Getting the Call to Play John ‘Doc’ Bradley: Phillippe campaigned hard for a role – any role – in Flags of Our Fathers. “I read that [Eastwood] had optioned this book in the newspaper and I immediately went out and bought it and read it within the next two days. I just thought to myself if there was one thing I could do in it, be involved with it in any capacity, the smallest role, I wouldn’t have cared. I just wanted to be a part of it, if at all possible. It was the first job in my life I’ve ever pursued the way I did this one. I’d never written a letter to a director before in my life, and I did on this film.
I went in many times. They didn’t want to cast initially people my age. Clint had thought he wanted 19, 20-year-olds, the age these guys were, so they saw me for the Mike Strank part, the Barry Pepper role. They read me a bunch of times, and then it just got further and further down the line. It was like they really wanted me to play Doc and I just couldn’t believe it. I was in my office in Venice when I got the call from my agent, and I literally dropped to my knees, I literally was just praising God. It was one of the better professional moments of my life, to get that phone call.
I had never met [Clint Eastwood] up until that point, because he doesn’t read actors. Phyllis Huffman, who’s an incredible lady and largely responsible for my getting this job - she passed away after the film was made - but he trusts her implicitly. She’s also a friend of his and so her word is really important to him, so I had never met him until we were getting on the Warner Brothers’ jet to fly to D.C. for our first day. Adam [Beach] and Jesse [Bradford] and I were all sitting on the plane just like, ‘Oh, we’re going to meet him. What’s he going to be like?’ His car pulls up and he gets out and it’s Clint Eastwood. Then you’re on a private plane with him, sitting like a little boy in the front, looking back at him. It takes awhile to get over the fact that you’re working with this legend. Then it does, and you find yourself having beers and talking politics with him. He’s so easy to be around. He’s funny and he treats people decently.”
Phillippe was extremely impressed with the way Eastwood works. “I hate when you’re on a film set and after every take you go, ‘Oh that was great. That was amazing.’ He doesn’t do any of that. He’ll say [doing a good impression of Eastwood], ‘That’s enough of that.’ And he’s right. I far prefer that. But I do remember when we did the flag raising. No one else had ever seen any of us rehearse it, but we’d gotten together on our own and studied the tape, and made sure we knew what the physicality was. When we did it the first time, he came over and addressed the group of us. He said, ‘I’m proud of you.’ That was pretty cool.”
The Responsibility of Playing John Bradley: “There was definitely an element of that, just the responsibility that comes along with playing someone who I feel was really a pretty great person, and had gone through these experiences. But in a lot of ways it makes my job that much easier. A lot of the work is done for me. This man existed; I can see pictures of him and know how he smiled and talked to his son, and find out how he dealt with people, and read the book and know what was important to him during this battle. It really does a lot of the work for me. Then it’s just about making sure that I’m prepared enough to replicate his ability with his equipment and the first aid stuff. I really took a lot of time to make sure I got [that] right.
I very much tried to make it accurate. I had pictures of him, a lot of pictures John Bradley. No audio recordings… I’d asked and looked for that, but they really couldn’t find anything until he was a lot older and it wouldn’t have made as much sense. But I kind of knew somewhat the accent from the area that he lived and the book was really helpful. But I didn’t have any video of him or anything. I had a lot of pictures, and I put them up all over my trailer and used those pictures and what I could take from the look in his eyes, and that sort of thing, to inspire me every day and keep me grounded and focused on him.”
Page 2: Playing a Navy Corpsman and Limited Dialogue
