This Christmas there’s another chance to catch a few Academy Alumni on the big screen in Damian Chazelle’s monster Hollywood epic, Babylon.
IMDb describes Babylon as “[a] tale of outsized ambition and outrageous excess, it traces the rise and fall of multiple characters during an era of unbridled decadence and depravity in early Hollywood.” It is said to be a mixture of mostly fictional characters with a bit of non-fictional sprinkled throughout. The film boasts a three-hour run time and a cast that includes Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie, Jean Smart, Tobey Maguire, and Diego Calva.
Amongst that mighty cast is veteran Hollywood actor Eric Roberts (Class of 1977) as Robert Roy. “I agree with all the Babylon lovers in anticipation. And then re-dawns on me… I’m in this thing! It will never feel real. But it will never stop feeling great,” wrote Roberts on social media once the trailer was released. Roberts attended the premiere with his wife, Eliza, earlier this month and has been on the record praising the film’s star declaring, “...Margot Robbie is going to win an Academy Award for that. She gives the most incredible performance in Babylon that I have ever seen…. She blew me away. I couldn’t believe how brilliant every minute of every day she was.” Roberts has been working in TV and film for over forty-five years and has amassed over six-hundred credits including such hits as Runaway Train, Inherent Vice, and The Dark Knight.
“It was the one and ONLY audition I had all of [2020], and I got the job.” Carson Higgins also appears in the film as Lloyd the sound mixer who gets in a fight with Nellie LaRoy (Robbie’s character) when she tries to act in a “talkie” for the first time and just can’t seem to get it right. Carson graduated in 2008 and has been steadily working at it ever since appearing in the touring company of American Idiot and a slew of short films including Class which was executive produced by Hank Azaria (Specialized Training 1980). Babylon is his first major motion picture. “If you had asked me what kind of movie I’d like to be in for my first film, this is exactly the type of movie and the type of people I woulda dreamed up…. I love this movie so much.”
See if you can spot both alumni in the trailer below:
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