While on his press tour for upcoming vampire-thriller “Daybreakers” (blergh), Ethan Hawke has discussed his epic “Growing Up” project with Richard Linklater and the possibility of a sequel to their “Before Sunset” and “Before Sunrise” films.
“Growing Up” (it’s working title) began shooting in 2002 and has been filming intermittently over the course of one actor’s actual childhood with the final product aiming to chronicle the life a boy from the age of six to twelfth grade. The project still has five years left and will be at least two and half hours long.
“I’m going back to Austin in March or April to do another little bit,” Hawke revealed to AICN recently about more shooting. “Some of the episodes happen with the mom, Patricia Arquette, and some happen with the dad, so we are each in like every other little thing.”
Hawk and Arquette’s characters eventually do get divorced along the way as his quote suggests. The boy in question, meanwhile, is actor Ellar Salmon who has next to no online presence. We were, however, able to conjure a few images of Salmon working on “Growing Up” as an indication to how the protagonist will develop.
“I’ve seen the first cut of the first seven years,” Hawke continues. “And it’s definitely one of the most interesting things I have ever been a part of, no doubt…About 20 minutes, your eyes just start tearing up and you don’t even know why. It’s about the nature of time and how it’s crashing into us all.”
“There’s even this one little scene that he shot — I don’t want to ruin the movie for people — but where the kid is just in line to get his book signed, the last ‘Harry Potter’ book that came out. It’s almost like a documentary. Richard filmed it. He just got the actor in it and he’s just waiting his turn in line with all of these kids dressed up like Harry Potter. By the time the movie comes out, that is going to be so funny and so interesting and so impossible to recreate.”
Hawke also added that the project is being “improvised around what’s happening to this kid.” It’ll be fascinating to see how Linklater ends up fusing the years together to form a narrative, or whatever his full vision is. One would think 2 1/2 hours wouldn’t be enough. Maybe HBO of IFC can make it into a TV mini-series? Sounds like it would benefit the project.
Meanwhile, with regards to a potential ‘Before’ trilogy, Hawke recently told Collider that any third film would “follow exactly the formula which is to let it happen organically” at “some point we will really have something to say.” On when that will exactly be, Hawke simply joked “my thought is we will make one as soon as everybody has forgotten about it.”
The actor also noted that the success of the second film has put unexpected pressure and expectation on any potential sequel which may be difficult build from.
“The success of the second film has made it a little difficult to see our way around how to do it,” Hawke explains. “Because the first time we revisited it there was no expectation…And now every time I go out to dinner with friends, “I’ve got an idea. What if it opens and she’s having a baby and…” So it would be very difficult for us to exactly know how to.”
Sounds like it could happen one day but not anytime soon. Nevertheless, between these projects, the spiritual sequel to “Dazed And Confused” and the black-comedy-crime story set in East Texas, hopefully Linklater can get onto something new soon having just had rom-com “Liars (A to E)” fall apart on him.
Though note, some studio that wants to be in the business of a smart, non-pandering “chick flick” (for lack of a better term), get on “Liars (A To E)” it’s a funny, sharp script and one of the more enjoyable ones that we’ve read in the last few months.
