George Clooney may be aging and slowing down in Hollywood, but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t have the strength to continue acting and directing. We already know from watching Clooney's best movies that he has major acting talent, but his work stands out as well when he's sitting in the director’s chair. In fact, his next directorial project is The Boys in the Boat, which is about when the University of Washington row crew represented the United States at the 1936 Summer Olympics. If you thought those rowing scenes looked intense in the trailer, Clooney joked that he “almost killed” his young cast with those rowing workouts.
When you look back on George Clooney-directed films, it looks like the former ER actor likes to make dramatizations of certain moments in history, like The Monuments Men, Suburbicon, Leatherheads, and more. If you think watching the young cast tread through waters with those oars was all pretend, think again. George Clooney jokes at a London screening that he “almost killed” his young cast with the rowing workouts he put them through:
We just worked ‘em out like crazy. We almost killed them. … [No, I did not join them] That’s why you direct, so you don’t have to do all that crap. I got to sit there and yell at them, go, ‘Row!’ And then I’d leave.
Well, that appears to be one advantage of being behind the camera! Instead of the Academy Award winner having to do the grunt work on-screen, he has the liberty to just sit back and let his young cast take the oars on this one. As the cast of the biographical sports drama had to portray one of history’s greatest rowing teams, this meant that it was time for them to get to work.
The problem was that each of them were amateurs at the rigorous sport. Fantastic Beasts actor Callum Turney explained to EW the pressure to perform as pro-rowers:
We wanted to impress and we couldn't. We tried but it just didn't work. I remember his face. You could see, behind the smile, the worry.
The British actor/model is referring to both George Clooney and producer Grant Heslov. For months, the cast spent four hours a day on the water, along with an hour of fitness training to grow some muscle. Fortunately, all of that hard work paid off within the next six weeks, as Heslov said they looked like an improved team. It’s amazing how even though this is all supposed to be acting, you’d think the cast from the Depression-era biopic really were training for the Olympics. By the end of training, Turney said he really did feel like he was part of a professional team.
If you thought the actors were the only ones having a tough time in those row scenes, the crew had challenges of their own. Back when Ben Affleck worked with George Clooney in The Tender Bar, the Argo actor did say Clooney was very smart about how to tell stories. He was absolutely right about that, as The Descendants actor had to figure out how to direct these scenes while on water.
The cast and crew are all moving with the water which made it hard to keep everything still. They had to figure out what angle to film the cast as well as the right lenses, and how to make what they’re filming look exciting. Real-life rowers who saw The Boys in the Boat after it was completed said they were impressed that Clooney and Heslov were able to shoot a real depiction of rowing they’ve never seen before. Talk about a compliment!
George Clooney may not have been the one steering the rowboat in The Boys in the Boat, but he certainly made sure to “work ‘em out like crazy” with training. Screenings for the sports drama may have gotten tepid reactions from critics, but I’m sure audiences will appreciate the hard work that was put into this movie seeing the rowing skills of the cast and the camera handiwork to accomplish those scenes. You can see for yourself when the 2023 movie release in theaters on December 25th.
