Bradley Cooper nearly quit acting before he was offered a role in Licorice Pizza

Bradley Cooper has revealed that director Paul Thomas Anderson is the reason he did not quit acting.

Cooper is a in real life producer Jon Peters in Anderson’s latest film Licorice Pizza, an erratic character who’s a lover of Barabara Streisand. He also buys the waterbed of a the child actor who is now adolescent businessman Gary Valentine (Cooper Hoffman).

“The reason that I didn’t give up acting is Paul Thomas Anderson,” Cooper stated to Mahershala Ali in the course of The Variety’s Actors on Actors(opens in new tab) series. “When Cooper approached me to possibly be in his movie Mahershala was really I’m thinking I’d let him in to his film. I’d take on anything. After we left Nightmare Alley, I was capable of growing beard and Searchlight was hoping that I wouldn’t contract COVID because we needed to return and carry on Nightmare Alley, but I thought, ‘There’s no way I’m not going to do it..’

“That was the first movie back from COVID. And Jon Peters was the beginning of the movie, so I started with everybody else, which was wonderful, rather than coming in when everybody’s already downriver. I spent three and a half weeks with Paul. I watched all the camera tests. He was teaching me all about lenses, things I never knew. He’s incredible.”

The ’70s-set coming-of-age film also features Alana Haim Benny Safdie, Sean Penn as well as Tom Waits. Hoffman’s character has a loose resemblance upon the producer of films Gary Goetzman, who started his career as a young actor and was the producer of a variety of films that ranged from The Silence of the Lambs to Mamma Mia!.

Cooper was also recently seen also in Nightmare Alley the psychological thriller directed by Guillermo del Toro. He is the carnival employee Stan Carlisle opposite Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, and Willem Dafoe.

If you’ve seen Licorice Pizza, fill out your watch list by referring to our recommendations for the other most popular films to watch in 2021..