Liev Schreiber
Liev Schreiber
Isaac Liev Schreiberis an American actor, director, screenwriter, and producer. He became known during the late 1990s and early 2000s, having appeared in several independent films, and later mainstream Hollywood films, including the Scream trilogy of horror films, Phantoms, The Sum of All Fears, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Salt, Taking Woodstock, Goon, and Oscar Best Picture winner Spotlight...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth4 October 1967
CitySan Francisco, CA
CountryUnited States of America
We talked about our grandfathers and their senses of humor and our sense of culture and history, and we had a lot in common,
When I read Jonathan's story, I said, 'This is just too weird and too serendipitous,'
I spoke to (director/historian Peter) Bogdanovich, who knew him personally,
There's something insanely sweet about him. And he is a very, very, very good-natured person. He is a truly kind person. I put him in some of the worst circumstances that you could put a human being in and there were homeless guys who I'd hired to be in the movie because I liked the way they looked, and they complained sooner than Elijah did.
When you're in a place like New York or D.C. you just can't beat it, and it's so hard to recreate because they are both such distinctive places.
I was out of my head. I was really frantic, ... I guess I was always under the misconception that a director makes the film, and it's not true. A director directs the people who make the film.
I always wondered about my grandfather's story. What was his life really like as a young man?
My grandfather was an athlete who worked as a butcher by day, but at night he taught himself to paint and play the cello. He was a very cultured man,
I have a pathological memory problem and when he died I was very angry and worried that somehow I wouldn't remember him,
I had wanted so much to make this a European film. Jonathan and I compared stories of our grandfathers. I wanted to show their survivors' sense of humor: If you believe your life is excrement then you either drown in it or transcend it with irony. That's a distinct Eastern European trait.
I did everything that my father did in trying to find him because I didn't live with him,
When you have this structure of a stranger in a strange land, it is essential that the place and characters be really authentic.
Well, I don't think I've ever been a huge target for the press, and I value that to a degree, because there's a certain value for actors staying beneath the radar so they can play characters.
There has been some updating. It's really quite smart.