LOS ANGELES — If director/writer Dan Gilroy had been born only a few years later than 1959, odds are high he would have never come up with the idea for his latest film project, “Roman J. Israel, Esq.” The film looks at a savant lawyer (Denzel Washington) stuck emotionally and socially in the 1960s who faces major changes after a tragic event.
“The spark to write the script came from growing up at the tail end of the ‘60s,” Gilroy says. “I was this 10-year-old kid looking out at the world and it seemed like everyone was involved in something. Everybody looked like they were going to change the world in some on-going never-ending way.
“And over the last 40 years it evaporated and dissipated into almost nothing.”
His exposure to that turbulent time wasn’t only influenced by the world outside but by what was going on inside his home. Growing up as the son of Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Frank D. Gilroy, he was able to watch his father as he worked at home plus he was always been surrounded by family members working in the arts in some fashion. Those factors resulted in some deep dinner conversations.
Gilroy became fascinated with the idea of what kind of person would not let the turbulent times of social unrest during the ‘60s fade away. His research led him to discover that many of those who held on to that era went into civil law. His decision to make his central character a savant comes from wanting to make Israel someone who looks at the law as if it were a religion.
Once Gilroy fell in love with the ideas for the script, he began to fill in all the elements of plot and character development. Gilroy could see no one other than Washington playing the title character as the script began to take shape. He’s been a big fan of the Oscar-winning actor for years and was so convinced that Washington was such a perfect match to play Israel that he heard the actor’s voice in his head as he wrote each line of dialogue.
It took Gilroy a year to write the movie, but if Washington had not signed on to the project, Gilroy would not have moved forward. Fortunately, Washington agreed to take on the role.
Bringing Israel to life was made a lot easier for Gilroy by the six months of work Washington put into creating his character before the cameras started rolling. The actor researched savants, the ‘60s and the law to use in playing Israel. He had every detail so defined that in one of his first meetings with Gilroy, Washington told the director/writer that Israel would eat nothing but peanut butter sandwiches over the sink. Gilroy jokes that his response was to ask if the peanut butter was creamy or chunky.
But, there also was a lot of exchanging of ideas on the set. That’s a part of the process Gilroy loves because he’s been surrounded by actors all his life, including being married to Rene Russo. The lesson he has learned from all that exposure is when working with actors - especially those who are such forces of nature as Washington — the best thing he can do as a director is to make sure there is a “safe space” to work and allow the actor to create. From the actors’ perspectives, they are getting to play the characters created by a writer who won the award for Best Screenplay at the 30th Independent Spirit Awards and was nominated for Best Original Screenplay at the 87th Academy Awards for “Nightcrawler.”
Even knowing he would only do the movie with Washington, Gilroy faced the first days of production with some trepidation. He knew Washington would show up fully ready to play the role and Gilroy was concerned he would not be able to match the work his star was doing.
“I kept thinking ‘Oh my god, I’m getting in a Ferrari and I hope I don’t crash this thing.’ I didn’t want to disappoint him because there’s so much horsepower with this thing because of Denzel, I didn’t want to run it off the road,” Gilroy says.
Gilroy was able to calm some of his fears by selecting a very familiar place to shoot the movie. As he did with “Nightcrawler,” Gilroy set “Roman J. Israel” in Los Angeles — and not the stops on a tourist map, but some of the seedier parts of the city. The location wasn’t just about familiarity as the downtown area, like Israel, is stuck in the past but is moving forward now due to urban renewal. Gilroy uses the changes going on in downtown to reflect the transformation that Israel faces in his life.
He got to do that because he was born at just the right time to have the spark to write “Roman J. Israel, Esq.” and the actor he envisioned starring in the film agreed to be in the project.
