Richard Linklater Talks ‘Hit Man’ and Directing Glen Powell, Adria Arjona Through the Sex Scenes: “Let’s Pull This Off in a Realistic Yet Hot Way”

In 2020, Glen Powell forwarded a Texas Monthly article to his Oscar-nominated director pal Richard Linklater. The article, published in 2001, detailed the true story of Gary Johnson, a Houston cop who worked undercover as a fake hit man to help convict criminals in murder-for-hire cases. Powell thought it was the sort of wacky, unique true story that he and Linklater could turn into a movie.

In fact—as Linklater quipped to Deadline last fall—he’d read that article when Powell “was in diapers.” Or at least, he’d read it years before Linklater cast a 14-year-old Powell in a small role in his 2006 film Fast Food Nation, and more than a decade before he cast him in a much larger role in the 2016 college comedy, Everybody Wants Some. Linklater already knew the reporter, Skip Hollandsworth, with whom he’d co-written another adapted-from-an-article film, Bernie. They’d even had meetings about a possible Gary Johnson movie, but Linklater had decided there wasn’t enough narrative arc for a feature film. When Powell inpsired him to take another look, the pair found a new way into Johnson’s story: making a bunch of stuff up.

“The real-life situation behind Bernie had its own narrative trajectory, within the story, to a large degree,” Linklater explained to Decider in a recent Zoom interview. “This kind of doesn’t. It’s more of an atmosphere thing. It’s in a world of fake. These are fake hitmen. They don’t exist. It’s all myth, largely created by movies and pop culture. So I felt we had this permission to just go with it.”

And so the movie Hit Man—which opened in select theaters on May 24, and began streaming on Netflix today—was born. Powell stars as Gary Johnson, the mild-mannered undercover cop who finds he just might like himself more as a sexy, dangerous hit man—especially after a beautiful woman named Madison (Adria Arjona) takes an interest in him. Though Linklater initially intended the write the film himself, the two friends went back and forth over the phone during the pandemic, sharing ideas, notes, and eventually, script pages. Powell became a true co-writer, a credit Linklater has previously shared with his stars Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy on Before Sunset and Before Midnight. “I give Glen a lot of credit. He really ran with it,” Linklater said.

The director and co-writer spoke to Decider about the real Gary Johnson (who died in 2022 at the age of 77), Hit Man‘s break-out scene, and the rare—but not first—Richard Linklater-directed sex scene.

DECIDER: This is the second time that you’ve adapted a Skip Hollandsworth article, but Hit Man deviates a lot more from the true story than Bernie did. Was that freeing for you? 

RICHARD LINKLATER: Well, I love the character of Gary Johnson, as Skip reveals in the story—his whole occupation, and his character, and all that. But the story was kind of repetitious. It was only when Glen and I really got to working on it, that we gave ourselves permission [to deviate]. I would never have done that in the previous Skip [movie]. The real-life situation behind Bernie had its own narrative trajectory, within the story, to a large degree. This kind of doesn’t. It’s more of an atmosphere thing. It’s in a world of fake. These are fake hitmen. They don’t exist. It’s all myth, largely created by movies and pop culture. So I felt we had this permission to just go with it. It’s in keeping with this story that’s all based on BS and people’s belief. I felt we could really go off the deep end and just push this story, keep it going, and imagine us a relationship with Madison.

The story Skip writes pretty much ends when [the real Gary Johnson] doesn’t arrest this young woman. Our leaping off point was: “What if she got back in touch with them? What if they started hanging out? Dating?” Then it becomes the study of identity and becomes more genre—film noir, hit man movie, screwball comedy. That’s when it gets kind of fun.

I read that you did speak to Gary Johnson before his death in 2022. What were those conversations like?

Well, he earns that thing at the end of the movie, that little coda that says, “Chillest dude imaginable.” That was my relation to Gary. He was so nonplussed. You would think when someone’s making a film, with your name on it, about your life, your occupations—but he was like, “Yup. Sounds good.” I thought I had to, like, impress him or sell him on letting us do it. He was like, “Well, Skip says you’re a good guy. Fine with me.” He really was beautifully detached from it. It was that Zen master in him. He had a Buddhist service after he passed away. I think he was that Vietnam vet who—aloneness was okay with him. You know? He was married a couple of times, and was very close to his exes, which we tried to portray in the movie. They like him. He was a really good person. No one ever say anything bad about him. But he’s a complex guy.  He contained the multitudes, let’s say. 

