Jake Gyllenhaal has now left these shores - leaving behind a country seduced by one of the most impressive beards to appear on the nation's chat shows in recent times. At the moment, one can just speculate whether Jake will be returning to Europe shortly for other End of Watch release dates but even though it was brief, the visit was a great success.
In addition to the Graham Norton Show and the Radio 1 Breakfast Show (see below), Jake also appeared on Channel 4's T4 show on Saturday morning talking to Jameela. Let us hope that video of this appears. An interview with Jake was also broadcast on the XFM Breakfast Show with Danny Wallace. Hopefully, you can listen to that here.
A brief recap of some of the other most significant appearances (ie, the ones we have a record of).
From overseas comes the news that End of Watch will be re-released in the US this month - surely a sign that the Oscar buzz is increasing in volume.
Meanwhile, this week Hitfix has published a wonderful interview with Jake in which he looks back over a career working with some extraordinary directors. This is just the sort of stuff I want to hear and Jake does not disappoint. Do read it, it's full an revealing. I was intrigued to hear Jake say this, for instance, about Sam Mendes 'he was the best acting director and coach that I've ever worked with. The things I learned about acting from him I've taken with me everywhere I've gone.'
There is much more about Ang Lee, David Fincher, David O'Russell, Jim Sheridan and Ed Zwick, as well as David Ayer. I wonder how many other directors Jake will work with during his long career that will also be called David...
In Hitfix's other full interview with Jake, David Ayer also reveals a little about why Jake was so keen to take on the End of Watch role - and that he was actually sick of his life. Clearly, here was another of those roles, as with Jarhead, that he fought for and he needed: 'Gyllenhaal was looking for something new in his life and, according to Ayer, chased the project down. "I think he was just frustrated," Ayer said by telephone. "He wanted to act. He wanted to just sink his teeth into a role and act and not be distracted by the sort of big business side of things. He wanted to lose himself and he wanted to be reinvented…He's just like, 'Look, I'm sick of everything. I'm sick of my life and I want to change it. I want change.' And that's all I heard, is that he's ready to transform. His heart was really open at that time and he was really receptive to doing something totally different and giving me the total commitment that I needed for this movie to work…I told him, 'Look, if this works out, you're going to come out of this a different person.' And I think that happened."'
The photo is from Jake's BAFTA End of Watch Screening on Friday evening (thanks to IHJ).
As we immerse ourselves deeper and further into the world of mysteries that will become known to future generations as '2012', one thing hasn't changed from the end of last year - the Jake Drought. Yes, at the moment it's easier to see a flying duckbilled platybus than it is to espy Jake Gyllenhaal amongst the coffee bars of American cities. As a result, this post takes us back to 2005 when Jake was, as I remember, everywhere. Sometimes at the same time. On one of those days, Jake attended the Variety Screening Series gala for Jarhead along with Peter Sarsgaard and Sam 'Bond Director' Mendes.
Back in January 2008, four years ago almost to the day strangely enough, I did a major post on this screening - do read it here - but links in it subsequently packed in. I have replaced the main podcasting link which will let you listen to the full Q&A (and it's a goodie) but a video of part of it is now available. And that wasn't originally featured. You can watch that below or find it here.
Many thanks to BBMISwear for finding the new links! Photo thanks to IHJ.
So! Is today Sexy Stubble Day or is it not? While we wait to hear about tonight's New Yorker chat in NYC (10pm EST), here is a short interlude post. Firstly, Jake Gyllenhaal has been seen today in the Big Apple and it was on another train. Duncan Jones certainly didn't put Jake off trains by blowing them up through Source Code. And for that the environment is no doubt grateful.
But on to more serious matters. Jake wasn't just seen on a subway train, he was also seen with a bear. 'I just saw Jake Gyllenhaal on the subway in NYC, bear and all. He looked at me and seemed afraid I'd say something. All good man, live your life.' So, bear...? Are we talking Grizzly, Polar, Black, Brown or Panda here? Something tells me, it's Grizzly. Hopefully not Polar. This post is going for a clean-shaven look in terms of photos - as a last-minute incentive.
