The man kept the hat
With his usual dry sense of humor, Ford expertly answers questions about if his real-life dynamic with Waller-Bridge is anything like that between Indy and his goddaughter, Helena. “No, that’s acting,” he says, simply. “The dynamic of the characters is an armature to tell the story. The relationship between Phoebe and I is not as fraught as the relationship between Indy and Helena. But as a relationship that’s built on collaboration and affinity for both the material and what each of us represent, I think I was well cast in this part to play opposite Phoebe Waller-Bridge.”
“It was a long list,” Waller-Bridge quips.
With Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny arriving in theaters just two weeks before Ford’s 81st birthday, and on the cusp of two other starring roles in Shrinking and 1923, Ford shows no signs of slowing down. He relishes the work and the collaboration on set, and doesn’t shy away from the physicality of the Indy role. Although that doesn’t mean he gets through every stunt unscathed.
In fact, in an early scene in the film, Ford added his own flourish, improvising a moment in a fight with Mads Mikkelson’s Jürgen Voller when Indy covers the antagonist’s face with his trademark fedora before socking him square in the jaw.
“It was the strangest thing,” Ford says. “I had trouble with the shoulder before, but it had not come its full course. I just was showing somebody where the punch would come from, to demonstrate what I wanted to do for [director] Jim Mangold to our cinematographers. And I pulled back on my shoulder and somehow it tore my [subscapularis] off the rotator.” The industrial accident required surgery and took Ford off set for about a month. When he returned, he was ready to keep going, galloping his way down the steps of a NYC subway set on horseback.
While other actors might keep a memento from set, Ford already had Indy’s hat and whip from an earlier outing when he returned for the character’s final adventure. “I’m not very sentimental,” he says, before adding, “I’m sentimental about the relationships that we have made and have had the opportunity to enjoy making these films. But the stuff, I don’t care that much about.”
In fact, Ford’s fedora isn’t on display in his home or protected under glass; it’s hanging in his closet with the rest of his clothes, he says. “What am I going to do with a whip? What am I going to do with that hat? I’m not going to walk down the street wearing that hat. It’s just sitting there with a bunch of other hats… Hats of no particular significance.”
As for Ford’s emotional ties to this moment in his own life, closing the book on a character that helped launch his career as a leading man, the tears in his eyes during the standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival last month say it all.
“He’s a contrarian,” his co-star Waller-Bridge says once Ford is out of earshot. “He’ll tell you the whole time ‘I’m not sentimental. I’m not nostalgic.’ Then he’ll like cry at his premiere. He cares a lot.”
Indy’s past adventures — the original four films and The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones TV series — are now streaming on Disney+. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny arrives in theaters on June 30.
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