Interviews

Dennis Quaid, Golden Globe nominee for Far From Heaven by Todd Haynes and for the TV movie The Special Relationship in which he played Bill Clinton, will next play Ronald Reagan in the 2022 movie Reagan. In these times of increased anti-Asian hatred, we go back to 1990, when Quaid was interviewed by the journalists of the Hollywood Foreign Press for Come See the Paradise, written and directed by Alan Parker.

Diane Kruger, born in West Germany, trained as a ballerina, moved to Paris at 17 to work as a fashion model, married French actor Guillaume Canet, acted in his directorial debut Mon Idole (2002). She was cast in the American films Wicker Park with Josh Hartnett, Troy with Brad Pitt as Achilles and Eric Bana as Hector, National Treasure with Nicolas Cage.

Last month, HFPA member Silvia Bizio recorded a conversation with director Peter Bogdanovich on the 50th anniversary of his 1971 Golden Globe-nominated drama, The Last Picture Show. With his sudden passing on January 6, 2022, we are presenting this podcast with our sincerest sympathies to Peter’s family and friends as we celebrate his legacy and listen to the colorful stories of his life and career.

A pairing made in film heaven: director and cinematographer Spike Lee and Ernest Dickerson, inseparable in almost everything they did as artists in the 80s and 90s, making six movies together, and great friends in real life. Recently the two sat down together in downtown Los Angeles, where they talked for an hour and a half in front of a rapt audience of 400 at the Colburn School of Music.

Jonathan Majors, Idris Elba, Regina King, LaKeith Stanfield, Zazie Beetz, and Delroy Lindo are just a handful of the acclaimed actors who appear in the western The Harder They Fall. The revenge-filled story follows a charismatic assortment of gunslingers, bandits, and outlaws in a fictional tale about real historical figures.

Moroccan actor Youssef Kerkour has gone from being typecast as a terrorist to acting opposite Adam Driver and Al Pacino in House of Gucci. And it seems there’s more to come, as Kerkour tells us he will once again be working with iconic director Ridley Scott on the Napoleon Bonaparte drama Kitbag, alongside Joaquin Phoenix.

Starting as a refugee and rising all the way to award-winning film star and now into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Zain Al Rafeea has done a lot at 17 years old. With only two acting roles under his belt, Zain has managed to catapult himself and his family into a new life.

“You could summarize Spin Time as a documentary about the poor as you've never seen them before,” says Italian author, stand-up comedian and satirist Sabina Guzzanti, known internationally for her 2005 documentary Viva Zapatero! Her new film, Spin Time, subtitled How Tiring Democracy Is!, had its premiere at the Venice Film Festival last September and will be screened in New York in early December. “The film portrays the world of the invisible poor, who refuse to play the victims here,” says Guzzanti, who is famous in Italy for her parodies and hilarious impressions of Italian politicians (her Berlusconi is a classic).