Work on ‘Asleep in My Palm’ family affair for Tim Blake Nelson

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — It is necessary for actors and directors to understand each other when working on a project. It doesn’t have to be a cordial relationship but at the end of the day there needs to be enough trust to get the job done correctly.

Tim Blake Nelson was certain long before he started work on the film “Asleep in My Palm” that he knew everything he needed to know about the director. That’s what happens when the man in charge of the film turns out to be his son Henry Nelson.

Nelson admits there were times on the set when he was just the hired hand to bring the characters to life. Then there were times when his fatherly instincts were more present.

“We were already collaborators on this movie beyond just the actor and writer/director because I produced it,” Nelson says. “One of the conditions of that was that I was going to stand by Henry and be a resource for him.

“He embraced that in a way that a director can embrace the input of a producer who is validly interested in supporting what the director wants. I was paternal as far as I wanted to support his vision with him always having the last word in the aesthetic choices of what the movie was going to be.”

The proof the relationship worked well is that father and son are writing a new script. Having father and son work on the production is in line with the chief themes of the film. “Asleep in My Palm” – available now through the digital platform of Video on Demand – looks at the responsibilities of parenthood. Tom (Nelson) is a war veteran who exists by living off the land. He and his daughter, Beth Anne (Chloe Kerwin), call a storage shed in rural Ohio near a small liberal arts college their home.

Staying alive is the priority but new challenges await. Beth Anne has reached the age of her sexual awakening and a need for independence. This unfolds as Tom tries to escape his violent and conflicted past. He is brilliant in some ways and mentally unaware in others.

Nelson had no problems deciding how to play the role.

“There is an argument to be made that the more intelligent you are the more broken you inevitably are going to be,” Nelson says. “That was very much a guiding principle in this role. His wisdom, his worldliness, his intellectual bandwidth all made perfect sense to me in terms of what transpires in the movie and what you end up learning about him.

“There is a line that Henry wrote about how the character has gone to fight in a war to learn about people. When I read that nearly broke me. I thought what a beautiful and tragic conceit at the heart of this character.”

It takes a powerful line to catch the attention of Nelson as the actor/writer/director and producer has appeared in more than 90 films. His credits include “Meet the Fockers,” “The Incredible Hulk,” “Lincoln,” “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs” and “O Brother Where Art Thou?”

This film had Nelson working with a novice performer in Kerwin as she made her acting debut. Both Nelsons felt incredibly privileged to work with the young actress on her film debut.

“This is an actress with an incredible career ahead of her,” Nelson says. “I just know that once people see this audiences and the people who make movies will be eager to have her come back and join them.

“This is an exquisite young actress at the beginning of her career and I think there is extraordinary stuff ahead of her.”

The two needed to bond quickly as “Asleep in My Palm” faced a brutal shooting schedule that included the project being shot in 17 days. The movie also was shot in Ohio during one of the coldest winters on record there.

Nelson points out that he went to college in Rhode Island and raised a family in New York but never saw a blizzard as brutal as the one that hit the cast and crew. The closest he has seen is when he filmed movies in the Yukon and Alaska.

“This was brutal but that’s the reality where these characters are living,” Nelson says. “The character that I played is effectively an indigent. So, I look at that kind of challenge as one to be embraced and not just tolerated.

“You want to bring it in and experience it while the cameras are rolling because you are only doing a favor for the writer/director of the movie when you do that.”

And that ended up being a double favor because of the family ties between actor and writer/director in “Asleep in My Palm.”

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