At some point, the shoot moved from your home state, Texas, where the real Gary worked, to New Orleans. I’m curious, why was that? How did you find filming in New Orleans influenced the vibe of the story?

I mean, yes, the real Gary lived in the Houston area. But it was just more practical. When you’re working on a super low budget, and you pieced together financing, that tax incentive money starts to take up a big percentage of your budget. I had a producer who was like, “Oh, how quaint you could shoot at home.” I don’t even live in Houston, so it’d still be a location shoot. But it just made sense for us to go somewhere else. But we could have gone anywhere— New Mexico, Georgia, you could go to any number of places. But it was like, “Oh, now New Orleans. That’s where the story really takes place.” It was easy to transpose this from Houston to New Orleans, put it like that. New Orleans has even more of a profile. You don’t have to explain New Orleans. People understand New Orleans as this bigger-than-life character. Fun place, but with a potentially dark underbelly. There’s a certain sometimes lawlessness or volatility in New Orleans that kind of goes with the city. There are a lot of characters there. It was an easy translation.

One of my favorite costumes that Glen Powell wears in this movie was Patrick Bateman from American Psycho. Was that something that came from you or Glen? Did he just have a Christian Bale impersonation ready to go?

A little of all of the above. We were designing these characters. But I give Glen a lot of credit. He really ran with it. It’s funny—it’s all fake. It’s all myth. We’re making this up for what the clients believe. You couldn’t really go too over the top. Gary’s thinking, “What will they think a hitman looks like?” You’re already into someone’s belief. As crazy as it got at times, I found that you couldn’t go over the top. Because it was all based on a crazy belief. That’s incredible comedic license! So that was a really fun element. And Glen definitely went off the deep end, with these accents. We always pulled it together right on the day. It was a lot of fun–hair, makeup, wardrobe. Everybody got in on it, to their fullest ability. 

Tell me about that show-shopping scene where Glen and Adria put on this radio play for the police. Did you know going in that this was the breakout scene of the movie?

That scene is sandwiched by two other scenes at her house. The first I would call the breakup scene—where she even admits what she did, he comes in, Ron leaves his gear. It’s kind of a breakup. The next scene, the heat is really on. Their freedom is on the line. Jasper— he’s the malevolent force. We don’t know what he’s up to at this point, but it’s definitely not good. He’s setting them up to fail. It’s if it’s a chess match, suddenly it’s check. It’s not checkmate, but it’s check. The next move you make could be the end of the game. What pressure to see your lead characters under! So this scene ends up working on multiple levels. There’s like three levels of acting going on. It’s so fun, on parallel tracks—what you’re saying isn’t what you’re acting, because it’s audio only. It’s a radio play, like you said. They’re acting for the hidden microphone. But they have to figure this out. Glen is directing her, she’s picking up the vibes. That’s just the technical side: Are they going to get away with this? And we’re pulling from to do that.

But on the other the parallel track, which I really think takes it to another level, is that it’s also a makeup scene. They’ve broken up in the last scene. Just by [Gary] being there, she realizes, “Oh, this guy really cares for me. He has my back. He could have just turned me in and washed his hands. But he’s here for me. He loves me!” This is a great makeup scene, where they’re sort of declaring their love and commitment for one another. They’re really going out on a limb for each other. At the end [of the scene], A) they got away with it and, B) this couple, that we’re invested in, are back together. So that’s great. 

I never anticipated the amount of emotional relief, joy, or whatever, happens at the end of that scene. It calls for its own little curtain call.

Oh, yes, I was applauding at the end of the scene.

I know! Because it’s performative. It’s rare. I mean, we didn’t design it that way. But I see why it happens now. In a movie about a lot of role-playing, that’s the biggest role of all, I think.

Speaking of role playing, Glen Powell has said that this is the first Richard Linklater movie with a sex scene in it–

What?! That’s such— that’s such utter bullshit! In the movie, Everybody Wants Some!!, there’s a sex scene with Glen Powell in it! Look at the movie, there’s a naked Glen Powell!

Right!

I think he really meant there is that sex has not been a dominant theme of my movies. I’ve had a lot of titillation. I’ve always been against, like, a gratuitous sex scene. I’ve never done that. So it’s not that gratuitous. But Glen himself has been in a sex scene in a movie of Richard Linklater. So I don’t know if he got that right.

