A pillar of the community sees his seemingly perfect middle class life begin to fall apart against the turmoil of the late 1960s in Director Ewan McGregor’s new feature, American Pastoral.
In the film based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Philip Roth, McGregor also stars as Seymour “Swede” Levov, a former high school athlete who is now a successful businessman and happily married to a former beauty queen. His life seems idyllic until his beloved teenage daughter becomes a radical political activist and disappears after being accused of committing a violent act. On his journey to find her and bring his family back together, Swede is finally forced to truly examine his life and the world around him.
Following the October 16 DGA membership screening in Los Angeles, McGregor sat down with Director Mike Mills, who had directed McGregor in the feature Beginners, to discuss the making of American Pastoral. McGregor also spoke about the film in a conversation moderated by Director Tim Blake Nelson (Anesthesia) following the October 22 DGA membership screening in New York.
American Pastoral is McGregor’s feature directorial debut. His other directing credit is the segment “Bone” from the anthology feature Tube Tales. McGregor has been a DGA member since 2015.
You can listen to McGregor's Q&A by clicking the podcast episode embedded below. You can find all DGA podcast episodes here.