Jon Hamm knows how to enter a room. This is a talent that should not be taken for granted. Previously, Hamm joyously bounded on-stage before the premiere of his new Sundance film, Michael Almereyda’s Marjorie Prime (losing his wallet in the process). And when Hamm enters the room in which our interview is to take place, he’s immediately greeted by well-wishers. Hamm’s a hard guy to miss: He’s tall, he’s handsome, and he knows how to shake a hand with the best of them. If Jon Hamm ran for political office, he’d be tough to beat.
In Marjorie Prime – based on Jordan Harrison’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play – Hamm plays a hologram. (There was much hype this week at Sundance about getting to see a Jon Hamm hologram in person. It was, let’s say, a bit smaller than expected. The Jon Hamm I spoke with on this day was not a hologram.) Hamm plays Walter, a hologram of the deceased husband of an elderly woman played by Lois Smith. It’s a fascinating concept that will probably become a reality someday – the ability to, sort of, replace a lost loved one.
I will refrain from complaining just how much it snowed this week in Park City, Utah. But, I will say the day I spoke to Hamm was yet another snowy day and, after awhile, it starts to get to you. At least to the point that everyone gets a little slaphappy and we just let the chips fell where they may during this discussion. And as it happened, Hamm was in the mood to break down the NFL playoffs. And I was in the mood to hear Jon Hamm’s opinions on the NFL playoffs. (Though, I’ll admit, I made sure Hamm saw my St. Louis Blues snow hat, which is his and my favorite hockey team, which spurned his deep dive into sports. So, yes, you can blame me.)
Ahead, Hamm also talks about playing a hologram, explains if he’s ever been in an bubble like his 30 Rock character (I had a specific example), and gives us a tease of his next film, Edgar Wright’s Baby Driver.
One of the last times I interviewed you was for an oral history of The Dana Carvey Show.
That came out great, too. That was really cool. Oh, man, I loved that show. Watching old clips of that you realize how ahead of its time that show was. I mean, it presaged Mr. Show, which was already ahead of its time. [Hamm sees my St. Louis Blues snow hat.] Whoa, look at that. That’s hot stuff.
I’m ready for a run from them.
I’m ready too, man. They’ve got to start playing well.
Your sports allegiances are appealing to me. We root for all the same teams: Cardinals, Blues, Mizzou, and even the Chiefs.
Yeah, I was sad to see the Chiefs lose. I was still hoping they were going to do it.
I don’t think they would have beaten Brady in Foxborough.
I don’t know, it’s interesting. Everybody knows what you have to do to beat the Patriots, and no one can do it. And it’s like the only people that have done it are the New York Giants in the Super Bowl, twice, consistently. Like you’ve got to put Brady on his ass, and you can’t turn the ball loose. That’s it. And the Texans did it for one half, and then they just forgot.
They really did look good for one half.
And then they forgot. They’re just like, Oh, well, it seems to be working. Let’s change everything. Oh, and what ends up happening is that the Patriots also are so exceedingly well coached that they adjust.
My headline, “Jon Hamm breaks down the NFL playoffs.”
I do think Atlanta’s going to be a tough match-up for the Pats because they’re like a ten-headed hydra. I mean, they just have so many, so many weapons. What the Patriots will probably do is what they did against the Rams in 2000 or, whenever it was, and just hold them. Hold the receivers off the line and make them throw a flag.
It was January 2002, one of the worst sports evenings of my life. I still lived in St. Louis and it was such a bummer. The celebration I was at ended abruptly.
Yeah, pulling the brakes on that one.
Marjorie Prime, this movie is fascinating.
I think so.
How familiar were you with the play?
I wasn’t familiar at all with it. I was familiar with Michael Almereyda’s work as a filmmaker and I found his work intriguing in the best sense of that word – and challenging and interesting. And so when I read the script and I found out that Lois Smith was playing Marjorie and that Michael was directing, I thought, well, this is quite an interesting combination of elements to come together in a weird little movie. I wonder what it will be like? And I was incredibly pleased with how it came out.
