Jessica Chastain, Oscar Isaac talk Scenes from a Marriage and how their viral red carpet moment is in stark contrast to their characters in the HBO series
- Long-time friends Jessica Chastain and Oscar Isaac were instant viral sensations when they shared a tender moment on the red carpet at the Venice Film Festival
- The duo had only three weeks of intensive rehearsal for the emotionally raw HBO series, relying on their well-worn relationship to see them through
A pandemic-weary world devoured the sight of Oscar Isaac, looking smouldering in classic black tie on the Venice Film Festival red carpet, hand in hand with his exquisite Scenes From a Marriage co-star Jessica Chastain in a sparkling red gown. Slow motion footage of the twinkling-eyed Isaac kissing the inside of Chastain’s bare arm went instantly viral.
The red carpet moment was a case of reality being more Hollywood than the five-part HBO limited series, an emotionally raw story of a marriage torn apart set entirely in a middle-class Boston home.
Playing husband and wife in Scenes involved the type of intensity that tested the decades-long friendship between Chastain, 44, and Isaac, 42. Chastain struggled with separating her own feelings from the pain she was bringing in her dramatic performance.
“There’s great love there. When you’re doing something difficult to someone you love, it’s hard,” says Chastain, speaking with Isaac from the festival, hours before hitting the carpet. “I’m not going to lie. It did get to a place where I was like, ‘I can’t see your face right now.’”
The couple’s long friendship, spanning back to drama school at Manhattan’s Juilliard School (Chastain graduated in 2003; Isaac in 2005) had intrigued Scenes director and co-screenwriter Hagai Levi for his modern adaptation of Ingmar Bergman’s revered 1973 Swedish miniseries.
