Joel Edgerton in Master-Gardener, the interview

THEthe body does not lie. AND Paul Schrader chose Joel Edgerton’s body. Together, in 18 days of filming (no one else can do it in America), joined by Sigourney Weaver and Quintessa Swindellthey created for Master Gardener-The master gardener an earthly paradise (in the form of a house with a garden, as in Gone With the Wind symbol of the aristocracy of the Southern United States) and gave birth to a wonderful triangle (“I love relationships with significant age differences, even if they aren’t politically correct,” Schrader told us).

Joel Edgerton, tenacious gardener of Master Gardener

Edgerton, actor, director, screenwriter, born and raised in Australiamuch loved by American cinema since he joined the team in 2002 Star Warsreveals about his Narvel Roth, tenacious gardener of Master Gardener – The master gardener (from 14 December at the cinema, seen at the Venice Film Festival where Schrader received the Golden Lion for lifetime achievement closing the “redemption trilogy” later FirstReformed with Ethan Hawke and The card collector with Oscar Isaac):

«I looked for the same energy in myself as the sinners in Paul’s previous two films. Here I must be the immovable center of the story while chaos swirls around me. A strange request for an actor, usually we need to hold on to something to find our way, but I understood that to Paul I was to be little more than a prop. I trusted and did everything to do as little as possible.”

“The prop” is actually filled with feverish energies. In the Garden of Eden by Norma Haverhill (Weaver)he administers the choices that govern growth and flowering, he asks his subordinates to smell the earth with pleasure to understand its secrets, and when he has finished the day, he sits at the desk and writes. He writes about flowers and philosophy, he writes as the pickpocket of Pickpocket by Robert Bresson, the film that «as a theology student who had turned his back on the church» convinced Schrader in his youth that he too could «make films like that».

Joel-Narvel thus inventories the worldin the diary, according to seasons and floral species, reassuring categories for those who have chosen to withdraw from life. The young Maya, Norma’s “cross-breed” niece, will force it back to us, to which Narvel decides to reveal the secret of his past: if he landed in Eden it is because, in an inverse path, he had listened to the serpent. A white supremacist, in a protection program since he betrayed his gang by refusing to participate in an execution, he bears the voluntary mark of sin on his skin (to quote the Calvinist and former seminarian Schrader).

So seek redemption…
More than in a religious sense, I would say in an ethical sense. You can bury the past, put it in a watertight compartment, but when you enter into a loving relationship, you can only live it if you are able to come to terms with every aspect of yourself. Narvel knows that if he gets close to another human being, and especially a woman, at some point he will have to reveal himself, every part of himself.

What was it like seeing his body on set covered in Nazi symbols?
Very strange. Even if you know you will take them off at the end of the day, they transmit a very strong negativity. Symbols have enormous power and knowing that they are permanent must have a powerful effect. And for Narvel they are there, a perennial testimony to his past. But Paul didn’t want too much emphasis on the tattoos, they are only seen in two or three scenes. And most importantly, he didn’t want me hanging around when we weren’t shooting.

Do you have any of your own?
I have some, birds mostly, not many. For an actor they are a problem, they must be covered.

His character says he “was raised to hate.” Positif wrote that the film is built around “the racist phantasmagoria of America Wasp.” You are not an American citizen, but you know the country well: what do you think about it?
We are smart enough to understand that hate comes from somewhere. You don’t become a hater if someone hasn’t planted that seed inside you. When we are children we don’t see divisions and we don’t care about skin color when we choose friends. Until the moment someone transmits those categories to us. As a parent, however, I think that placing the burden on the shoulders of those who raised us and the community is too simple an explanation: at a certain point we must enter adulthood and see the way with our own eyes, take responsibility for judgment and ask ourselves what is right or wrong.

