Teenagers Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward play young lovers Sam and Suzy in Wes Anderson’s “Moonrise Kingdom.” As for the rest of the cast, it’s one big name after the other: Bruce Willis, Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton, Edward Norton, et al.
“This is my first film,” says Hayward. “My tennis teacher told me to go to the open audition and so I went just for fun. At no point did I imagine it would all get so serious!”
Gilman was already enrolled in acting classes when he met Wes Anderson.
“One day my mother came to pick me up from school, something she never does. I thought something bad had happened,” he remembers. “But when she told me I had the part, I screamed, cried and laughed. It was one of the happiest moments of my life.”
Although set in the 1960s, Hayward and Gilman had no trouble relating to their characters.
“The film is about two besotted teenagers. They don’t care about the consequences of their actions, however reckless. And what we learn from it all is that love really does conquer all,” says Gilman.
So what about that kiss between Sam and Suzy?
“There weren’t that many people on set that day and Wes had more or less choreographed each and every single one of our moves. That’s when it hit me that we were actors, for real,” says Hayward.
