clooney), the governor of Pennsylvania.

Myers considers switching to the rival campaign days before the Ohio vote, torn between campaign managers played by Philip Seymour Hoffman and Paul Giamatti. Evan Rachel Wood shines as a campaign intern; Marisa Tomei appears as a New York Times reporter.

Movie goers will see Gosling at Fourth Street, the Fifth Street skywalk, Roebling Suspension Bridge, Miami and Xavier universities, Lunken Airport and Covington's picturesque Riverside Drive.

"I once spent a few weeks house-sitting there (on Riverside Drive). I like that street a lot," said Clooney from his Los Angeles office.

"I loved being at Xavier. Miami University was exciting ... places I had gone to as a kid to see ballgames."

Clooney created quite a stir here. Hundreds watched from the perimeter; 25,000 emailed to be background extras.

"I never met so many cousins I didn't know I had," he joked.

The crowds didn't interfere with his work, said Clooney, whose mother is the Kentucky Film Commission chairman. Production on "Ides" moved in March to Detroit, where most interiors were filmed. Ohio and Michigan gave "Ides" filmmaking tax credits.

Clooney waited three years to make "Ides" here. Although the Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky Film Commission started scouting sites a year ago, the script was finished before Barack Obama's election in 2008. The timing wasn't right back then for a jaded looked at the political process, he said.

"When Obama won, even a lot of my conservative friends were in such a good mood that we thought we couldn't make a movie like this," said Clooney, a liberal Democrat who has discussed efforts to end genocide in Darfur with Obama in the White House.

"Some people will think this is some long civics lesson ... (but) it has very little to do with actual politics, and much more to do with what happens to any person who gets involved in the backrooms," he said.

As Gov. Morris, Clooney's proposal to outlaw the internal combustion engine in 10 years to end America's reliance on foreign oil may sound familiar here. It came from Cincinnati Post columns written by his father, a former TV host and Channel 12 news anchor.

Did he research old columns on microfilm?

"No, believe me, if he's written about it, he's talked about it hundreds of times," he said. "A lot of those ideas were a big part of my growing up."

The script's dark tone came, in part, from his father's lone political campaign.

In 2004, Nick Clooney got 44 percent of the vote in a run against Hebron Republican Geoff Davis for Kentucky's 4th District seat in Congress. Davis outspent him by nearly $1 million.

His dad "was pretty devastated" when voters believed TV ads demonizing him as a Hollywood elitist. They showed him wearing an Army jacket, round John Lennon-style glasses, and holding a joint, his son said.

George - who didn't campaign for his dad - heard him talk about the "uncomfortable, embarrassing and at times humiliating" process of seeking campaign funds.

So in adapting Beau Willimon's play, Clooney wrote a scene with Morris lamenting to his wife (Jennifer Ehle, "The King's Speech") about fundraising, union deals and negative ads: "I wasn't going to do any of it," Morris tells her.

Clooney said he saw his "father really fight it, and lose pretty terribly. No matter how pure you try to keep it, you're always going to have to take meetings with people you don't like. I got a real sense of how ugly it is - and that was just for a congressional seat."

Clooney also drew on his experience with political consultants Michael Deaver, James Carville and Mary Matalin on his 2003 "K Street" HBO drama about Washington lobbyists.

Before reading "Farragut North," he and Heslov also were writing a screenplay about a "bait-and-switch" conservative Republican who comes out against the death penalty after securing the presidential nomination.

"We were working on a morality play. We had a couple of different versions of it, basically about 'Do the ends justify the means? And at what point is it OK to sell your soul?' " Clooney said.

This isn't the first time Clooney paid tribute to his roots here.

Clooney pushed for and made live telecasts of an "ER" episode and CBS' "Fail-Safe" movie because of fond memories of his parents doing live TV here in the 1960s and 1970s.

When he won the best supporting Oscar for "Syriana" in 2006, he was also nominated for writing (with Heslov) and directing "Good Night and Good Luck," about CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow, his father's hero.

"He's overwhelmed me quite enough," said Nick, 77. "He should stop now."

Are more Academy Awards possible for "Ides"?

That's not important to Clooney, who grew up watching classic films with his dad, author of "The Movies That Changed Us" in 2002.

"I don't remember who wins awards, I remember movies. I remember seeing Paul Newman in 'The Verdict' and thinking: That's as good of a performance that I've ever seen.

"We made the film we wanted to make, and we're very proud of it. It's the kind of film I grew up watching in the '60s and '70s," he said.

"I've been doing this for a long time, and all I really want to do is make films that I'm proud of later in life. This is one of those."

Good interview. Thanks, Katie. As they say, the early bird gets the worm, and I finally figured out (duh) why you are so quick on the draw. Time is everything.

Since he'll be in NYC for Charlie Rose and Letterman, I wonder if he'll stop in Cincinnati on Friday for the premiere? Now that would be cool!

That would be nice since so much filming was done there. It is true what he says about the movies you don't remember the winners.

melbert wrote:Since he'll be in NYC for Charlie Rose and Letterman, I wonder if he'll stop in Cincinnati on Friday for the premiere? Now that would be cool!

I hope so!! Since I live in the city, it will be such a treat if I do see him.

Pictures MM!!!! Pictures!!!!!

Yay!! I'm achieving total Clooney-dom!!!!!!!!!