Writer/Director brothers Mark and Jay Duplass are focused on making the independent, smaller budget films they are known for, like Jeff Who Lives At Home where they have total creative control over stories they’re interested in. Lately the pair said they had no interest in making a superhero movie, even when they confirmed they had received an offer to make one.
As Mark points out, “We said no. The thing that happens when you sign on to a $180 million movie is that the movie is not a movie. It’s a commodity. We’re not in that business”. Jay pointed out, “it’s very easy to blow people’s minds in Hollywood. Just say no. Now, if it were Batman and Robin as a 98 percent relationship drama in the Bat Cave… I would bet that’s 12,000 people’s favorite movie”.
Some directors including independent filmmaker James Gunn went on to make successful films in the Marvel film pantheon with Guardians of the Galaxy while still being able to inject a degree of auteur style, leaving their creative mark on the film. When looking at the Duplass brothers filmography, it’s clear that their style of film-making doesn’t fall in line with big-budget, over the top films. Mark Duplass has also acted in various films and television including ones directed and written by the duo, yet he didn’t want the fame of a big movie star explaining that privacy is more important to him:
“I think there was a minute where I thought, I might try to do this. I might take a run at this and be like the Paul Rudd or what Chris Pratt has become. This was last year. And then the little taste I got of losing my anonymity from the two weeks Tammy was on billboards scared the shit out of me. And I was like, nothing is worth losing my public privacy and I will specifically will not do it. Being the lead in The One I Love? Great. Twenty minutes in Zero Dark Thirty? Great. Being the lead of a Guardians of the Galaxy and losing my ability to walk thorough a city with my children?”
#Peace.Love.DuplassBros
