Though its mammoth box office numbers (per Box Office Mojo) and overall legacy tell a different story, arguably little was expected of “A Star Is Born” prior to its 2018 release. Sure, people were intrigued by the project because Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper were in it. Ditto for the film marking Cooper’s directorial debut. But few would’ve bet on “A Star Is Born” spawning a massive pop hit, becoming one of the legit event films of 2018, or earning eight Academy Award nominations, including that year’s Best Picture.
That likely includes Sam Elliott, who earned one of those Oscar nominations for his scene-stealing supporting turn in the film. Still, Elliott admitted in a 2019 interview with Entertainment Weekly he had a good feeling about the film after his first meeting with Cooper, stating, “I was excited about it when I left there because I knew Bradley wanted me for the part.” Elliott continued, “I hadn’t seen the script […] But it was just evident that Bradley was, number one, so f***ing smart, much smarter than I would ever thought of being. I mean, he’s well-educated. And as it turned out, he’s a brilliant filmmaker.”
Despite the enthusiasm Sam Elliott clearly had for “A Star is Born” after his initial meeting with Cooper, the legendary actor admitted part of that meeting was a little bit on the strange side.
Elliotts first meeting with Bradley Cooper was apparently quite odd
Per Elliott, much of his meeting with Cooper was indeed quite lovely, with the actor telling Entertainment Weekly, “I went to his home, and had a meal with him. We talked for a couple of hours, talked about our moms, and our families, and the business, and talked about his vision for the film.” While it didn’t keep him from signing onto “A Star Is Born,” one moment still stood out to Elliott as particularly “weird,” and it involved Cooper playing a tape of himself working with a coach to get the specificity of his character’s voice down for the film.
Seems that seconds into the tape, Elliott could tell it was his own iconic timbre Cooper was trying to emulate, claiming, “[Cooper] played [me] the tape of him working with a voice coach, when he’s trying to get my voice down. I remember him saying, ‘This is going to sound a little weird,’ and it f***ing did sound weird. Because it sounded like me! And he’s been listening to my voice in interviews … he was saying s*** that had come out of my mouth.”
Bizarre as the vocal-theft was for Elliott, Cooper’s voicework in “A Star Is Born” proved as vital a part of his bravura turn as anything else he did as an actor. Whether it was planned or not, the concept of that very voice-theft eventually factored into one of the pair’s most dramatically potent moments. And whoah daddy, did Elliott slay in that scene.