Tag: matt bomer

‘American Crime Story: Versace’ Had A Surprising ‘American Horror Story’ Vet Behind The Camera

There have been a lot of visually and emotionally beautiful episodes of The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story, but few are more important than “Creator / Destroyer.” For hours and weeks now, the Ryan Murphyshow has explored the lives Andrew Cunanan has ruined, but in its final two episodes, the series has shifted its focus to finally land on the killer himself. At the center of this heartfelt and disturbing examination of a serial killer is Matt Bomer in his directorial debut.

Though Bomer is likely best known for portraying Neal Caffrey on White Collar, the Magic Mike and Chuck actor actually has a fairly long history working with Murphy. In 2014 he starred in HBO‘s The Normal Heart, a TV movie that followed a writer and activist as he sought to expose the truth about the emerging AIDs crisis. Bomer starred as Felix Turner, the love interest of Mark Ruffalo‘s Ned Weeks. However, his journey through Murphy’s many projects was far from over. Later that year Bomer starred as the prostitute Andy in American Horror Story: Freak Show, and the next year he made an extremely memorable appearance in American Horror Story: Hotel when he was raped to death by a demon with a drillbit dildo. Based on those appearances, you may assume that the Bomer-directed episode of American Crime Story would be just as flashy as those past roles. You would be wrong.

“Creator / Destroyer” is packed with disappointment, a theme the show has played with but has never really embraced until this point. The hour starts on a young Gianni Versace (Wolf Fleetwood-Ross) as he follows his seamstress mother around. During a particularly emotional moment, Gianni’s mother tells him that though she was told she could never pursue her dreams, things would be different for him. If he wants to learn how to sew, she will teach him.

The episode then jumps decades ahead into the future where it follows two other parents set on giving their child the world — Mary Ann (Joanna Adler) and Modesto (Jon Jon Briones) Cunanan. From Modesto commanding a young Andrew (Edouard Holdener) to say goodbye to his home to the tears our murderous protagonist sheds over getting into his dream school, the episode is immediately established to inspire failure. It lives up to those down-facing expectations time and time again. It’s not just Andrew (Darren Criss) who fails to live up to the pedestal of his parents’ expectations. At the end of the episode, Modesto is just as much of a failure in his son’s eyes.

These themes are wonderfully highlighted through Bomer’s direction. When the camera focuses on Mary Ann or Modesto’s tenser scenes, it’s more active, echoing their anxieties about barely achieving the aspirations they have for themselves. However, when the camera is on Andrew, its steady, sweeping angles are even more anxiety-inducing. When Modesto first shows his son the master bedroom that is destined to belong to him, there’s a sense of pride that’s not unlike when Mufasa first showed Simba everything that the light touches. However, we already know how this story ends. Everyone is going to be deeply disappointed.

That is nothing to say of the episode’s excellent use of color. In an interview with Nina Jacobson and Brad Simpson, the executive producers told Decider that using pinks was very important to the creative direction of the show. The warm color palette  was supposed to represent homosexuality and opulence while echoing the colors of Miami. In contrast, “Creator / Destroyer” dwells almost exclusively in radioactive greens and harsh, office-lit yellows. It’s a decidedly mundane and borderline gross-looking episode in an otherwise breathtakingly gorgeous show. And that’s the point.

For seven episodes now, The Assassination of Gianni Versace has hinted at this idea that Gianni Versace and Andrew Cunanan were never really so different. However, it’s “Creator / Destroyer” that quite literally spells out that relationship. Both men came from fairly humble beginnings. Both seemed to have loving parents who wanted what was best for them. Both were gay men during a time when that was still culturally taboo, and yet one man inspired joy, made art, and built an empire while the other took the lives of five innocent men. To fully understand the horrors of the Andrew Cunanan case, we have to eventually try to understand Andrew Cunanan. In Versace‘s second to last episode, Bomer has captured the frustration, disappointment, and shock attached to this historical figure in a way that’s emotional while capturing Murphy’s signature camp at just the right moments.

‘American Crime Story: Versace’ Had A Surprising ‘American Horror Story’ Vet Behind The Camera


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“Creator/Destroyer” with Matt Bomer

Joanna Robinson and Richard Lawson discuss “Creator/Destroyer,” the penultimate episode of The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story, including additional bonus segments with lead actor Darren Criss. This week’s featured interview is director and frequent Ryan Murphy collaborator Matt Bomer who discusses stepping behind the camera for his directorial debut.