Do you believe in the possibility of second chances?
I believe it yes and no. There are choices we make in life for which we will have to account eternally, choices that have the character of irreversibility. I too have done things that I am not proud of and that are in a gray area, but they are things that I have learned a lot from and that I believe have not caused harm. But if I had intentionally inflicted pain on someone in an irreparable way, then I would be in a zone that might be difficult to evolve from. It depends on how we want to live, whether we decide to withdraw from society or whether we want to continue to be part of it, to connect with other people. I believe that anyone who gives a second chance to someone who made a mistake should have all the information that allows them to decide.

You seem well equipped to handle conflict.
I wouldn’t say so, maybe that’s why I became an actor. To manage conflicts on the screen. When there’s tension I stick my head in the sand. Do you like gardening, do you have a green thumb? I’m a terrible gardener. But it fascinates me, I did some reading for the film, especially on hydroculture, a technique that takes a long time, because it seemed to me the most suitable for a character like mine. I’m the type who let plants die due to neglect, but now that I have children I understand the importance of taking care of things that are outside of me. I grew up in Australia, in a rural area, in contact with animals. Even then I wondered what my life would be like if I had grown up in New York.

Plants regenerate. How does she regenerate?
I’m the type to make the same mistake over and over again. As if I never learn. I have an addictive personality, and this has caused me problems in the past. Now my addiction is physical training. During Covid I started doing yoga and since then I have to do it every day, I can’t skip it even once. So the benefit I could have is canceled out by the stress of finding the time and way to do it at all costs… Another difficulty, as I get older, is being able to change. When you are young, the stages of life force you to do it: school ends at a certain point and you have to look for a job and, if you don’t like it, you will look for another one. But in the place where I have arrived, at this age, the stimulus for change must be found within me. Instead I tend to stay in what I do even when I would like to do new things, learn, nourish myself.

Is love the best engine of change, as the film seems to tell us?
Maybe it’s not always, but it’s a better solution than hate. When I was a boy I only thought about romantic love, now I think it’s a very selfish concept. If I look at those relationships, I wanted to love someone and be loved in return. I now appreciate more the possibility of loving someone beyond the expectations we may have from a relationship.

What is it like working with Sigourney Weaver?
I love her, she’s one of those artists I watched from afar before becoming an actor. It’s nice to get to work with people who, with their talent, have contributed to making you who you are. Especially if the result isn’t so bad in the end.

Do you want to go back to directing?
I would like, my last film as director was 2018, but during Covid I became the father of twins, a boy and a girl, the king’s choice. And this now occupies my whole life. I don’t want to drag the family perpetually around the world, I’m looking for projects that allow me to stay in one place for at least a year. I like working for others, but I love the responsibility of writing, of doing it myself.

What will your next film be about?
I have a couple of ideas in my head, suspenseful, psychological stories, I like the idea of ​​shocking the audience for good reasons. I believe that human beings can represent the greatest strength to each other, but also the greatest danger. And I want to enter that territory.

When did you first feel the desire to make films?
As a boy I was obsessed with cinema. We lived outside the city, you had to drive 20 minutes to get to the first cinema, luckily there was a shop that rented VHS tapes. But being an actor didn’t interest me yet: as a child I wanted to be Indiana Jones, not Harrison Ford. Then I started taking theater courses in high school and when I saw Arthur Miller’s The Crucible I told myself that’s what I should do: be on stage. Up until that point I had only watched action movies and thrillers, stories where a knife was always involved and there was a lot of blood, movies with muscles, especially American ones, with macho men. I was born in 1974, that was the cinema of my youth. Then I started watching films that had been made before I was born and there I found what opened my eyes and made me want to be part of that world: the cinema of the 70s, actors like Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino, Gene Hackman, Robert De Niro, stories without a moral center, with complicated characters.

Do you think you’ll ever make films that your children might watch?
They won’t be able to see my next film until they’re 16 (The Boys in the Boat by George Clooney, about the University of Washington rowing team at the beginning of the Depression, on the other hand it will be for everyone, ed.). I have a passion for drama and dark atmospheres. No, I don’t think I’ll ever write a fantasy.

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