After Sam Elliott made headlines over his controversial comments about the Oscar-nominated The Power of the Dog, the film’s creative team swiftly came to the project’s defense.
“I’m sorry, he was being a little bit of a B-I-T-C-H,” director Jane Campion told Variety on Saturday, March 12. “I’m sorry to say it but he’s not a cowboy, he’s an actor.”
Campion, who won the impressive Theatrical Feature Film award at the Saturday’s DGA Awards, told the outlet: “The West is a mythic space and there’s a lot of room on the range. I think it’s a little bit sexist because think about the number of amazing Westerns that were made by Sergio Leone.”
The Star Is Born actor, 77, previously slammed the film’s portrayal of cowboys last month.
“They’re running around in chaps and no shirts. There’s all these allusions of homosexuality throughout the movie,” Elliott said during the February 28 episode of Marc Maron’s “WTF” podcast, calling the actors Chippendale dancers who “wear bow ties and not much else” and the film a “piece of s—t” as a whole.
“[Benedict] Cumberbatch never got out of his f–king chaps. He had two pairs of chaps: a woolly pair and a leather pair,” Elliott said during the podcast appearance, referring to the Doctor Strange actor, 45, who played one of the lead roles in the film. “Every f–king time he would walk in from somewhere — he never was on a horse, maybe once — he’d walk into the f–king house, storm up the f–king stairs, go lay in his bed in his chaps, and play his banjo. It’s like, what the f–k?”
The movie, which has since garnered 12 Oscar nominations, follows rancher Phil Burbank (Cumberbatch) in 1920s rural Montana as he teaches his brother’s new wife and her son how to run the family farm. Kirsten Dunst, Jesse Plemons and Kodi Smit-McPhee also star.
The Parks and Recreation alum was also upset that Campion, 67, chose to shoot the Western-inspired film in her native New Zealand instead of its Montana set.
“What the f–k does this woman from down there know about the American West?” Elliott told the 58-year-old host, noting that he thought Campion’s previous work was brilliant. “Why the f–k did she shoot this movie in New Zealand and call it Montana? And say this is the way it was? That f–king rubbed me the wrong way.”
The Bright Star filmmaker, who is up for Best Director at the 2022 Academy Awards, is not the only Power of the Dog creative team member to defend the film’s merit. Plemons, who played George Burbank in the movie, revealed he “laughed” after Elliott’s remarks made headlines.
“I don’t know why [I laughed],” the Windfall actor, 33, told Variety on Saturday. “I haven’t listened to [Elliott’s podcast interview] so I’ve heard it from what people have told me. I know there’s some undertones to what he said, but I also feel like you don’t have to like the movie and that’s totally fine. Not everyone has to like it.”
Scroll below to see how the Power of the Dog cast and creative team defended their movie amid criticism:
