The Coen brothers on Serious success

Film journalist Joe Leydon's chat with Joel and Ethan Coen conducted during the Toronto International Film Festival has just gone up on the Cowboys and Indians website. (The main reason they were being interviewed by this particular publication is because they are currently working on a remake of the late era John Wayne western True Grit.) Below is an extract from their conversation in which the filmmaking siblings discuss A Serious Man and their feelings on success:

C&I: It’s a movie about a man whose faith is tested while so many terrible things happen to him. And yet, it’s a comedy — a very dark comedy — and critics and audiences are responding very favorably to it.Joel: It’s very gratifying when people like your movie. Because it’s a bummer when they don’t.Ethan: But there’s a funny thing about gauging reaction — it happens so much after the fact. Like, it’s a little odd to be here and hearing what people think of [A Serious Man] because we’re right in the middle of writing something else. It’s strange when you’re sort of whipsawed back to the old thing. Like Joel says, it’s cool when they like it. But it’s sort of like praise for something that isn’t really attached to you at this point. But you think, “Well, okay, yeah, we’ll take the praise anyway.”C&I: In A Serious Man, your protagonist questions why he must endure so much misery. Consider the flip side of that: Do you fellows ever wonder why you’ve enjoyed so much success?Joel: Oh, yes. Absolutely. We consider ourselves very lucky. It’s like, sometimes, we do wonder ... Ethan: How did that happen?Joel: Right. How did that happen?Ethan: It’s very weird. It’s almost like a mistake has been made.

You can read the entire interview here.