Brendan Fraser’s career resurgence isn’t limited to Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale,” for which Fraser is widely expected to land an Oscar nomination for best actor. While the actor is destined to attend the 2023 Oscars as a nominee, he’ll also spend next year as a cast member in his first Martin Scorsese film. Fraser is playing a defense lawyer in “Killers of the Flower Moon,” Scorsese’s 1920s Western crime drama about the FBI’s investigation into a string of murders among the Osage nation.
Fraser has a supporting role in “Killers of the Flower Moon,” which is being led by the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Jesse Plemons and Lily Gladstone. During a recent interview with GQ, Fraser recalled a meaningful reunion with DiCaprio that took place on the “Flower Moon” set. The two had not seen in each other in nearly 30 years, when they briefly met on the Paramount Pictures lot after Fraser caught a screening of DiCaprio’s breakout film “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape,” which earned DiCaprio his first Oscar nomination.
“[Back then], when he was I think probably all of, I don’t know, 17, 16 years old maybe, he did ‘Gilbert Grape.’ I saw it on the Paramount lot. I think I had just been in ‘School Ties’ or something then, and I was, like, flummoxed but I just wanted to tell him, ‘Hear, hear. That was incredible.’”
It was the briefest of encounters, but Fraser’s words of encouragement to the young DiCaprio clearly stayed with the latter for all of these years. When the two came to face to face on Scorsese’s “Flower Moon” set, he brought up that first encounter to Fraser.
“He repeated that to me. He remembered me,” Fraser said. “He said: ‘You were the only guy who didn’t treat me like a little kid.’ He volunteered that to me. That was meaningful.”
Apple is behind the release of “Killers of the Flower Moon” but has yet to announce a release date. Fraser next hits the big screen in A24’s “The Whale,” opening Dec. 9 in theaters.