Q. So how did you get started in the film business?
JG: I went to Columbia College in New York City and found myself cutting classes to watch double features in the various (now-defunct) revival houses that used to dot the city. I saw everything from John Ford westerns to obscure Ozu films. Meanwhile, I was haunted by the question of what I wanted to do with my life. It says something about me, though I’m not sure what, that it took me two years of constant movie watching to realize I wanted to make movies.
I went to Film School and immediately after, wrote a script with my brother Daniel called IDLEWILD. I traveled to LA and gave everyone I met a copy of the script. A few months later, my brother and I had an agent, and a couple of weeks after that, the script was optioned. I was 24.
Q. What inspired you to create Wonderful World? Was it inspired by something that happened to you in your life? Or possibly something that you saw about the world that made you want people to change? What about this project screamed “Josh Goldin do this!”
JG: I was inspired to make the movie by having kids. Until then, it was fun to be cynical. It also came easy to me. I have a legacy of negativity in my family (my grandmother who lived to the age of 99 once said on her birthday, “It’s been a terrible century.”) And the world, though cloaked in day-glo colors, is a pretty craven place overall, money trumping almost everything, including common sense and good intentions.
Once I had kids, though, and loved them as much as I did, I was struck by the disparity between how I wanted them to see the world and how I SAW it myself. I really wanted a different attitude for myself so when I told them things like “most people are nice”, I wouldn’t feel like a liar. This made me pose a haunting question to myself. How much of my attitude toward the world is the world’s fault and how much of it is the fault of my own habits of thought? It’s also the question of the movie. The answer is not a simple one, at least for me.
Q. Ben Singer is an interesting character. He’s very cynical and one can say even jaded. What does he represent?
JG: He represents the truth unadorned. And the unadorned truth is always only a half truth. Meinche ounce said, “For every complex problem, there’s a simple solution… and it’s always wrong.” Ben Singer has looked at the world of man and decided it’s filled with greed and meanness and cavalier disregard for everything beautiful—poetry, love, art… And he has a lot of evidence for this. He’s a very black and white character. If he learns anything in the movie, it’s that good is mixed with bad in everything, in people, in business, even in government. It’s possible to be two things at once. In his case, you can be right and wrong at the same time.
Q. What do you think made Matthew Broderick perfect for this role? (in other words, why him?)
JG: There are several reasons why Matthew Broderick is perfect for this role. The first is that he’s a great actor—one of the most underrated actors of our era I think. As importantly… the character of Ben Singer is complicated and requires an actor equally complicated to play him. Matthew, like every thinking person on our globe, wrestles with the same issues Ben Singer wrestles with. You can’t be an American in these times and not see the perniciousness of corporations. Republicans and democrats are united in this. Yet, the Supreme Court just passed a law allowing Corporations unfettered access to our government through campaign contributions, equating the giving of money to “free speech”. How can this happen? And how can any thinking citizen remain uncynical in the wake of this incredibly cynical act by one of our most powerful branches of government? I haven’t talked to Matthew about this specifically, but I know he would be both outraged and… not surprised. He has a healthy streak of cynicism to him, but he’s also generous and, well, quietly bemused by it all, which I think is a healthy way to be. It was very important to me that the actor who played Ben Singer be one who could sympathize with Ben Singer’s dark outlook, yet not be dark and unpleasant himself.
Q. Sanaa Lathan absolutely lights up the screen when paired together with Broderick’s character. What does she represent?
JG: Mostly she just is who she is and doesn’t really represent anything, but I think, in a movie where the play of ideas is as important as the relationships, “just being who you are” is an archetype of sorts. You might say she’s an emissary from the world. Ben Singer lives a quiet, muted life and suddenly, this noisy, vibrant, impulsive, self-centered, generous, hungry woman comes crashing in, who represents all that is good (and bad) in the world. It’s impossible for him not to fall in love with her… and (given who he is) very possibly be burned.
Q. Same question as before, what made Sanaa Lathan perfect for the role of Khadi?
JG: Again, Sanaa Lathan is a great, woefully underused actress. She is incredibly devoted to her craft and a constant questioner of what she’s doing. In other words, she’s a very thoughtful actress. Matthew and Sanaa are very different kinds of actors, but they have this in common. Both are thinkers. It’s what binds these two spectacularly different characters as on screen lovers, I think. Both are thoughtful, caring people, and you can sense their thought process in their faces.
Q. So at the end of Wonderful World what do you want your audience to walk away thinking?
JG: I want people to feel that this world is neither a wonderful world nor a terrible one. It is both. And that it’s impossible to be sane, much less honest and happy, unless you embrace this duality. But also, with this realization… comes a little sadness.