Jake was also seen with Maggie yesterday. The bear wasn't mentioned so clearly it was behaving itself. Maggie was also seen out for a bite to eat this week with Sam Mendes, her past director and Jake and Peter's (plus a local boy round these parts). Sam does look like he may have heard this one before - maybe it was one of Jake's old jokes.
Tonight, with or without his bear, Jake will be talking with Ed Zwick and the New Yorker about Love and Other Drugs. After not having heard much at all from Ed on this movie, suddenly he can't hold back. We've been talking here about our favourite Jake movies and it appears that Ed has been giving them some thought too. Here are some words of his on his leading pair from Blast Magazine: '“You have to look at an actor’s body of work,” Zwick said. “I’ve been watching Annie’s work in the last couple of years. Increasingly, the braver she gets, the more she takes chances and the better her work. She’s clearly someone who is ambitious and serious and coming into the height of her power. I thought, well gee, nobody has seen how earthy and tough and funny Anne really is.”
'“And Jake, really when given the right script has been extraordinary. Some choices are less good than others I think, but when I got to know him, I saw something nobody else has seen, just how funny he is, and how charming and open and attractive in this way. Nobody has seen Jake be that seductive bad boy, and I said let’s show audiences parts of these actors they think they know but don’t.”'
Personally, I think this is something that David O'Russell saw in Jake too and we will also see this side of him in Nailed - hopefully.
Do keep your own top tens coming in the comments. I'm really enjoying reading them and I'm not the only one. Includes pictures from links, IHJ and a WDW scan.
Gorgeous blue-green eyes, long lashes, disapproving manner, 55-60, male? You could be Jake Gyllenhaal's dad and the role is up for grabs.
'Casting forces for filmmaker Ed Zwick have been talking to candidates to play the father of Jake Gyllenhaal in Zwick’s “Love and Other Drugs” film also starring Anne Hathaway. The ideal actor should be between 55 and 60 years old and it couldn’t hurt if he has gorgeous blue-green eyes with long lashes like Jake’s. But anyway, the character is a doctor who disapproves of his son’s career as a pharmaceutical sales guy. Also being cast for the flick, which rolls in September, are his younger brother and mom.'
The younger brother and mother don't get much of a look in here, but, presumably, you'll want to keep your lashes long for these roles as well.
Talking of film fathers, one who looked to me like a good match as a dad for a young Jake was Dennis Quaid in The Day After Tomorrow. "We had Dennis in mind because he is strong, smart, likable, fatherly and tough," [Producer Mark] Gordon says. As for Gyllenhaal, last seen with Dustin Hoffman in Moonlight Mile, "you could believe Jake is Dennis' son, and not just physically. Together, they are charming, funny and warm." For me, it was the dimples...
Another film producer, Frank Marshall, has been talking about his future projects including the future Lance Armstrong biopic: 'Despite the various casting rumors, Marshall says an upcoming unknown actor is looking likely to take the role of the famed cyclist as the likes of Jake Gyllenhaal and Matt Damon are too old - “The book really only takes Lance up to the first tour, so he’s only 21.”' This surprises me because it suggests that, even back in 2006, when Jake was out cycling with Lance on what seemed like every Summer Sunday, he would have been too old. It also makes me think there'll be a Part 2.
Proof
It was wonderful to see the Brokeback Mountain videos from Venice and, with extra thanks to Monica, we can now see the photocall from Proof's showing at the same festival. Proof may have been overshadowed by Brokeback but if you want to see Jake strike a pose then look no further.
And finally...
As an update to yesterday's post, surprisingly and disappointingly, and despite her presence in the UK of late, Maggie Gyllenhaal wasn't at the Edinburgh Film Festival last night.
Sam Mendes and John Krasinski (and Sean Connery) were. We (and Sam) already know John Krasinski.
With big thanks to a London blogger, Jake Gyllenhaal and The Hat were seen yesterday playing pirates in Kensington Park. Not only that, there was a camera to hand. And, unless Jake has developed an interest in 16th-century rigging, it's quite possible that Jake was entertaining fellow pirate Ramona. Thanks Get Real!
