www.austinmonthly.com/Blog/March-2017/SXSW-2017-Pierce-Brosnan-Talks-The-Son/#.WMQnUetB96A.twitterSXSW 2017: PIERCE BROSNAN TALKS “THE SON”
WE CHATTED WITH THE FORMER JAMES BOND PRIOR TO SOUTH BY SOUTHWEST ABOUT SHOOTING THE EPIC AMC SERIES IN AUSTIN LAST SUMMER
BY DARCIE DUTTWEILER | PHOTO BY VAN REDIN/AMC
Published: March 11, 2017
Based on the Pulitzer Prize finalist novel of the same name by local author Philipp Meyer, new AMC series The Son is debuting during South by Southwest on Sun., March 12 at 7 p.m. at the ZACH Theatre, almost a month prior to its official premiere April 8 on the cable network.
Brosnan stars as Eli McCullough, the titular “first son of Texas,” a patriarch of a family whose success is due to a lot of bloodshed at his hands. The series also depicts his younger years, when he was kidnapped and then adopted into a tribe of Comanches in 1849.
We were lucky enough to visit a day of shooting last October, as the production shot in the Central Texas area for nearly five months. In preparation of our feature running next month, we chatted with Brosnan on the phone in early January. Read what the former 007 had to say about filming in the capital city, what drew him to the character and more.
Make sure to pick up a copy of Austin Monthly’s April issue for more about The Son, including tales from our set visit.
Hi, Pierce. I have a very important question for you first. How many tacos did you eat while you were in Austin?I didn’t have one taco. I didn’t eat a single taco.
You didn’t have any tacos?I had some great brisket; I had some short ribs. Having lived in California for 30-odd years and then some, my meat consumption has diminished. I’m an Irishman and was brought up on great Irish stews. But no, I seem to have missed out on the tacos. There’s always season two, Darcie. I’ll come looking for you, and you can take me for your best taco.
That’s a deal! Have you ever been to Austin before, or is this your first time?This is my first time, and I enjoyed it enormously. The warmth and the hospitality—the experience was first-rate. I just absolutely adored the town. There’s this great intimacy to it, and once I got over the shock of the freeways there, which are just ginormous and kaleidoscopic and otherworldly, I loved the intimacy of the town. I had a great time there and would ride my paddleboard up and down Lady Bird Lake—or Town Lake, whichever one you wish to call it. I really couldn’t have been happier.
What was it like to film here during the summer?Well, the heat was fairly intense—that just kind of blew me away. I knew it was going to be hot, but, when you get up at 5, 5:30, 6 o’clock in the morning to go to work and there’s a heat advisory saying “Do not go out,” and by 9 o’clock you’re sitting on your horse and it’s 104 degrees, that fairly slaughters you. But the thing was, the work was so good. The scripts, the stories we were doing were so powerful, and the crew we had there were just absolute warriors and the most gracious men and women I’ve come across in the film community.
And there’s great food and great bars and places to go to in the evening. So, I enjoyed your hometown.
According to your Instagram, you were having a lot of fun in town. Were you aware of the press that those photos were getting?Yes, it became evident as time went on that it seemed to be garnering quite a lot of interest. I mean, again it’s a very small town. But, yeah, I was aware of it.
Does it feel weird to have people show that much interest in where you’re eating and getting your cowboy hats from?The world we live in now is so interconnected. Having been an actor and a public figure for many years now, it’s just second nature. The Instagram came about because our son was on it—he went on it three years ago, and my wife went on to make sure that he was acquitting himself properly and she said, “You should go on; it’s good for your fans.” So I use it very much in that capacity.
Do you wear your cowboy hat regularly now that you’re back in California?I love my cowboy hat. I love my George Strait hat. I wear it on the beach in Malibu. So there you have it. One particular day I was passing Allen’s and I had to do some shopping or something like that, and it was really hot and I thought, “I need a cowboy hat.” I walked into Allen’s and it was the first hat I picked up and put on my head. Texas Hatters did all the hats for the show, and they have made some of the finest, most beautiful hats. Somehow Malibu and the cowboy hat just don’t seem to kind of go hand in hand, but I do wear the George Strait cowboy hat here.
