Julianne Moore & John Turturro on Their Movie ‘Gloria Bell’

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: So, actually, that’s really interesting, wanting to work with certain people. And I guess, you know, you’re both at a certain stage in your career where you can actually make these decisions. How sort of empowering and liberating is that? Especially for you, Julianne, because, I mean, women of a certain age, I think we’re all around the same age, the three of us, it’s not so obvious in Hollywood.

JULIANNE MOORE, ACTRESS, “GLORIA BELL”: Well — but why say certain age? I mean, I actually — I have to say, like I take — I want to comment on that because like why would you say that because you wouldn’t say that about men, you know —

JOHN TURTURRO, ACTOR, “GLORIA BELL”: Right.

MOORE: — and I don’t think there’s anything pejorative about any age, and that’s what’s kind of great about Gloria and Gloria Bell too, is that this character could be anywhere or anyone, you know. So, what really is unique about it is that kind of intimate observation of as a person throughout their life when nothing extraordinary happens, when it’s just like, you know, you get up, you go to work —

TURTURRO: Right.

MOORE: — you meet your friends, you go dancing, you meet a guy, you know, all that comes to — that kind of observation of someone’s life, that’s what was really fascinating about it. And it could have been a man, you know, it could have been a younger woman, it could be whatever. But I do think that — and also she’s someone — the trick that Sebastian has too is that she’s someone who’s sometimes a secondary character in the scene that she’s playing.

AMANPOUR: Yes.

MOORE: So, we have a whole, like, lunch date with Rita Wilson and I actually only have one line in it.

TURTURRO: Right.

MOORE: And so, everybody else is talking and Gloria is just listening but the camera stays on her in a weird sort of way. So, that’s what the trick, is like how do you — this person who might be ordinarily a secondary character even in a scene is the one who’s a primary character in the film.

AMANPOUR: I mean, look, it’s complex and it’s subtle and it’s really interesting. I personally beg to differ, I don’t think it would be as interesting if it was younger people, a younger — I think what’s really, really interesting is that you are, you know, middle aged in the film, John, you’re middle age in the film, you’ve both gone through marital disruptions, you’ve been divorced for a long time. And you, your character, Julianne, is Gloria, you go —

MOORE: Yes.

AMANPOUR: — through — you do this — you go out and you dance on your own and maybe get —

MOORE: Right.

AMANPOUR: — picked up and there’s nothing pejorative or sleazy or weird about it, and that, I think, is interesting because it’s not easy to do that at any age, frankly.

MOORE: No, it isn’t.

TURTURRO: No.

MOORE: No.

TURTURRO: No.

MOORE: I mean, she’s remarkably brave. I think just the way that — what really struck me about this character is that she — the way she engages in her life with her relationships, with her family members, with her friends, with her boyfriend, with the world. You know, the fact that she’s always willing to try new things. And she’s — and sometimes she’ll little more than you’d recommend, right. You know, sometimes you’re like — as an audience you’re like, “Oh, no. Don’t do that,” and then she does it the way that we all kind of do sometimes.