That was yesterday - what about today? At about 9pm this evening, Maggie Gyllenhaal's new film Away We Go gets its British premiere on the opening night of the Edinburgh Film Festival. Maggie is one of the stars expected to walk the red carpet alongside Sam Mendes. I doubt that Jake will make an appearance but it is possible that he too will head north today to this amazing city.
Talking of film festivals and red carpets, a big thank you to Monica for discovering two videos from Brokeback Mountain's huge success at the Venice Film Festival in September 2005. It's a pleasure to include them here.
The strange and mysterious tweeting world of twitters has alerted the inhabitants of New York City to the possibility of encountering Jake Gyllenhaal around each and any corner of that city. Time for all NYC Gyllenhaalics to start frequenting those bistros and coffee shops, and hat shops. Talking of hats, Jake has been spotted again today. This time Jake was a 'Chic Sighting' for Fashion Weekly: 'Meanwhile at Balthazar, a knit cap-wearing Jake Gyllenhaal arrived for a late breakfast with three distinguished gents.'
From my reckoning, it would seem that the sighting was chic for five reasons: 1) It was Jake 2) the hat was a beanie and not a fedora (the beanie is now officially forgiven by WDW) 3) Jake was with 'distinguished gents' (presumably, they wore ties) 4) Balthazar is a French bistro of 'exceptional design' 5) it was a 'late' breakfast. Having studied the breakfast menu, I like to think that Jake's breakfast featured egg with soldiers.
I also like to think that a late breakfast meeting with three distinguished gents means that Jake is putting his autograph on the contract for Love and Other Drugs, aka LOG.
Sam's Jarhead regrets
Sam Mendes has briefly touched on Jarhead during his publicity rounds for Away We Go and there would be no complaints about this statement: 'I’d like to do a director’s cut of Jarhead.'
'[How was that film compromised?] I took the politics out of it. [Why?] I don’t know. Because it felt wrong at the time, I think. I was too close to it, and I couldn’t give it a context. We were in the middle of the height of the Gulf War, and people were determined to make the film into something that was political, and I felt that I wanted it to stand on its own, and be timeless. The thing I regret, which I didn’t have to do on Away We Go, was that I didn’t have a chance to be away from it for a while. I shot Away We Go, then did a play, then came back to the film and did post. So that gave me some objectivity with it, whereas with Jarhead, I was working on it right up until its release date. I had a strange experience during the premiere of Jarhead, I was watching it and thinking ‘Wait a minute, they’ve skipped a scene! Where did that scene go?’ Then I realized, I’d cut the fucking thing! (laughs) And that shouldn’t happen to you as a filmmaker. You should know the landscape of your movie intimately. That just shows you that sometimes when you don’t have the time, you can really compromise your own material without meaning to.'
Jarhead is such a strong film that I doubt many of us (biased as we possibly are) would have thought the film compromised and would instead argue that some films have too long in post-production - I can think of several examples. But a director's cut of Jarhead would be some treat and I hope Sam gets the chance to release a film with a landscape he recognises and feels comfortable in. Obviously, it would feature more shower scenes.
'Jake is like one of those Japanese fighting fish that can constantly change their appearance. When they're threatened they go bright orange, and when they're safe again they're next to invisible. So many things flicker across Jake's face, and the camera captures them all.' Sam Mendes in W (Jake's response, showing his Donnie Darko research had paid off: 'I'm sorry to kiss Sam's ass, but he's rad.')
Jake Gyllenhaal is able, through the slightest hint of a raised brow or the subtlest lift of a lip, to suggest every emotion by just the softest hint. As a result, the audience feels it all. No need to scream and shout, sometimes you don't need to say a word.
Ang Lee famously told the Guardian that Heath was '"easy to photograph, easier than Jake," observes Brokeback director Ang Lee. "With some actors, you have to avoid this and that. Not with Heath." Nevertheless, natural born performer and photography fan Jake Gyllenhaal (his mother bought him an 'old fashioned' - probably means it took batteries and film - camera for his 21st birthday), Jake knows all about showing the camera what it wants.
