in Crazy Heart
(© Twentieth Century Fox)
In Scott Cooper’s new film, Crazy Heart, Maggie Gyllenhaal gives a heartfelt performance as Jean, a fledgling journalist and single mom who tumbles into a destructive relationship with Bad Blake, a down-and-out alcoholic country singer (played by Jeff Bridges, who is sure to receive an Oscar nomination for his work).
Not surprisingly, Gyllenhaal — who is happily married to actor Peter Sarsgaard — admits it was initially a challenge for her to make sense of these characters’ sudden relationship.
“I remember right before we started shooting thinking to myself, ‘How does a capable, smart woman fall for such a serious drunk,'” says the actress. “And then I decided she’s just not thinking. That happens. I am a person who uses my brain a lot and sometimes I don’t think too. What I love about this movie is that it makes you be compassionate about why certain people love each other. You realize that you can be so attracted to the thing that makes you the sickest.”
The movie is Gyllenhaal’s first starring role in three years, after she took something of a hiatus when her daughter, Ramona, was born. “Suddenly, I had this surge of feeling that I think all parents must have intermittently during their children’s lives that I had been completely focused on my daughter and on being a mother, and that I needed to do something just for me,” she says. The shoot was quick, taking only three weeks, and Ramona came with her on location in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Being a mom, however, strongly influenced her performance. “So much had built up in me that needed to be expressed from becoming a mom that’s now in this movie,” says Gyllenhaal. “Jean has been trying to be a good mom to her son and pull together a good life from what was a difficult beginning, and yet I think she also feels like she needs something just for her, that feels good for her even if it’s bad. In fact, it’s probably better for her if it’s bad. When I first watched the movie, I was ashamed at parts of it because Jean seems so weak. But in the past couple of months, I’ve begun to see the real power in being vulnerable and not being so ashamed of your own weaknesses and that it’s okay to expose that sometimes. I knew that in my work before I knew it in my life.”
Gyllenhaal says working with Bridges and Cooper was one of the best experiences of her film career. “What is so nice about working on a script that is so good and with an actor like Jeff who is so good is that you really don’t have to make a lot of choices,” she says. “With a weak script, you have to solve a lot of things on your own, and if you’re working with a leading man who’s not there with you, you have to make a lot more choices as an actor. But if you’re lucky enough not to be in that position, you can just let anything happen.”
She’s had that experience working with her husband; the pair teamed up earlier this year for a production of Uncle Vanya at Classic Stage Company and are considering another go at the stage. “Peter and I have been talking to our director, Austin Pendleton, about doing another play together. It can be done pretty easily, because we don’t want to be in a big theater, just someplace small for about six weeks. When you’re working with Austin, you feel like you’re in acting class,” she says. “I’ve also been talking to Tony Kushner, whom I’ve done a couple of things with, about acting in one of his plays. Whenever he asks me to do one, I just drop everything and go. I’ll really do whatever he wants.”
