The Greatest Game Ever Played-Interviews With Cast And Crew

Posted by Jacob Ziegler on 09.30.2005

My interview with Chet!

THE GREATEST GAME EVER PLAYED – INTERVIEWS

Writer – Mark Frost

The driving force behind telling the story of “The Greatest Game Ever Played” was unquestionably Mark Frost, the man who wrote both the novel and screenplay, and was also one of the film’s three producers.

“I’ve played golf my whole life, so I know the game,” Frost said. “I was amazed that no one had told the story of Francis Ouimet yet, so I saw a great opportunity here.”

Frost, whose credits include the TV shows “Twin Peaks” and “The Six Million Dollar Man,” was heavily involved with the production all the way through. For Frost, the decision to collaborate with director Bill Paxton was an easy one.

“I greatly admired ‘Frailty’ [Paxton’s 2002 directorial debut], and from the beginning it was clear that we had the same kind of vision for the story.”

Picking a director wasn’t the only key choice Frost would have to participate in. Frost, Paxton, and the film’s producers had to find a leading man to bring the story of Francis Ouimet to life, and they find that when they found Shia LaBeouf.

“We started with Shia,” Frost said, “and we went along with casting from there.”

The amount of work Frost put into this project from start to finish would likely classify it as a labor of love. “I’ve played golf my whole life, and I grew up in New England, so I know the game and the locations very well. I walked the courses used in the story, so that I would know how they feel.”

Frost hopes that “The Greatest Game Ever Played” can break the “sports movie” stigma and reach a mass audience, because the story more than anything is about “class and character.”

Director – Bill Paxton

Dressed casually, Bill Paxton bellows a welcome greeting from across the room. “You’re from Kalamazoo, right?” he asks me. I respond affirmative, and he becomes energized. “My mom’s from Kalamazoo, I can’t wait to tell her I talked to someone from there. She’ll be excited.”

Rumor has it that celebrities are real people too, and it doesn’t get any realer than calling your mother.

“I’m an old school kind of director,” Paxton said, as he prepared to talk about the new film he directed, his second, “The Greatest Game Ever Played.”

“Normally I wouldn’t call attention to the camera,” but I thought that this film needed some torque,” he said. “I felt like these characters weren’t just playing each other at a game of golf, but fighting for their lives, and I needed the film to reflect that.”

Paxton was excited for the opportunity to direct a film that was so wildly different from his 2002 debut, “Frailty,” about a family selected by God to slay demons.

“The story of Francis Ouimet is a real watershed moment in the history of sports, and no one had really told this story yet,” Paxton said.

“This is a character driven movie, told simply, and without schmaltz,” he continued. “It’s about character and class.”

Paxton drew on his love of movies to help him create the “Greatest Game,” which was cultivated as he grew up in Ft. Worth, Texas. “I remember the first movie my father took me to,” Paxton reminisced, “was Dr. No in 1962. He always took us to movies that he wanted to see.”

Citing Alfred Hitchcock’s “Strangers on a Train” as his favorite film, Paxton admitted to being influenced by Hitchcock and Martin Scorsese, among others. He referred to the style on “Game” as a “love letter to movies.”

According to Paxton, a great deal of the film’s success was due to the casting freedom Disney allowed him.

“We were able to make the film without any huge name stars, and that was really important,” Paxton said. Paxton praised the films leads, 19-year-old Shia LaBeouf, and Stephen Dillane, but also recognized the importance of his supporting actors.

“Elias [Koteas, who plays LaBeouf’s father] was great, because his father was a Greek immigrant, so he really understood how to play an immigrant father himself.”

“I had to use Luke Askew, just like I did in ‘Frailty’,” Paxton continued, “because I’d like to revitalize his career just like [Quentin] Tarantino did with Robert Forster. Luke’s really great.”

However, there was one actor that really put the film over the top. Josh Flitter played Francis’s caddy Eddie Lowery, and stole every scene he was in. “Eddie was what we called ‘The Closer’,” Paxton said. “We knew we had a great film, but Josh is the one who really made everything come together.”

Star – Shia LaBeouf

At nineteen years old, Shia LaBeouf has a resume that many actors his elder would envy. He’s worked with Jon Voight, Sigourney Weaver, Will Smith, Keanu Reeves, and Cameron Diaz, among others.

His biggest role to date, however, is in Bill Paxton’s “The Greatest Game Ever Played,” in which he plays Francis Ouimet, the amateur golfer who scored the upset of the century at the 1913 U.S. Open.

LaBeouf has an almost palpable confidence about the quality of “Greatest Game,” and he attributes a lot of it to director Bill Paxton. “Bill understands how to deal with actors and even the crew,” LaBeouf said.

“We all really wanted to make a great film, and Bill really rallied the troops,” he continued. “By the end, grips and gaffers and everyone was giving ideas and input. I’ve never been on a set where that happened.”

LaBeouf’s experience working on this film was unique for more than just that, though. He underwent months of golf training, even touring with the UCLA golf team. “I hated golf before I started on this movie, but playing on that team made me realize how much of the game is mental, and how intense it can really be,” LaBeouf said.

While the film does focus primarily on a golf tournament, LaBeouf said that it was the character and the story that attracted him to it. “This is such a great story that it could have been about Frisbee and still been moving.

“I saw grown men coming out of the movie crying,” he continued, “and it wasn’t because of the golf handicaps.”

The ultimate compliment came from the Ouimet family. “They loved it,” LaBeouf said. “They said that for 115 minutes I was Francis Ouimet, and there isn’t a nicer compliment than that.”

Just as Mark Frost and Bill Paxton, LaBeouf really put over the work of Josh Flitter, who played the pint-sized caddy named Eddie who helps Francis compete. “The relationship between Eddie and Francis was really the heart of the movie.

“Eddie had what Francis lacked – the confidence and flamboyance,” LaBeouf said. “They complimented each other so well.”

LaBeouf hopes that people can get past the “sports movie” stereotype and can become immersed in “The Greatest Game Ever Played.” “It’s very rare that people really feel the movies,” he said, “and I really think this is a film people will feel.”