'It takes a certain type of person to enjoy entertaining people, and to use his own body for it... The instrument is... me! And if I'm going to play it, it's weird.' (W magazine.) Peter Sarsgaard said of Jake in the same magazine: 'His relationship to performing, and all the issues he has with it, is a lot more complicated than most actors I know... I think it's something he's going to wrestle with for a while.'
The drive to perform is quite probably something one must be born with, and Jake's desire for the spotlight has been there ever since he 'came down with a bad case of acting flu while performing in a skit. He and his friends were singing Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" when he realized he wanted to be a professional actor.' (Knight Ridder 2001.) It is one reason why the role of chef appeals: 'I think performing has always been a big thing for me and I think cooking is another type of performance.'
Jake told Boyfriend magazine: 'I remember when I was little that I loved acting coz I wanted the attention! Then I would do a play at school and look into the audience and see the reaction on everyone's face, and that's what I love. Now it's become more than that.'
As for the obvious rewards of performing: '"Are you kidding me? I was so surprised!" Jake Gyllenhaal said about getting his first Oscar nom, for best supporting actor in "Brokeback Mountain." Speaking from the set of "Zodiac," Gyllenhaal said he was asleep when his agent called with the news. "I try not to have expectations. I had given up expectations in the past little while, and it's done me a lot of good. I think it's good to leave your expectations at the door. I feel that way about my birthday, I feel that about Christmas, and I feel that way about this."
For someone who wants an audience, Jake is in luck, he has one ready and waiting.
It's been brought to my attention that People magazine is asking readers to vote for the Best Chest of 2008 (Best male chest, that is...). Ludicrously, Jake Gyllenhaal has opposition, although they shall remain nameless. I thought I would try and put matters right by presenting the true competition for this prestigious title.
Sea chest
Sleepy chest
Fit chest
Wet chest
Working chest
Sports chest
Holiday chest
Treasure chest
Jake and dinner
During the publicity for her new film, Revolutionary Road, the lovely Kate Winslett has been discussing what it was like to mix work and marriage with director Sam Mendes. Kate recalls that she has had experience of Sam bringing his job home before - namely for Jarhead: '"I had to remind him: 'Don't you remember on Jarhead? Because I was there when Jake [Gyllenhaal] would call you in the evening and you'd talk for two hours on the phone,'" she says. "Even if we were in the middle of a dinner that I'd spent hours cooking, he would take the call. And quite right, too."'
And finally
A blogger has been talking about the mysteries they encountered at Pinewood Studios last week, and they included tea drinking Arabian assassins - methinks work was still goin on with the Prince of Persia last week.
Yesterday (Friday), Jessica Biel was photographed arriving at the Wildfire post-production studios in LA, where she is doing voiceover work for Nailed. Now this has to be good news and an indication that perhaps this film is at last receiving its finishing touches. At least, Nailed is in a fit enough state for there to be a voiceover, and that's got to be good. I also like Jessica's jumper - after yesterday's post, I think Jake would like it too.
Voiceovers are not to be sniffed at. They take skill and can play a huge role in setting the mood and tone of a film, not to mention shifting the plot and characterisation along and creating a relationship between the speaker and his listeners. While Jake Gyllenhaal is at an advantage when it comes to voiceovers - just listen to that voice of his - he still has admitted to finding them tricky and his most perfect voiceover, for Jarhead, didn't start off that way and nearly lost Jake the much-wanted role.
In DVD Review, both Sam Mendes and Jake discussed with some honesty how Jake messed up the voiceover for his audition, so much so that, even though Jake was Sam's first choice, Sam turned to look at other actors, leaving Jake to phone him in the middle of the night, fighting to get another chance. Sam said: 'Jake didn't nail the audition. He was very much who I wanted straight away but when he came in he didn't audition well.. When he started reading I thought 'Who is Swofford and who is this guy?' The problem with writing a movie based on a book that's a first-person narrative is that, often, the least clear thing about the book is the person writing it.'