‘Assassination of Gianni Versace’: Matt Bomer on directing that pivotal origin episode

Tonight’s episode of The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story is notable for giving viewers the origin story of Andrew Cunanan’s childhood and family, particularly his abusive father, Modesto (a terrifying Jon Jon Briones). But it also marks the directorial debut of actor Matt Bomer.

The star, who’s worked with executive producer Ryan Murphy previously on Glee, American Horror Story, and The Normal Heart, talked to EW about being assigned this pivotal hour and his future directing hopes.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: How did this happen? Did you mention this to Ryan?
MATT BOMER: I’d worked with Ryan obviously multiple times before. He knew I always came in with excessive reams of research and homework and overly fastidious preparation. He mentioned to me that I should direct at some point, and I didn’t think much of it at the time. I think he knew I needed to be creatively re-inspired and reinvigorated. He called me in December and said, “Hey, I want you to direct!” I was thinking maybe it will be American Horror Story: Cult. When he said, “I want you to direct on Versace,” I promptly fell out, passed out, and when I regained consciousness I was not sane enough to say no, I said yes. It was really the best thing that’s happened to me in a long time.

It was like a four-and-a-half-month process for me. I read over 3,000 pages of books on directing. I did an intensive at the DGA. I shadowed two of the directors on the show and met with every film and episodic director friend of mine I could to just be a sponge. I met with editors. I knew the level of work that was going to be going on, and I wanted to be able to come and really be able to play on that level.

Did you get to pick your episode?
No, I was shadowing and kind of waiting in the wings. There was a time when it was going to be maybe the Miglin episode, and then there was a time it was going to be the episode that aired this week. I’m grateful I got the episode I did. It’s such a psychological episode, and we wanted to do it in a Sidney Lumet-esque style. There are some fancy camera moves in it, but it’s really mostly about these relationships and these character dynamics. And this great central question of what makes one person a creator and one person a killer? The answer being hard work. Andrew is someone who’s been told by his family that he’s special and exceptional, and you’d think he’d be the one to rise and succeed. Gianni is being bullied in school and has a loving mother who says you have to work to make your dreams come true. Her work ethic that she instilled in him, plus his art, is really what created the label of Versace.

You played Darren Criss’ brother on Glee. How was it working with him in this regard?
I knew Darren was a tremendous artist and had lots of stories inside of him. I was lucky enough to be in the front row, eating popcorn, watching this performance from very early on. I was watching this performance really since they got to L.A. From the first frame I saw him, I was like, “Whoa. This guy has tapped into something that is electric and spontaneous.” There are moments where Darren is so good, he can be silly and then they’re calling “rolling” and he’s right there. I would look at his face and it was like he had been possessed by this soul. It was really creepy to see and amazing to watch and inspiring.

It’s not a traditional narrative structure. It must have been hard to tell this story backwards.
I had been on set and so immersed in the story for so long that it wasn’t something I had to put a ton of thought into just because I was so entrenched in the story already. I was lucky to get this episode because it’s almost a standalone. So much of this was can we get the audience to sympathize with a monster and understand that he was this child who was inured to violence very early. He had this snake oil salesman of a father who was teaching him that it’s not enough to be smart, you have to fit in. You’re special! Here’s the master bedroom. He basically had this family hostage emotionally, physically, sexually. So we got to watch that all play out on him and then meet him when he’s in high school.

I wanted it all to build up to that great Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now kind of confrontation that they have at the very end. That was kind of our inspiration for that. We wanted to have that final confrontation where you got the feeling if he just lashed out at his dad or punched him or killed him, he wouldn’t have killed anybody else. But because of that moment he turned inward, it later gets expressed outward for other people. We’re all responsible for the choices we make and the actions we take, but Andrew was a victim. We wanted the people to say, “Can I on some level sympathize with a monster?”

Was that in Maureen Orth’s book, that Andrew went to Manila to see his dad?
He did go to Manila and he did see his father one last time. Some of the dialogue and circumstances are imagined, but that’s what makes [Versace writer] Tom Rob Smith so brilliant, and they had all kinds of research going on outside the novel.

Jon Jon Briones as Modesto Cunanan is incredible. Did you have input in casting him?
Yes, it’s owed to a lot of people. I had been asked to direct before on things I was acting in, but I didn’t want that half-assed first experience directing. I wanted the whole experience. I wanted to be in every casting session I could. I wanted to be on location scouts, design meetings. It’s a real testament to Ryan Murphy, but Jon Jon had been brought to my intention very early on by Darren and Tom Rob Smith, who had both seen him in as the Engineer on Broadway in Miss Saigon. So I immediately reached out to Ryan and the producers and said, “We have to make sure we get this guy on tape.” He gave a kick-ass audition. This is a guy who has been doing mostly Miss Saigon for mostly the last 20-something years, but who was ready for this opportunity. Ryan is willing to take risks on people in order to serve the story. He’s done it for me in the past. This was that moment. My favorite part of this experience was getting to work with Jon Jon and getting to see somebody rise to the occasion.

