Glen Powell On First Golden Globe Nom For ‘Hit Man’
DEADLINE – There’s nothing better in baseball than a surprise grand slam, and this morning, Glen Powell got one in his first Golden Globe Nomination for Male Actor in a Comedy/Musical for the Netflix movie he produced and co-wrote, Hit Man.
Powell was in London for the shoot of his next movie, Edgar Wright’s The Running Man when his family –who literally has cameo roles in the Paramount title– “stormed” into his hotel room screaming with glee over the Globes news.
The movie, which world premiered at TIFF during the strike in 2023 where it was snapped up by the streamer, has been a passion project for Powell, his first learning about via Michael Costigan at Aggregate Films who turned the Top Gun 2 actor onto Skip Hollandsworth’s Texas Monthly piece about a humdrum professor who moonlights for the police department. He poses as a hitman. In the movie, he winds up falling in love with one of the cops’ women of interest. Powell suggested they take the idea to his former Fast Food Nation filmmaker, Richard Linklater, who is great with characters. Linklater was very acquainted with the real life story of Gary Johnson. Brad Pitt at one point wanted to play him, but a script couldn’t be cracked. Powell and Linklater found a way in.
“We figured out where fact and fiction were married by taking this idea, the fantasy of a hitman, the fantasy of ourselves,” Powell tells Deadline this morning.
Powell was just involved in co-adapting the title with Linklater, but was heavily involved test screenings, and rolled up his sleeves in shaping the film.
“What a wild crazy journey this has been,” breathed Powell this AM. Looking back he tells us that there were “an amount of times (Hitman) it fell part; but there was a collective feeling of who you can be, if you set your mind to it.”
Powell gave a special shoutout this morning to “the assistants at CAA” who he showed a first cut to.
“I hosted a screening at CAA, invited all the assistants to watch and they did comment cards. We did a Q&A afterwards. All the assistants were in the room and a lot of their notes made it into the movie.”
“They believed in the bold decisions in the movie; a lot of things that made some people nerviouse, they were excited about,” adds Powell on how CAA staffers were integral in solving first act problems, as well as pace and clarity.
After starring with his sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephew in Running Man, Powell will stay in London through the spring when J.J. Abrams secret movie ramps up with Jenna Ortega. Powell says that as far as any description for the movie, “it’s classified! It can’t tell you anything!” All he says is “it’s really big, really fun.” A movie for the era.