With the score, it’s very ominous.
It’s ominous in a way; it’s uplifting in a way – it’s very subjective. And for a movie kind of about memory, I think subjectivity is kind of a nice thing. I was saying to somebody else, but it doesn’t spoon-feed you plot or details. There’s no right answer for a lot of this stuff.
I liked Geena Davis’s line that every memory is a memory of a memory, so they get chiseled down.
[Geena Davis, who I didn’t notice was sitting right next to us, chimes in: “That’s hilarious, you’re talking about me while I’m right here. I love it!”]
I didn’t see you. I’m happy I said something positive. I will say, you all set the record for the most rambunctious entrance at a Sundance premiere I’ve ever seen.
Dropped my phone! I mean, it was a whole thing. You know, it’s been snowing all day. Look, I’ve been here in various capacities and I know the end of the first weekend people are a little tired. It’s been snowing, it’s hot, it’s cold. I want to give everybody a little charge sometimes.
If the hologram was a real service, would you use it?
Well, I don’t know. But I think it’s probably something that we will all have to think about in our lifetime.
I can imagine it at first as just being on a screen, and then eventually it turns into what this movie kind of shows.
I bet it’s coming. I bet something like this is coming.
I think I’d use it. At first I was like, no way. By the end of the movie, yeah, I probably would.
Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know if it would be comforting or not and I think that’s the uncertainty that the movie deals in.
I think if you had things that were left unsaid, it could at least maybe help with that.
Maybe. Yeah, maybe. I mean, look, I lost my mother when I was nine years old, so it would be interesting to have some facsimile of her for various reasons – to have a mom, to have somebody to talk to. And I think in a therapeutic sense, it would probably be good. But I don’t know. It’s weird enough seeing Peter Cushing onscreen and Carrie Fisher as a young person onscreen. The uncanny valley is a weird place to live in, you know?
Last time I interviewed you, you received a text from one of your handlers that the Mizzou football team had won…
They were a good team then that year, right?
They were a very good team. But I had just checked the score and they had lost by a lot and I had to tell you that. It reminded me of the 30 Rock episode where your character is in a bubble.
[Laughs.] Yeah, I remember that now. I do remember that.
Do they just always lie to them about Cardinals and Mizzou scores?
You know, usually the answer is that they’re clueless. A lot of people in this business, especially on the publicity side, don’t really care about sports.
So they just say, “Good news, they won!”
“I think they won, yeah. I think they won. I think they won. They probably won.”
You were so excited. I was so bummed I had to tell you they lost.
Aw, nooo. I can’t believe I didn’t just check it, you know?
Well, it was in Toronto and there are international fees. It’s expensive to check.
Oh, right. Yeah. Of course. I was just in Toronto. It’s so nice up there.
You’re in Edgar Wright’s Baby Driver. I am very excited.
I never know what finds an audience and what doesn’t and unfortunately I don’t really have to, necessarily. That’s not really up to me, marketing and all that stuff is up to the people. But I do think it’s a good movie and I do think it’s an interesting movie. And Edgar’s such a talent.
His last movie was in 2013. We haven’t had a movie from him in a while because of the whole Ant-Man thing.
Yeah, World’s End was a few years ago now. You know, he’s the kind of guy who doesn’t make a movie until he wants to make a movie. And so, when the Ant-Man thing happened and they said, “You’re making a different movie than the one you wanted to,” he said, “No, I’m not.” And, you know, God bless. I mean, that’s the kind of person that you want to go into battle with. And when he showed me the Baby Driver script — I did a read-through of that script before he went down the road on Ant-Man, so it was a while ago — and then he said, “Well, I want to make this movie.” And it’s hard. There’s a lot of things in it that are interesting, but very difficult to achieve for a price. And that’s kind of what we all have to deal with now. But I really like it. I think it’ll be surprising and cool.
You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.