In lesser hands, that performance would be broad and not so gray. But it’s so shaded.
I saw him as Willy Loman. This is somebody who comes from the rural Philippines and has to pull himself up by the bootstraps. He really had to make his own way. It’s that middle-class thing of you work and work to make to that higher class. What do you sacrifice in the process in terms of your morals and your ethics? It’s a very American, human, relatable story.

Where did Darren’s dance come from at the high school party? Was that improvised?
It was largely improvised. They also had a dance instructor there. We were so excited about that moment and that reveal. It was Ryan’s idea to have “Whip It,” which is such a specific beat and not the easiest thing to dance to. Darren just had a ball with it. In my original cut, it ended with him and Annaleigh Ashford on the dance floor and her falling into a full split.

We shot three different endings to this episode, and one of them was the two of them. But one of my favorite scenes to shoot was them by that fire, and you see that fire of their initial romance and coming together.

What do you want people to take away from your episode?
I think we discover in this episode that Andrew was also a victim. Like I said, we’re responsible for the choices we make and the actions we take. But he at one point was an impressionable, open child who was inured to violence at a young age, and messaging that’s not healthy for anyone to have. The things his father says to him and does to him both as a child and when he’s older that he internalizes were a big part of getting the full, holistic picture of who he was by the time we’re in the final episode with him in Miami.

Will we see more “Directed by Matt Bomer” credits?
I would love that! I had such a great time doing it. I was also really blessed because when you’re working with Ryan Murphy, you have the best people in the business around you. I know that I’m going to get to another job at some point and it’s going to be like the Real Deal Holyfield and it’s not all my friends that I’m working with. But I just loved it. It was a huge episode. The first cut was 90 minutes long. I think half the battle is just knowing, oh my gosh, I can do this. I can be given this massive script and do it on time and get it done. Hopefully there will be more stuff, but it’s got to be something that moves me.

Tell me about doing The Boys in the Band on Broadway!
We start rehearsals on Good Friday. I’m so excited. Just to get to share the stage with those guys and work with Joe Mantello as a director and watch and learn. So much of my understanding of our history starts with Larry Kramer and Torch Song Trilogy. To go back another generation and understand what pre-Stonewall life was like and the fact that these guys are all cooped up in this house together because if they’re dancing in public they’ll be arrested! The stakes are so high! Society has told them that they are “other,” “less than,” and “shameful.” So there are all these misdirected emotions coming at each other in different ways, and what they really want to say is “I love you” and “We’re the same!”

‘Assassination of Gianni Versace’: Matt Bomer on directing that pivotal origin episode

‘American Crime Story: Versace’ Director Matt Bomer on Bringing Three Different Continents to Life Within L.A. City Limits

The penultimate episode of “The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story” is almost like a checklist of all the challenges a director might face in crafting an episode of TV. For Matt Bomer, that’s exactly why it made for the perfect directorial debut.

“We had two child protagonists in the first couple acts of the episode, so you’re already on child hours. We’re in three different countries, five different cities. Party scenes, trading floor scenes, a period piece,” Bomer told IndieWire. “I was so grateful to be thrown so many challenges my first time directing because I was able to tick off so many boxes of things that I don’t have to worry about any more. Half of it was just getting it done and knowing you can do it and do it on schedule.”

Known for his work in front of the camera, Bomer had other opportunities to direct before but always wanted to wait for the optimum chance to immerse himself in a project. When “American Crime Story” became a possibility, Bomer devised his own personal film school to get himself ready to meet the challenge.

“I was waiting patiently in the wings. Ryan had reached out to me back in December [2016] and asked me to direct. After I passed out and regained consciousness, I said yes and really spent four and a half months on this episode,” Bomer said. “I read over 3,000 pages of books on directing, I shadowed two different directors on the show. I sat down with film and television directors who are friends of mine who were willing to be mentors. I did an intensive at the DGA. I knew the level of artistry that was [happening] on set and I wanted to meet everyone on their level.”

Part of Bomer’s signing up for “American Crime Story” was the chance to fully commit to the task. He was on set for a month of shoots while the show was filming other episodes in the season, affording him the chance to know the full crew before he started.

“I didn’t want that partial directorial experience. I wanted to really immerse myself and approach it like any director would. I wanted to be there for all the scouts. I wanted to be in the room for all the casting. I wanted to be in all the design meetings. I didn’t want to just lean on the director of photography to get me through while I worked with actors,” Bomer said.

For an episode that meant turning L.A. into locations as wide-ranging as San Diego and the Philippines, it was an investment that paid off down the road.

“I had to find three different countries within a Los Angeles area,” Bomer said. “We had an incredible production designer in Jamie Walker McCall. She worked her magic, particularly what she did in the Baliuag shack. That final confrontation between Andrew and his father is a setpiece we talked through that she built. I think her work on that was tremendous.”

The pivotal piece in the “Creator/Destroyer” puzzle is Jon Jon Briones, who plays Andrew Cunanan’s father Modesto, a man whose pathological drive to appease his son lays the groundwork for the rest of the “Versace” saga that came before this. Briones’ reputation as a performer had preceded him on set, with “Versace” star Darren Criss and writer Tom Rob Smith both praising his legendary, long-running work as The Engineer in “Miss Saigon.” Through the audition and right up through the first day of shooting, Bomer knew they had the perfect man to play Modesto.

“We started with that move-out scene early on. He had this guy and he knew this man. We were also shooting this while he was in a Broadway show, so we had to shoot all of his stuff out in six days straight and then he had to fly back to New York,” Bomer said. “That final scene, that ‘Heart of Darkness’/’Apocalypse Now’ confrontation at the end of the episode, that was really when I went, ‘OK, this guy is sensational. He’s got this all mapped out and he knows how to do this.‘”

Building a relationship with the two performers at the heart of the episode was key. Even though Bomer didn’t come in with a predetermined directorial style, he had the advantage of having already seen what Criss was doing with Andrew Cunanan as a character before it came time to show how he got there.

“I had been witness to what Darren was doing on set and had been blown away by it from Day One. I knew how he liked to work. I think a big part of directing is when you’ve got something great, get out of the way. Just set a good frame that tells the story right, stage it right,” Bomer said. “I try to give the actors a lot of information about what the scene’s about by how I stage it. There are also times when it’s a three-page scene between two people and I go, ‘I’m not giving you anything. Let’s rehearse until we get something that’s organic and true and then we’ll shoot that.’ So there’s no one-size-fits-all. You’re always dealing with a different box of crayons, depending on which artist you’re working with in any given scene.”

That preparation meant that even the smaller moments in the episodes, ones on a much simpler scale, had the opportunity to take advantage of everyone’s shorthand.

“One of my favorite things we did was that really quick scene where he puts on the CD and he’s picking out his big reveal outfit for the party. It was a tiny little thing, but we were just vibing creatively with the camera people, with Darren. Everything was coming together at that point. I think we did it in one take,” Bomer said.

That sense of understanding came from collaborating with people that Bomer had previously worked with on other Ryan Murphy projects. Those individuals were part of every step of the “Creator/Destroyer” process, from the on-set crew to the stewards of the post process.

“I was so fortunate because when you’re working with Ryan Murphy, you’re working with the best people in the industry. I’m not talking about episodic. I’m talking about in the industry,” Bomer said. “The camera crew, the production designers. Simon Dennis, the director of photography. Alexis [Martin] Woodall, what she does in post-production, the way she tones these shows is phenomenal. My editor, Shelly Westerman, was a personal hero of mine. She did ‘Velvet Goldmine’ and worked on so many of the films that were really central to my cinematic experience as a young man.”

That editing process shines in the boardroom scenes where Modesto is essentially pitching the American dream to his employers, both before he’s hired and after his penny stock scheme has been sniffed out.

“This is Sidney Lumet-esque style, where these performers are all bringing their A-game. Shelly and I knew we wanted these scenes to live for a long time, not to be this MTV, jump-cutting thing. Stay in masters longer and not chop and chop and chop to distract,” Bomer said. “Particularly in an episode like this, it’s so psychological, you needed to have this creepy drifty feel and live in these moments that are uncomfortable and horrific and scary. Especially when you have performers operating at this level.”

Bomer said he’s back to being patient about any future directing opportunities, but having this finished and released to the world is the first step in keeping those future options open.

“It was all a learning process, but I feel like with anything, discipline can give you freedom. I was so overly prepared because I had the time and the luxury to be overly prepared. The first couple days we finished a bit early and I was able to take some deep breaths,” Bomer said. “I know that there will be a time when I am directing and I’m having to deal with some much harsher realities that you don’t have to deal with when you’re working for Ryan Murphy television. The best thing this gave me was this sense that I can do it.”

‘American Crime Story: Versace’ Director Matt Bomer on Bringing Three Different Continents to Life Within L.A. City Limits