‘65’ Star Adam Driver Talks His Sci-Fi Dinosaur Thriller and the Eerie ‘White Noise’ Parallels in Ohio
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65 star Adam Driver is all about consistency.
He prides himself on doing as much of his own stunt work as a production will allow, but it’s not because he wants to impress anyone. It’s because he wants his characters’ physicality to remain consistent throughout any given film, and his latest sci-fi thriller, 65, from A Quiet Place writers Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, was certainly no exception. Driver plays Commander Mills, who crash lands his spacecraft on prehistoric Earth, and together with one other survivor, Ariana Greenblatt’s Koa, the duo must overcome dinosaurs, the elements and a communication barrier to hopefully find rescue.
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While 65 was easily the most physical job of the 15-year-old Greenblatt’s career, Driver still puts Martin Scorsese’s Silence above it, though for a very different reason.
“[Silence’s weight loss] was a long thing to maintain for four months, but 65 was definitely really physical,” Driver tells The Hollywood Reporter. “One of the points of the movie is that because [Mills and Koa] can’t communicate, physicality became something that was really, really important. And so it became important to do all of those things.”
On Feb. 3, tragedy struck East Palestine, Ohio, when a Norfolk Southern freight train derailed, forcing residents to evacuate after gallons upon gallons of toxic chemicals spilled into the air, soil and water. But what makes the situation all the more chilling is that some of the evacuated residents had served as extras in Driver’s 2022 film, White Noise, in which a train accident leads to an airborne toxic event and residential evacuation.
Needless to say, Driver has had a difficult time processing this recent event where life imitated art, but he hopes that the welcoming Ohio community gets the help they need.
“It’s a very eerie, bizarre coincidence that we were just there making this movie, and some people, who were actually in our movie, were then enacting it in real life,” Driver says. “I don’t have a frame of reference to process that. It’s a terrifying thing that happened and is happening, and to oddly have some distant connection with it is strange.”
Driver adds: “That area [in Ohio] was very generous to our production when we were shooting there; and a big part of our film is how nebulous information can get when there’s no clear plan in place to quickly address situations like this. So I hope they get the proper attention, and answers, safety and accountability they are looking for.”
Below, during a recent conversation with THR, Driver also explains that adaptable and flexible young directors like Beck and Woods are not that different from the many auteur filmmakers he’s worked with in his career.
So when you first got the 65 script, were you able to read it without knowing about the dinosaurs?
Beck and Woods sent me a video explaining what they wanted to make before I read the script, so I read 65 with that in mind.
You’ve worked with practically every seasoned director in the industry, and each filmmaker, presumably, has their own way of doing things. But in Beck and Woods’ case, this is only their third time directing, professionally. So are there advantages to working with directors who may not be set in their ways yet?
Well, actually, what makes the seasoned directors you’re talking about so great is that they’re not set in their ways. The expectation would be that a [Martin] Scorsese or a [Francis Ford] Coppola would be like, “Do this,” but that’s the opposite of how they are. They couldn’t be more collaborative or open. And they, of course, have a huge cinematic reference, and they have such control over the language of cinema that younger directors don’t have. That is for sure, and they come from a time when there were more people in a room figuring it out.
But 65 was a unique experience. I certainly hadn’t worked with [Beck and Woods] before, but it was good. So I can’t really think of any [other advantages to young directors] because the seasoned directors that I’ve worked with also approach it as if they’re trying to find it again. They have that kind of humility, and they go into a project without coming up with a set way.
65 really put you through the wringer. Is this one of the most, if not the most, physically demanding roles you’ve had so far?
I would still say Silence was the most physically demanding role because there was so much weight loss. That was a long thing to maintain for four months, but 65 was definitely really physical. One of the points of the movie is that because [Mills and Koa] can’t communicate, physicality became something that was really, really important. And so it became important to do all of those things, because the environment is a whole other character in the movie.
Adam, I’m sorry that I have to ask about this, but life recently imitated art in the most tragic way. Given that you worked with these people on White Noise, has the news out of East Palestine, Ohio, been impossible to process?
It’s a very eerie, bizarre coincidence that we were just there making this movie, and some people, who were actually in our movie, were then enacting it in real life. I don’t have a frame of reference to process that. It’s a terrifying thing that happened and is happening, and to oddly have some distant connection with it is strange. That aside, that area was very generous to our production when we were shooting there; and a big part of our film is how nebulous information can get when there’s no clear plan in place to quickly address situations like this. So I hope they get the proper attention, and answers, safety and accountability they are looking for.
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65 opens in theaters March 10. This interview had been edited for length and clarity.
