{"id":17488,"date":"2022-06-25T10:00:57","date_gmt":"2022-06-25T08:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/?p=1668253"},"modified":"2022-06-25T10:33:11","modified_gmt":"2022-06-25T08:33:11","slug":"bryan-cranston-at-some-point-relatively-soon-im-going-to-hit-the-pause-button","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/rss_feed\/bryan-cranston-at-some-point-relatively-soon-im-going-to-hit-the-pause-button\/","title":{"rendered":"Bryan Cranston: \u201cAt some point relatively soon I\u2019m going to hit the pause button\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>

By Patrick Cremona\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Saturday, 25 June 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

\n\n

In 2003, retired production line manager Jerry Selbee made a discovery that would change his life forever. Whilst perusing a brochure for a new state lottery game, he noticed a loophole that had the potential to make him millions, one he couldn\u2019t believe no one else had spotted.<\/p>\n

And so, with help from his wife Marge \u2013 and eventually from the entire population of his tiny Michigan town Evart \u2013 he set about exploiting that loophole, managing to win huge sums of money over several years and helping to revitalise the financially struggling town in the process.<\/p>\n

This incredible true story is the subject of Jerry & Marge Go Large, a brand new film that launched earlier this week on Paramount Plus<\/a>, which sees Bryan Cranston take on the starring role.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s as if you\u2019ve discovered a buried treasure,\u201d the Breaking Bad star says of the story during an exclusive chat with RadioTimes.com<\/a>. \u201cIt\u2019s like, we didn\u2019t do anything, we just dug in our own backyard \u2013 and there it is! It was an adventure for them that they took advantage of in all the best ways, and there was mutual benefit all around \u2013 not just to them and their families but the community at large.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cranston hadn\u2019t previously been familiar with the story before being sent the script, but he was instantly enamoured with the idea when he read it, feeling it was the perfect kind of project for him at that particular moment in time.<\/p>

\u201cI felt it was a breath of fresh air kind of story,\u201d he says. \u201cOver the 90 minutes, it would be a feel good movie \u2013 and coming out of COVID and the lockdown, this is the first project I wanted to do. And it was good for me to do it \u2013 because I felt a sense of community as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

After landing the role, Cranston began researching the case \u2013 reading assorted articles and watching various news items about the real Jerry and Marge. And he and co-star Annette Bening even went one step further and visited the couple themselves \u2013 an experience which he found incredibly insightful.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey live in the state of Michigan,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s a very rural area in many ways, and certainly their little town is very rural. There\u2019s one traffic light in the town, 1,900 people total \u2013 so everybody knows everybody, and everybody knows Jerry and Marge. And almost all of those people in the town wanted to be a part of it, to be a part of that group.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"""\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
Annette Bening as Marge Selbee and Bryan Cranston as Jerry Selbee in Jerry and Marge Go Large<\/span><\/figcaption> Paramount<\/i><\/span><\/div>\n

Capturing that sense of community was something that was particularly key to the project, and Cranston believes that exploring the difference between life in the city and life in the country is a key theme of the film.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think you have to strike a tone that people feel is authentic and real,\u201d he says. \u201cSo for those of us living in cities, we see living in rural settings as a simpler life. And that\u2019s not using it pejoratively, I\u2019m saying that there are less things going on, and that\u2019s an attractive quality. And so we wanted to have it conveyed as a more simplistic thing, a smaller environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course, no one could be a better judge of the film\u2019s authenticity than Jerry and Marge Selbee themselves, and Cranston seems delighted to report that the pair \u2013 who appeared at the film\u2019s Tribeca Film Festival premiere earlier in June \u2013 were very pleased with the final product, even if they had a few minor concerns early on in the process.<\/p>\n

\u201cMarge wasn\u2019t really taken by the idea that it was going to be a Hollywood movie,\u201d he says. \u201cShe was more concerned with how are we going to be depicted? Are we going to make sure that it\u2019s clear that they didn\u2019t commit any wrongdoing? It was not criminal [what they did], it was within the realm of the game, so she was more concerned about that.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for Jerry, Cranston explains that when they first met he told him he wasn\u2019t planning on doing an impersonation of him \u2013 that he would \u201cadjust him\u201d a little for the movie.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe theatrical licence that I took is that I made him less gregarious, less affable,\u201d he says. \u201cI thought it was a better contrast to his success in what he was doing, if he was a little more contained, a little less socially adept. Jerry is very open, and he\u2019ll talk to anybody \u2013 but my Jerry, in the movie, was less of that, more of a quiet man, a man of numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"""\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
Jerry Selbee and Marge Selbee attend the film\u2019s premiere at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival<\/span><\/figcaption> Getty<\/i><\/span><\/div>\n

The issue of how much dramatic licence films like this can take without the project becoming compromised is an interesting one, and Cranston refers to comments made by acclaimed screenwriter Aaron Sorkin when discussing how far films based on true stories can get away with deviating from the real events. The important distinction to make, he says, is between accuracy and honesty.<\/p>\n

\u201cAccuracy is important in journalism,\u201d he says.\u201d You [have to] get the facts correct \u2013 it\u2019s a story, it\u2019s a news item. But we\u2019re not in the journalistic business, we\u2019re in the entertainment business. So when we\u2019re telling a story about real people, it\u2019s important to be honest, but it\u2019s not important to be accurate in the sense that by virtue of making a movie, we have to take liberties in so many areas.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst of all, people know I\u2019m not Jerry Selby, so you have to accept that. And then we have to truncate stories. We have to shorten stories in order to fit in and get to the core. So it\u2019s more important to be honest, that we are depicting real-life events and how they were approached, as opposed to being exactly accurate in each little thing.<\/p>\n

As an example, he cites the fact that the real Jerry and Marge have six children and \u201cscores of grandchildren\u201d whereas, in the film, they have only two \u2013 each of whom plays a key role.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe felt, and I think rightfully so, that we should only give them two children so that we can deal with both,\u201d he says. \u201cOtherwise, if you only deal with two children, and the audience knows they have six, it\u2019s like, \u2018Where are the rest of their kids?\u2019 And that kind of gets us away from the adventure and the story itself. So you have to make those decisions based on what is best to maintain the drive of the story.\u201d<\/p>\n