While recently preparing for an interview with Joaquin Phoenix during the Los Angeles press day for his new 2025 movie Eddington, I took notice of a special aspect of his filmography. His latest film is his second time working with writer/director Ari Aster, and that fits an interesting pattern, as there is a litany of talented and high profile filmmakers with whom he has worked multiple times – the list including Ridley Scott, Paul Thomas Anderson, Gus Van Sant, James Gray, Terry George, M. Night Shyamalan, and Todd Phillips. Discovering this, I couldn’t help but think that it said something about the way that he works with directors, and I felt compelled to ask him about those relationships the following day.
It won’t surprise anybody to learn that there isn’t just one thing that he is looking for – a reflection of the complexity in how directors and actors work together. It’s part of the former’s job to personally connect with the latter in order to evoke the best performance possible, but in answering my question, Phoenix first prioritized a big picture perspective. Anybody can point a camera at a subject, so he wants to work with people who do it in ways that nobody else is considering and can’t copy. The Oscar winner explained,
I think in some ways it's very simple with the director for me in that I just want somebody that – it seems obvious – but just has a really unique vision, right? That they do something that no one else can do, that you can't replicate what they do; you can try, but it's never gonna be the same. Right? And so I think that's kind of the most important thing for me.
If you look up and revisit the list of names mentioned in the first paragraph, I think it’s fair to say that he is regularly successful in looking for filmmakers with unique vision. There are a lot of auteurs who have successfully made movies that are instantly identifiable via their special signatures and flairs.
It’s not solely about the big picture, though, as Joaquin Phoenix continued by noting the importance of working with filmmakers who know how to push the right buttons and get him to “explore” aspects of his abilities of which he was previously unaware. In a director, he looks for someone who can make him see new angles. But also not to be ignored as well is the importance of clicking personalities. He added,
And then: can they find something in me that I haven't explored before – a different way that I might have an approach of character? And are they gonna be able to challenge me and elicit something from me? And then will I be able to be around them for three months and like, not hate them? Sometimes it really just comes down to like... 'cause you're spending like hours upon hours with somebody and you're talking about things that are kind of happening in the world, but in the world of the film, in the world at large and your own personal experiences, and things can get heated and intense and also humorous and fun.
If you don’t already know: movie-making is hard. It seems like glamorous work if you’re solely focused on the red carpet side of things, but it takes dozens upon dozens of people to make a feature, and things can get stressful and hectic. Needless to say, everything becomes much more difficult if a lead actor grows to loathe their director. Or as Joaquin Phoenix put it,
You go through this really intense condensed period, this relationship with somebody that's like really intense for three months. And so you're like, I want to remain friends with them and I wanna bring out the best in each other while we challenge each other. So I think those are, those are kind of what I look for.
As you can probably tell, the actor has a pretty clear idea of what he’s looking for so that he can reach the expectations that he has for himself and his work. But one other aspect also matters, as he threw in as an addendum:
And also just like just like if they'll have me. Like, if I'm available and if they'll have me.
After making Beau Is Afraid, Ari Aster clearly felt very happy about having Joaquin Phoenix on set again, and audiences will be able to see the end result of their collaboration in theaters this weekend (courtesy of A24). Featuring a talented ensemble cast that also includes Pedro Pascal, Emma Stone, Austin Butler, Luke Grimes, Micheal Ward, and Deirdre O’Connell, Eddington is a movie that has been intentionally made to be divisive, and that has most definitely been the reaction from critics in the run up to its release. It’s certainly a fascinating work, the story set during the controversy-filled summer of 2020, and one you can make up your own mind about it seeing it on the big screen starting tomorrow, July 18.
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