Let’s talk about your character Eli a little bit. I know Sam Neill was originally supposed to be Eli, so how did you get involved in filling in right before shooting?
Well, I had a film that I was going to go to work on that fell apart. I said to my agent, “Look, I want to fill this summer,” and this came out of the blue, literally. The next day they said, “Well, you’ve just been invited to play in this series for AMC,” and I had been actively looking to go back to TV. I fell in love with the series, absolutely adored it right off the bat. I went in and with the producers, the writers, and by the end of the week we had a deal. Sam is an old friend and I called him up and I said, “Listen, thank you very much, I’m trying not to make a big deal of it, and all the best.” We know each other, and he was very gracious, I spoke to him recently, and he’s in good form.
What made you want to get back into TV?It’s such a fertile medium now, with the scripts and the books and the writing. I have done my movies, and I will continue to act in movies, but I just wanted to have more of a consistency to my years. On a yearly basis just to be able to be part of something, which is exhilarating. And I found it here, just by accident in The Son.
What was it about The Son that reeled you in?It was the writing, the storytelling, and the epic grandeur of the piece. Eli is a mythic American hero; he’s kind of the epitome of rugged individualism, you know, this man that comes from nothing and against all odds builds himself an empire. He’s a man that’s shaped by the losses in his life. And this story, this epic story, about America, about oil, about Texas, the making of an empire on the landscape of the Republic of Texas. Just the beauty of Philipp’s prose and the storytelling. At this point in my life, I’ve known a certain amount of hardship, but the hardship of loss of family, the struggle it takes to keep a family going, and the desire and the want for looking forwards, that’s the man that Eli is. If anything kind of defines Eli, it’s his flexibility and how he deals with the world and his lack of sentimentality. He’s a man who is constantly pushing himself, learning. His mind is open to the world.
How much of the character did you have a hand in shaping versus what was on the page?They gave me the scripts, and I followed the notes. When the text is good, there’s only so much talking. The text was beautifully rendered, and then you go forth with the knowledge you have of the history. But it’s the emotionality of the man and you’re dealing with sensing and intuition constantly, and that’s what this man is about. But Philipp wrote the scripts, and I played the part. We talked about weapons. He loves, loves his weapons and was so enthusiastic to tell me what handgun I was going to be shooting and what rifle I was going to be shooting. He has a beautifully dark, mischievous sense of humor and he’s an extraordinarily well-read, erudite fellow on the history of Texas and America and the landscape of our country then and now.
How does an Irishman go about portraying the first son of Texas?Well, you know, most of the people who came over were Irish. Your forefathers built on the shoulders of Irishmen and women and Scotsmen and women, Germans. So the seed, the essence, of your nation, your people are my people.
How do you make Eli, who has gone through so much and is maybe not the most likable of dudes, into this character that people care about?It’s a tricky question, but again you go back to the writing, and there’s always ambivalence, and when there’s ambivalence within the heart of a character or of a story, then you have the drama. I hope you can sympathize with him in some regards. He’s fighting for his life here, fighting for his family. He’s a man who’s shaped by the losses in his life. By his late 40s he’d lost three separate families. He’s lived his entire life in violence, surrounded by war all his life. He knows that he can’t just wish the violence away; you have to control it.
I have to ask you about the beard, because it’s beautiful. How long did it take you to grow, and are you sad it’s gone?No, I’m not sad it’s gone, no. Everything changes, everything falls apart, and then gets shaved. I started growing it the day I said “Yes.” That was four weeks to episode one, so as the episodes go on the beard gets longer and bigger and bushier. A good beard, a great-looking gun, a great horse and a hat—there you have it.
That’s all you need.Make sure to pick up a copy of Austin Monthly’s April issue for more about The Son, including tales from our set visit