It was very clever that Gary and Madison love role play in their real lives and in their sex lives. But I have to ask, why airline role play? Was that a little Top Gun wink?

[Laughs.] I forget exactly. I think we just thought that was funny. Adria maybe came up with that? I think she did. It’s sensitive. You’re showing an adult sexual relationship. That carnal passion drives the story, and it’s important. That’s why I haven’t done a lot of gratuitous sex scenes. The day I do it, it’s going to be important. It’s going to be very intertwined with the story. And that was important for them. So working with them, I was like, “Well, what’s what’s sexy? Let’s pull this off in a realistic and yet hot way.” So everybody kind of brought stuff to the table. That was the way we approached it. And so what they thought was fun, and funny, too. That’s a fun, playful scene.

I heard that when you and Glen took the script out on the town, studios weren’t interested, which shocked me. What studio wouldn’t want a Glen Powell and Richard Linklater action comedy?

None of them!

What was the feedback you were getting from the studios? What made them hesitate?

I don’t know. Everybody’s scared. [The movie] was not one thing. It’s not a hit man movie. I remember one conversation, they wanted it to be like a “real hit man movie.” I was like, “No, the whole point is, it’s a fake hit man.” People feel really comfortable with something they’ve seen before. This was a mash-up of things that they hadn’t seen. Maybe there are elements they might know, but—I don’t know! I can’t speak for anyone. You know, I think if it was today, with Glen having been in a few more movies that did well, maybe it’d be different. But at the time…

Every movie is hard to get going. Studios, by and large, aren’t looking for adult dramas, or even comedies, so much anymore. We know what world we’re living in. They’ve changed quite a bit. So I don’t know. We were lucky to get it made at all. But, you know, the same people, even when it was a finished film, too. That’s the more telling thing about our industry, probably—as a finished film, showing it to very appreciative audiences, and a nice critical response, they still didn’t want it! That’s a studio issue that I can’t speak to.

You’ve talked a lot about the theme of identity in this film. Maybe it’s because I recently saw I Saw the TV Glow, but it feels like Gary’s identity journey could be read as trans metaphor, or a queer metaphor—this idea that identity can change.

Absolutely. 

How would you feel about the film being read this way? Did you and Glen think about that angle at all, when talking about identity?

I think about that a lot. That’s the times we’re living in. I’m close to that. At the end, we say, “Hey, be who you want to be.” I think that’s the ultimate optimistic message of the movie—that you can be who want. There’s no limitation. I find that creative. I find it empowering. I think it’s great. You can read it any way you want. But, yeah, I totally appreciate that.

Hit Man also touches on police brutality issues. Gary says at the end of the film that Jasper was a racist cop. Can we assume that the teens that he beat up were Black teens? 

Yeah. In New Orleans? It’s a predominantly Black city. So yeah, you read between the lines. We don’t come out and say it. There’s a sensitivity toward—the other the Black people in the police force you can tell don’t like him too much. He’s a problematic character. So yeah, I think, without underlining it too much, yeah, that’s the implication. Most cop brutal cops are usually brutal in that area. Right? If you’re going to be a brutal cop, you’re usually racist, too.

Was there ever a version of the script where that was more explicit?

No. No, we always knew he did something bad. We were trying to regulate it. The idea of a video that someone shot—because that’s real—that went that just went viral. He’s kind of dancing around that. It felt realistic, too. It gets him kicked off the force, and he’s sitting there complaining, “Well, the comment section is two-to-one in my favor.” Like, yeah, right. He’s blaming cancel culture. It felt of our time. But that’s a real issue. And thank God for body cams and video—not that it seems to lessen the incidence of it.

I know I’m out of time, but my last question: Could you give us an update on Merrily We Roll Along? Have you, or will you be, filming any sequences this year? 

Well, it’s obviously a very process-oriented thing. Yeah, we will be shooting another here pretty soon. We’re trucking along here. So all good. Actually, by the end of this year, we might be technically a third of the way through, content-wise, but not year-wise. It’s a little top-heavy, in the years—it gets spaced out. You know, whatever! It’s weird to talk about something that’s so… the final thing is so in the future. But it’s in process. 

Well, I certainly will be looking forward to it over the next decade or so. 

More than that, unfortunately! Try 16, 17 years.