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(De Niro was similarly a fan of Mamet, calling the writer “wonderful.")
“Three years earlier than that, I had no money,” he says.
Credit: Paramount Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
Paramount offered him $800,000, the most he had ever made on a film, but Costner insisted.
“I said, ‘You know what?
“There’s still that kind of number, I think, in the psyche of Americans.
Paramount Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
It certainly was with me.”
Then came the hard part.
“But the truth is, you’re stuck inside the lines of something that’s written…
Paramount Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
I understood history of him, but I really was having to play this character.”
I think they paid $5,000 for it at the time,” he recalls.
(He spends the film’sopening scenein it).
“It was a great chair.
I’m sorry I didn’t get it.”
“All the actors were very experienced and professional.
Everybody played an important element in the film.”
(Costars on Ness’ team included Charles Martin Smith and Andy Garcia.)
Costner also says he felt “in sync” with De Palma, whoseScarfacehad come out four years prior.
“Brian was so open for ideas and suggestions,” Connery added.
“Working with him was everything that I expected.”
He’s a good director with actors.”
Hiding in a church, the old cop gives the naive G-man a master class in justice, Chicago-style.
“You want to get Capone?
Here’s how you get him,” Malone instructs Ness.
“He pulls a knife, you pull a gun.
He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue.
That’s the Chicago way, and that’s how you get Capone.”
“I do not approve of your methods!”
the horrified Mountie captain exclaims.
Well, you’re not from Chicago," Ness replies.
And so, the student has become the master.
“It was all about expectancy,” Connery says of the shocking moment.
“The scene was very realistic and quite vicious if I must say.
Very creative to say the least.”
Another memorable demonstration of brutality comes from De Niro’s Capone after Ness' first successful alcohol raid.
“Sunny day, the stands are full of fans,” he muses.
“What does he have to say?
‘I’m goin’ out there for myself.
But I get nowhere, unless theteamwins.'”
“It’s a touching scene,” De Niro says when asked about the horrific sequence.
“I’m joking.”
Costner remembers pestering De Palma with constant questions about the rest of the players in the complicated sequence.
“And he was like, ‘Which guy?
I’m on you right now.’
Or is there another one coming?
Or is there somebody over here?'
Brian would look at me and I said, ‘I need to act that.
“He was like, ‘What’s going on here?’
and I said, ‘Well, I’ve already shot [all my bullets].
“Some people say, ‘Oh, bullsh.’
It’s true; I could see what was happening.”
“Allmy ideas were refined.”
