It's pretty wild how Collider’s Steven Weintraub has decided to throw Anthony Mackie under the bus. He’s saying that Mackie, who stars as Falcon in the MCU, was the absolute worst interview he’s ever done, going as far as to call him an “asshole.”
The unwritten rule in the industry, for any journalist, is to not reveal these sort of things. Weintraub, a genuinely nice guy who ardently prepares for every interview he conducts, is a professional and must have over 1000 interviews in his portfolio.
Honestly, maybe Mackie was just having a bad day?
I interviewed Mackie back in the days of “Detroit,” probably around 2017, and he was quite agreeable. Never noticed anything out of the ordinary or an ego seeping through.
Honestly, I’ve interviewed plenty of filmmakers and actors and rarely had any bad experiences. I’ve chatted with the likes of Anya Taylor-Joy, Matthew McConaughey, Saoirse Ronan, Maggie Gylenhaal, Richard Gere, Anne Hathaway, Timothee Chalamet, Steve Carrell, Carey Mulligan, Kiera Knightley, etc.
Usually when an actor promotes his or her film, they tend to be courteous and open and never really prone to any sort of outbursts or attitude. It’s all part of the game. They just know the power a journalist might have in regards to the type of coverage that might give to their films, and themselves.
Of all the filmmakers I’ve interviewed, and there have been hundreds, I can only think of Stephen Frears being a real “asshole” to me. Gosh, he’d be giving me these one-word answers and it looked like he was just having a miserable day.
I don’t conduct interviews anymore, mostly because I’m busy maintaining this site, and I love doing it, but I still get interview requests, on a near daily basis. Eventually, I’ll get back to doing them. Some of my absolute favorite sit downs were with Paul Verhoeven, Michael Haneke, Sean Baker, Claire Denis, Richard Linklater, Ruben Ostlund, Lynne Ramsay, and Denis Villeneuve