Edward Burns
Edward Burns
Edward Fitzgerald Burnsis an American actor, film producer, writer, and director best known for appearing in several films including Saving Private Ryan, 15 Minutes, Life or Something Like It, A Sound of Thunder, The Holiday, One Missed Call, 27 Dresses, Man on a Ledge, Friends with Kids, and Alex Cross. Burns directed movies such as The Brothers McMullen, She's the One, Sidewalks of New York, Purple Violets, and The Fitzgerald Family Christmas. He also starred as Bugsy Siegel in the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth29 January 1968
CityNew York City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
Spielberg gave us three takes before saying anything to us. Since then, I do that, three takes, to let the actors find their rhythm.
The way I see it, when I go out as an actor, it should be on a type of film I'm never going to do as a director.
Actors are con men and con men are actors.
Newlyweds shooting budget: 5k for actors, 2k insurance, 2k food and drink. 9k in the can. We only shot 12 days. That's how to make an independent film.
Trust your actors. That's why I work with the same actors time and time again. I encourage them to change the dialogue to achieve one thing: keep the characters honest.
I spent four months in Prague in these blue rooms reacting to nothing and you basically place your faith in the hands of the director and the special effects co-coordinator and you keep your fingers crossed and hope that the creatures look really scary.
When I was 25 years old and had no money - and didn't know how to make movies and had no experience - I was able to get $25,000 together, and that film was 'The Brothers McMullen.'
Maybe I should have taken a few chances. That's not to say I want to go make 'Star Wars', but I need to shift my career into the studio world. That's where my head was at when I thought of the original plot.
Look: You're not gonna become a millionaire doing this, but that was never the point. And I think a lot of people in the indie film business kind of took their eye off of that.
Well, honestly, the films I personally like to go see are smaller, more character-driven pieces, so that's why the movies I've made have been smaller, more character-driven movies.
So you got the cool New Yorkers, and then there are the less-than-cool New Yorkers.
And at no point did making 'Brothers McMullen' feel like work or hardship. It was really just a matter of 11 days of fun over the course of 8 months.
But the longer I'm in the business, you see a lot of times these screenplays have been rewritten 5 times and you're not really offending an author.
The con movie is a little bit different where maybe we tell you what we're going to do but it never goes down the way you expect because there's so much double-crossing and cheats and lies going on along the whole way.