According to Jake, 'I had a really hard time with the narration and it was almost the thing that didn't get me the part. When I came in and read for Sam, he made me read the voiceover. It was really literary and I really thought that I fucked up... and I did fuck it up!... He turned and said to me, 'You didn't seal the deal, I have to tell you!' That's his way of saying that I had just fucked it up. I had a hard time with that.' To get over this, Jake was given Swofford's original journal: 'It was a little green book... and it had on it a song lyric which was so cheesy and young, and kind of sweet in alot of ways.. Then when you open it up it's about how many girls he wants to fuck and how many people he's going to fucking kill and blah-blah-bah, he's on watch and it sucks and this guy sucks and they kicked our asses today - not the same perspective that the book was in. And I just thought, 'That's who I'm playing, not the guy who wrote the book!'
Sam came back round to wanting Jake, 'When I first saw him at the initial audition, I thought, 'Maybe Swofford isn't this, maybe he's something else. maybe he's much more hardcore, more silent and private and inaccessible.' So I met with a lot of other actors and I read the part with them all to try and see what kind of a person Tony was. Every week there'd be a new draft and then, eventually, I came full circle to Jake. It took me a while to realise what I wanted.'
Jake also told Entertainment Weekly about his first audition in Sam's New York apartment: 'It was really, really literary and hard to get your mouth around... I couldn't connect. I thought I'd f---ed it up' and while Jake was filming Brokeback Mountain he was troubled at the thought of Sam auditioning other actors.
This is a far cry from the time when the very young Jake was being put through his action hero paces on the set of The Day After Tomorrow. Back in June 2004, producer Mark Gordon and director Roland Emmerich told SFX magazine, with not a little humour, how they set about making their vision a reality, complete with CGI and wet actors. As Roland says: 'If you make a film that has amazing images, you can still bore people to death.' Obviously they avoided this straightaway by hiring Jake Gyllenhaal.
It was all new for Jake as Roland describes: 'As he'd only done small, independent movies he was really excited to come and do a movie like this... It was an opportunity for him to be really physical. The toughest scene for him was the one in the water tank. Water is always tricky. If you're standing hip-deep in the stuff and you have to do the same scene over and over again, and on top of this it's raining on you, and there are wind machines blowing in your face... well, it's not very attractive. We tried to make it as pleasant as possible for him.'
''We gave them umbrellas occasionally,' deadpans Gordon.'
I was amused to read here that the 'rapscallions behind South Park had received a leaked copy of The Day After Tomorrow screenplay, and had plotted to make their own, alternative version, filmed in absolute secrecy and then released on the same day as the bona fide original. A version made with puppets. 'They're not doing that', says Emmerich, with the air of a man who never once found this idea even remotely amusing.' They called Rupert Murdoch: 'And when Rupert wants to take care of business, he takes care of business, and he took care of it for us...'' I hope they still have their kneecaps.
Jake has said that one of his favourite scenes is the one where tornados devastate his home town of LA. Apparently ''A lot of people wanted me to cut that bit out and I said, 'Only over my dead body,' says Emmerich 'I've had to live in this town for 14 years and I didn't enjoy it one bit.' Sounds fair enough to me.
As you can tell, I've been having a winter's day going through my old Jake scrapbooks, which go back quite a few years. And I rediscovered this newspaper cutting which gives us some idea of what dreams drove Jake to be in the movies in the first place: 'Ever since I was a little boy, I've know what I wanted to be: a bird. Unfortunately, I was not that great at flying, so I gave that occupation up. I felt depressed that I did not have something to look forward to when I grew up. But since the day I saw my first movie, my worries were over.'
'There in front of me was a 'scween' (as I called it then). After the screen opened, people started moving around on it. It amazed me! It was a momentous occasion. It confirmedwhat I would do when I grew up - sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I had not gone to that movie, but I did. And it gave me the 'key' to my acting future!'
And finally...
Prince Dastan's rather fine and gorgous foe, Toby Kebbell, attended the UK premiere of Leo DiCaprio's Body of Lies last week and, according to Empire, Toby is currently 'training hard for his big fight scene with Jake Gyllenhaal.' (I couldn't help myself from correcting the spelling of Gyllenhaal...). Now, I would pay good money to see this big sizzling fight scene, and I expect I will, over and over and over...
Includes pictures from links, IHJ, Getty and scans from WDW.
