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“I’m hallucinating,” said Johansson, who just got off a long international flight, where she’s filming another movie. “It’s 5 in the morning — which is a great time to be doing an interview on stage.”
“Paper Tiger” premiered in May at the Cannes Film Festival. However, this marked Johansson’s first time watching the movie (at least in a festival setting); she missed the Cannes premiere because she was shooting yet another movie, “The Exorcist: Martyrs.”
“Don’t rub it in!” Johansson joked about her absence on the French Riviera.
Set in 1986, “Paper Tiger” follows two brothers, Irwin and Gary Pearl, whose get-rich-quick scheme to help clean up the Gowanus Canal lands them in the crosshairs of the Russian mafia. Johansson plays Linda, wife of Teller’s character.
Johansson, Driver and Teller walked the red carpet with Gray at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall and sat for a post-screening Q&A, during which they spoke about their close camaraderie during production.
“No work required. There’s a mutual admiration between the four of us,” Driver said. “A set culture comes from the top down, and James sets a culture where everyone feels free. We immediately felt comfortable with each other.”
Added Gray, “We had a nauseatingly lovely set. I love them. I’m not on the Today show. I’m telling you the truth.”
Before the screening began, Gray took the stage and consciously kept his intro remarks short and sweet.
“When I was in film school many years ago, students would show their films, and the students that talked the most [before] often made the very worst movies,” he said. “So I am going to speak very briefly.”
Gray praised the producers and actors who helped bring the film to life and reflected on his early dreams of being a filmmaker.
“I can’t help but remember my mother and father when I said I wanted to be a movie director. ‘How are you ever going to do that?’ And here I am,” Gray said. “I’m not sure the lesson in that.”
NYFF artistic director Dennis Lim introduced Gray as “one of the great living American filmmakers” and praised the director for championing a “singular” artistic vision.
“It’s not easy to make personal films in the current landscape of American cinema,” Lim said. “The fact that there are 24 executive producers credited on this film, like, who speaks to that.”
New York Film Festival’s 64th edition, which runs through Oct. 12, will host the world premieres of “Artificial,” Luca Guadagnino’s buzzy movie about OpenAI founder Sam Altman; Ava DuVernay’s documentary “14th”; director Tony Gilroy’s music drama “Behemoth!” with Pedro Pascal, Olivia Wilde and Will Arnett; and Takashi Yamazaki’s kaiju sequel “Godzilla Minus Zero.”
“Premiere status is never the be-all and end-all for us,” NYFF artistic director Dennis Lim told Variety ahead of opening night. “Timing is always part of it. But I think we’ve proved in the last few years that we create a pretty interesting context for the launch of a film.”
