After a well-publicized delay and the ouster of Steven Soderbergh from the director's chair, shooting on "Moneyball" is underway in Los Angeles. Based on the best-selling book from Michael Lewis, Brad Pitt stars as Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane, whose small market Major League Baseball team instituted an innovative, statistics-based approach to build his [...]
After a well-publicized delay and the ouster of Steven Soderbergh from the director's chair, shooting on "Moneyball" is underway in Los Angeles. Based on the best-selling book from Michael Lewis, Brad Pitt stars as Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane, whose small market Major League Baseball team instituted an innovative, statistics-based approach to build his team's roster and win the 2002 MLB American League West Division title.
Late last week, on his way to the Los Angeles set, cinematographer Wally Pfister ("Inception," "The Dark Knight") called up MTV News to talk about taking on the project, working with Brad Pitt and co-star Jonah Hill, and the support — and script approval — of the MLB for "Moneyball."
MTV: I've got to imagine going from "Inception" to "Moneyball" is pretty much night and day in terms of your process.
Wally Pfister: Exactly. It's such a different experience than a huge action picture and that's really the reason I decided I wanted to do it. It's really pure, pure storytelling. It's a single character piece about Billy Beane and his desperation to make a winning team out of a team with one-third of the payroll of the New York Yankees. It's a fascinating story. [Director] Bennett Miller brought me into the process and said, "Look, I want to make a simple movie. It's not going to be like a 'Batman' movie." He loved my work, but asked if I was game for doing something in a simple fashion. I said, "Sure!" And I really wanted to work with Brad Pitt.
MTV: Going from Leonardo DiCaprio in "Inception" to Brad Pitt — that's not bad work.
Pfister: The second you read the screenplay, you know it's perfect for Brad Pitt. He's got exactly the right amount of serious acting chops and a great sense of humor to make this character come to life. Also, it's Jonah Hill playing a serious part. We shot several scenes this weekend. Jonah and Brad are phenomenal together.
MTV: Are you going to be shooting on location in Major League stadiums?
Pfister: We are. We're going up to Oakland in a few weeks. We'll be shooting stuff at the A's stadium and staging some games. And then we're creating a stadium in Los Angeles that will play as a couple other MLB stadiums. The actual baseball games are actually a small part of the film. It's really the story of this man's journey from a losing team to a winning team.
MTV: It's cool that you're getting cooperation from the MLB, because it wasn't clear for a while if they'd definitely support the movie.
Pfister: They've been unbelievable. The only way they'd license this is they have a certain degree of script approval. They have a certain degree of involvement in terms of what we're doing. We're quite dependent on them in terms of using the teams and filming in the stadiums. They're pretty powerful. But they've been phenomenal. The MLB people have been so supportive and rolled out the red carpet, as have the Oakland A's. The team understands what a terrific opportunity for publicity this is for them.
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