Amy Adams had a cute interview with Jimmy Kimmel to promote Hillbilly Elegy, costarring Glenn Close. It’s on Netflix but it’s getting trounced in reviews so I doubt I’ll watch more than clips. Amy and Glenn are two of the most-nominated and most overlooked by the Academy. That could change for one or both of them with this film. On Kimmel Amy was charming and down-to-earth. It’s been a while since I’ve seen her interviewed since she’s always been good-natured and sweet. I especially liked how she described her remote social life and I wanted to talk about that. She has movie nights once a week with a group of people online and she randomly Facetimes her friends. I guess most of them have iPhones then. That makes me wonder if the celebrity set are using iPhones more than the rest of us. Here’s some of what she told Kimmel and the video is below.
It takes some getting used to to be home this much. I’ve actually become.. Way more social. I have a zoom moms group we get together and sort of talk
About our concerns and cares and then I do something called a facetime people in my contact group to see who will answer.I do a movie night once once a week. We watch a movie and then do a quiz. A group of friends invited me to it which I’m grateful for. Every week we watch a best picture nominee starting from 1960 we’re in the 80s now so it’s been a while.
I haven’t seen like movies I really should have seen so this has been great for me. I saw the deer hunter which I hadn’t seen and godfather one and godfather two.
I have a retroactive crush on Robert De Niro. I have a crush on him in the 70s. That’s what I’m getting out of movie nights not some sort of deep education about cinema but just that Robert De Niro is really hot.
[From The Jimmy Kimmel Show on YouTube]
Amy is one of us, lusting over young Robert De Niro. As for randomly videochatting people, I don’t even call anyone except my mom without asking first! All my Zoom calls are set up ahead of time. It’s wild that she Facetimes people without checking with them first, but they don’t have to answer I guess. I love that she’s watching all the Oscar-winning films with friends remotely. That’s a great way to structure your week. Just last week I started Zooming with people to watch a show together and I’m surprised how much I like it. All you do is queue up the show at the same time and as long as it’s not too loud you usually don’t hear an echo. I could also relate to her saying she’s more social now than before. I really listen to people more than I used to and we discuss more important things. That’s all we can do now (other than watching a show) since we’re not doing many activities together. There’s more depth to my conversations and friendships, which has been a silver lining. I enjoyed listening to Amy because she made me realize some things about my social life.
Here’s that interview! Amy says she wears wigs for Hillbilly Elegy, which she prefers because it’s easier. Jimmy makes her feel guilty about getting a smaller turkey for Thanksgiving, which is funny.
Amy on March 3rd going to the hair salon:
photos credit: Avalon.red and Backgrid
I watched hillbilly Elegy …it is awful . Not her acting ( she has a supporting character for me) or Close ´s ( lead) but the lead male actor is so uncharismatic and the directing/writing is bad.
Ron Howard is clearly not David O Russel .For some reasons, it looks like The Fighter when you think a little but contrary to DOR,Howard has no empathy with the characters
I’ll add that it’s likely that the source material was garbage. I’m salty that it was even made into a film. J.D. Vance is terrible and I don’t like to see his terrible views rewarded. But maybe a terrible film is fitting, then.
Along with a group of family and friends, I read Hillbilly Elergy when it was first published. It is an excellent book. When we heard Ron Howard was going to bring it to the screen, we wondered how they could produce a successful translation given the complexity of the book, but we had hopes as it was Ron Howard. Unfortunately —- based on the critical reviews and clips they have failed, but I still highly recommend the book.
During the spring I was definitely more social than in pre-pandemic real life, with Zooms with friends at least 2-3 times a week. The Zooming has scaled back to almost nothing these days but I have one group chat that goes on all day every day. I tend to text with people more than talk on the phone although my niece will FaceTime me at random times.
In summer and fall we had occasional socially distant gatherings in backyards but with colder weather those are dropping off, too. I don’t miss the social contact that much — maybe because one of my college kids has been home all fall semester — but my husband definitely does.
I’ve seen some reviews that say Amy and Glenn are unrealistic in their portrayals. As someone who grew up with women just like them they are spot on. However the overall movie and especially the male lead have some struggles. The male lead might as well be a puppet. That’s how lacking he is in charisma.
Spot on! I agree with you I wasn’t sure I would like it but I did, depicting the complex realities of poverty is not an easy thing to do. U can never go wrong with Amy and Glenn Close. The male lead was questionable. It showed how circumstances whether good or bad can determine life’s outcome.
My take on the male lead was he unassuming, quiet trying to avoid making any waves whatsoever as children in such dysfunctional homes often do.
I haven’t watched it yet, but my cousin’s 20 yr old daughter called me in tears after watching it. She has a drug addict mother, and was mostly raised by her abhorrent grandmother who was not much better (in Ohio) and she thought the themes were so close to her own life, that it was painful to watch. I’ve heard a lot of people calling it “poverty porn”, but maybe those people don’t really know what growing up that way is like, because I’ve had more than a few people tell me it really resonated with the way they grew up.
Video chatting someone without planning ahead of time is a major no-no to me. I’d be annoyed if someone did that to me.
I was pretty social when everyone was equally staying at home – it was a novelty for people to do zoom calls and virtual movie nights. I still do some movie nights with friends (Teleparty is a great tool for that), but COVID fatigue has ruined a lot of that socialization. I’m still dedicated to staying home as much as possible, while some friends and family, erm, not so much. I realize there are downsides to a literal lockdown (not that we had a strict one to begin with), but socially I much preferred those first couple months where we were all in this together.
Same Amy, same. My brother always jokes about how anti-social I am but lockdown has made me more social. I used to think about how to make more friends which is hard when you’re an adult. But Ive actually made more connections in lockdown. And I love the idea of a Zoom movie group.
She’s one of my favorite actresses so I will probably watch the movie, despite the bad reviews.
I would say I’m less social, but my inner introvert doesn’t mind it one bit. This time of year is a little harder though, I usually do a lot of holiday activities with friends and family, and none of it is happening this year of course. I am going to miss it, but more important to stay safe.
Amy probably usually has such a busy work schedule, I’d imagine now she has a lot more free time to do stuff like the moms group and the movie group.