Interviews with Steven Soderbergh

This chapter presents the two interviews with Steven Soderbergh that offer insights into several of the most prominent aspects of his career as a filmmaker. The first interview, Geoff Andrew talking with Soderbergh and George Clooney before a live audience in London in 2003, touches on remakes, allusion, and their collaboration with the aim, in the actor's words, “to push the things we've learned from foreign and independent films ... back into the studio system.” The second interview, conducted by David Sterritt, focuses on Che, probably Soderbergh's most ambitious film to date. After acknowledging Soderbergh's tendency to experiment and defy expectations, Sterritt in his introduction calls Che “a daring project even for him.” What follows in the interview is the director's defense of the politics of class, embedded in all his films, that came to the forefront in Che.