Robert Duvall Remembered by Tender Mercies Director Bruce Beresford
Following the death of the legendary actor Robert Duvall on Sunday at the age of 95, Bruce Beresford, the Australian filmmaker who directed Duvall in 1983’s Tender Mercies, for which Duvall won the best actor Oscar in 1984, shared his memories of Duvall exclusively with The Hollywood Reporter. As you can read below, Beresford — whose credits also include 1979’s Breaker Morant, 1986’s Crimes of the Heart and 1989’s Driving Miss Daisy, which won the best picture Oscar — remembers the actor as “surly” but “absolutely great.” * * * I never saw Duvall again after Tender Mercies. It was on in Cannes, but I was filming something else, so I never got to Cannes. And then we were both nominated for Oscars, but I was somewhere else filming. The film was written by Horton Foote. Horton had written other roles for Bob. In fact, Horton suggested Bob for his first film, To Kill a Mockingbird. And Horton wrote Tender Mercies specifically for Bob. I had the script sent to me by the Hobels [Philip Hobel …
