Writer/Director Oren Moverman’s “The Dinner” takes place at one of the most fashionable restaurants in an unnamed town. Two estranged brothers (Richard Gere and Steve Coogan) and their wives (Rebecca Hall and Laura Linney) meet for an uncomfortable conversation.
Stan Lohman is a popular congressman running for governor. His troubled younger brother Paul is a caustic former teacher. When Stan invites Paul for a dinner, the stage is set for a tense night. While the two brothers are constantly at odds, their 16 year-old sons are close friends, and the two boys soon become the center of the conversation as family secrets are dredged onto the table along with the main course.
Cast Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Rebecca Hall and Chloë Sevigny attended the film’s Tribeca Film Festival premiere. Check out our exclusive red carpet interviews below:
Tell me a little bit about your collaborative process with Oren and what that was like.
Rebecca Hall: Sure. Well, Oren works in a really fascinating way. He doesn’t really believe in rehearsal. We shot over nights for nearly the whole shoot, so I remember sitting in a little room in this abandoned house where the set was while they lit the set downstairs and then being called downstairs to set sometimes at two, three in the morning, when I’m already a little sleepy. We had anywhere between five and eight pages of dialogue to get through and we never rehearsed them. We never said them out loud and he would say, “Action,” and shoot it straight away. The level of concentration it requires to be vigilant and not miss your line and perform the scene as best as possible, meant that we all had to really listen to each other, which gave it this really interesting quality, I think.
Was there any improv?
Rebecca Hall: A lot. Oh yeah, yeah, a lot.
And what was it like to bounce off all these other stellar actors?
Rebecca Hall: Incredible. These are all very smart, accomplished actors, obviously, so it was great. It was like being on a team of very accomplished athletes. We could all just throw the ball at each other and everyone would catch it and throw it back.
Tell me a little bit about your collaboration with Oren on this, and why you wanted to be involved?
Laura Linney: I’ve always been a big fan of Oren’s. Then working with him was really just a wonderful, creative experience. He’s kind and easy and gives you an enormous amount of room, and yet you feel totally safe the whole time. I loved it. It was really an adventure, and I had a terrific time. We all did. All four of us had a great time.
Speak about reuniting with Richard Gere.
Laura Linney: It’s my third time working with him. tend to make a movie with Richard once every 10 years, which is good. We have a really nice friendship that’s been based over that period of time. He’s just a joy. He’s a real Godsend. He really is.
Tell me a little bit about the role you play, and introduce yourself.
Charlie Plummer: I’m Charlie. I play Michael Lohman. My character is one who does something very very upsetting and awful and seemingly gets away with it, but in actuality, the whole movie is really about if you really ever do get away with things or if they always come back to haunt you. That’s kind of what my character’s going through, although he doesn’t have much sympathy unfortunately for the actions that he made. I haven’t seen the final cut, but the majority of the film and the script takes place over one dinner and there’s lots of flashbacks. I’m in most of the flashbacks, and the event the they’re discussing with the dinner is that.
Who did you get to work with?
Charlie Plummer: I worked with Steve Coogan and Laura Linney. They played my parents in the film.
How was working with them?
Charlie Plummer: They’re phenomenal. They were so fascinating and so much fun, and so kind and nice and warm and everything. It was really fantastic.
How was working with Oren?
Charlie Plummer: He’s such a smart genius person. Like I said, top to bottom, everything he does is so phenomenal. But also I just learned so much in his process, the way he likes to shoot, I’m definitely going to take with me for the rest of my career.
What’s up next for you that you’d like to share?
Charlie Plummer: I’ve got a movie coming out in the fall called Lean on Pete, and I did that with Chloë Sevigny who’s in this, and also Steve Buscemi. I have another one coming out right after that, and then I’m going out to Rome in a month to start a film.
Tell me a little bit about the role you play.
Adepero Oduye: I play Richard Gere’s chief of staff and so basically she’s there as his rock and kind of on the outs in terms of what’s happening with this family at this dinner and pieces it together. Just basically is like a confident and rock.
Tell me about working with Mr. Gere.
Adepero Oduye: Amazing. It’s surreal. He’s such a lovely actor, generous and kind and he is an icon, but a total people person, and that was thrilling. I’m at the dinner, but I’m not at the dinner, so I’m kind of working for him around the dinner, but not at the dinner.
Tell me about working with Oren.
Adepero Oduye: Oh, Oren is an amazing director because he’s very much a collaborator. I consider him an actor’s actor, respectful of what we do and really open to what we have to say, what our thoughts are, just a very generous, kind, present soul. In my opinion and in a lot of people’s opinions he’s a true artist and it’s been really thrilling to work with him.
What’s coming up next?
Adepero Oduye: Doing a play right now at New York Theater Workshop. We just started our previews. It’s called Her Portmanteau. It’s about a Nigerian family in America and yeah, that’s the latest and the greatest.
Tell me a little bit about why you wanted to do that project?
Adepero Oduye: It follows a Nigerian family for decades and so as a first generation Nigerian myself, many stories haven’t been told from that perspective and so it’s so thrilling to work with a Nigerian American playwright with Nigerians in a piece. Ed Iskandar is the director and he’s Chinese Indonesian, so it’s this mix of people who understand what it means to be an immigrant, an outsider, but also be American. Yeah, so it’s just fulfilling. Yeah, one of the most fulfilling things I’ve done in a while. I think what’s great about the play is that there are a lot of people who can relate to this story. You don’t have to be Nigerian. You don’t have to be African. You can be immigrants from anywhere and that’s kind of the feedback we’ve been getting so far. Yeah, we just started and so, yeah. A lot of work, but amazing!
Tell me a little bit about what attracted you to this project.
Michael Chernus: The director, Oren Moverman, is an old friend of mine and I have a role in his movie, The Messenger, and so Oren came to me and pitched me the idea of being in this movie and whenever Oren asks, I always say yes.
What is your role?
Michael Chernus: The movie’s called The Dinner and it takes place over the course of this elaborate, ridiculous, multi-course meal at this super-fancy restaurant and I’m the head waiter, maitre d’, of the restaurant. Without giving too much away, in the course of the film, this intense family discussion, argument erupts at the restaurant and so I end up having to sort of be the moderator and run interference on this giant discussion.
Tell me about being a fly on the wall a little bit.
Michael Chernus: Yeah, it was a little bit of life imitating art. I did get to be a fly on the wall with these four great actors who are the guests at the dinner, Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Rebecca Hall and Steve Coogan. Any bit of star struckedness or nervousness I had totally fed into I think what my character might be feeling in that moment.
Following the screening Chloe Sevigny, Ben Stiller, Christopher Abbott, Michael Chernus, Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick, Miles J. Harvey, and Director Oren Moverman celebrated 2017 Tribeca Film Festival premiere of The Dinner at the official after party sponsored by Nespresso at White Street.
PHOTO CREDIT: Theo Wargo/Getty Images