Panic!: FX’s The Old Man

  • Saturday, November 23, 2024 / 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM (PST)
  • Pollock Theater
  • Screening Format: 4K digital projection (48 minutes)
  • With Jeff Bridges and Amy Brenneman (actors)
  • Moderated by director/writer/producer Brad Silberling

In a media landscape more and more panicked to capture youthful audiences with impatient content, what does the radical act of authentically capturing aging on screen and in storytelling look like? FX’s hit series The Old Man, which recently concluded its second season, holds some answers. The series follows Dan Chase (Jeff Bridges), a retired CIA operative and veteran of the Soviet-Afghan War. Chase’s attempts to live his twilight years in peace and off the grid are thwarted when would-be assassins show up on his doorstep, sparking a cat-and-mouse game that sees Chase evading the grasp of both CIA assistant director Harold Harper (John Lithgow) and Afghan warlord Faraz Hamzad (Navid Negahban). Along the way, Chase attempts to keep his past from tarnishing his newfound relationship with Zoe McDonald (Amy Brenneman), who seems fated to become embroiled in a saga stretching back decades.

The Carsey-Wolf Center was delighted to welcome Jeff Bridges and Amy Brenneman, the award-winning stars of The Old Man, for a pre-screening conversation with director/writer/producer Brad Silberling. Bridges and Brenneman shared their creative perspectives on the series’ treatment of aging and discussed other aspects of their unique collaboration. A screening of The Old Man season 2, episode 6 followed their conversation.

All seasons of FX’s The Old Man are now available to stream on Hulu. Photo courtesy of FX Networks.

Biographies

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Actor Jeff Bridges

Jeff Bridges is one of Hollywood’s most iconic actors, as well as a singer, producer, photographer, and philanthropist. In a career spanning decades, Bridges has been nominated seven times for an Academy Award, finally winning the Oscar for Best Actor in 2009 for his performance in Crazy Heart. He earned his first Academy Award nomination in 1972 for Peter Bogdonovich’s film The Last Picture Show, and he received his second nomination three years later for his role in Michael Cimino’s Thunderbolt and Lightfoot. He would go on to receive Oscar nominations for Star Man (1984), The Contender (2001), True Grit (2010), and Hell or High Water (2017).

Bridges was last seen in 2018’s mystery thriller Bad Times at the El Royale as Father Daniel Flynn. That same month, he appeared in the documentary Living in the Future’s Past, directed by Susan Kucera and co-produced by Bridges. In 2022, Bridges starred in and executive produced FX’s series The Old Man. For his role, he received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series.

In 1983, Bridges founded the End Hunger Network, a nonprofit organization dedicated to feeding children around the world. He is currently the national spokesman for the Share Our Strength/No Kid Hungry campaign that is fighting to end childhood hunger in America.

Bridges is also an avid photographer and musician. His photographs have been featured in several magazines, including Premiere and Aperture. In 2003, powerHouse Books released Pictures by Jeff Bridges, a hardcover book containing photographs taken on the sets of numerous films. In 2019, Bridges released Pictures Volume Two. In August 2011, he released his self-titled major label debut album for Blue Note Records. Grammy Award-winning songwriter, musician, and producer T Bone Burnett produced the album. In 2014, he released his first live album, Jeff Bridges & The Abiders Live.

Bridges and his wife Susan divide their time between their home in Santa Barbara and their ranch in Montana.

Photo: John Russo

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Actor Amy Brenneman

Amy Brenneman divides her time evenly between acting, producing and political activism. She earned a degree in Comparative Religion at Harvard, with a specialty in Indo-Tibetan Religion, studying sacred dance and indigenous ritual in Kathmandu. She was a founding member of the Cornerstone Theater Company, which specializes in site-specific community-based theater on themes of social justice. Her theater credits include starring in the world premiere of Rules of Seconds and the West Coast premiere of Power of Sail. Her original work for the theater includes Mouth Wide Open and Overcome.

She created, executive produced, and starred in the TV series Judging Amy, which earned two TV Guide Awards, three Golden Globe nominations, a Producer’s Guild Nomination, three Emmy Award nominations, and a People’s Choice SAG nomination. The series was based on the work of her mother, the Honorable Judge Frederica Brenneman. Other television credits include NYPD Blue, Frasier, Heartbeat, Goliath, VEEP, Private Practice, The Leftovers, Tell Me Your Secrets, and Shining Girls.

Amy’s film credits include Casper, Fear, Daylight, Heat, Friends and Neighbors, The Jane Austen Book Club, Peel, The Book of Love, and Words and Pictures. Amy has a long collaboration with Rodrigo Garcia, with whom she worked on Nine Lives, Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her, and Mother and Child.

For her activist work, Amy has been honored by Women in Film, The Brady Center, the League of Women Voters, the California State Assembly, the National Children’s Alliance, the Chime Institute, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, the Help Group, and the Producer’s Guild of America, among others. She currently serves on the Creative Council for the Center for Reproductive Rights and received the Eleanor Roosevelt Award from The Feminist Majority for her ongoing commitment to reproductive rights.

Amy is married to writer/director Brad Silberling and has two children: Charlotte and Bodhi.

Headshot of director Brad Silberling. It depicts a man with shoulder length hair in glasses, a black button up shirt, and a black blazer. He is smiling and appears to be posed in front of a crowd of people.

Director/Writer/Producer Brad Silberling

Director/writer/producer Brad Silberling’s work has traversed feature films and television throughout his career. His most recent film is the suspense drama An Ordinary Man starring Ben Kingsley. His prior features include City of Angels, starring Meg Ryan and Nicholas Cage; Moonlight Mile, starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Dustin Hoffman, and Susan Sarandon; Lemony Snickett’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, starring Jim Carrey and Meryl Streep; 10 Items or Less, starring Morgan Freeman; Land of the Lost, starring Will Ferrell; as well as his debut film, the family classic Casper, produced by Steven Spielberg. In television, his growing stable of hit series include the critically acclaimed comedy Jane the Virgin; Emmy-winning Netflix romance Dash and Lily; the period drama Reign; contemporary reboots Dynasty and Charmed; and the Disney Plus series Diary of a Future President. He is a graduate of the UCLA School of Theater, Film, and Television where he earned his master’s degree in production, following his bachelor’s degree in English from UC Santa Barbara.

This event is sponsored by the Carsey-Wolf Center.

CWC Presents: Panic!

The Carsey-Wolf Center’s 2024-25 feature series Panic! explores the complex relationship between media, an anxious public, and the turbulent currents of social, cultural, and moral panic. The series will examine how such panics have appeared on screen over the decades, but also consider how the screen itself—as technology, as gathering space, and as a site of fantasy and desire—becomes the object of reactionary backlash. Panic! will be a yearlong showcase of the films, discourses, and cultural practices that have tested the limits of public acceptability, and that have much to teach us about the cycles of panic that define our own political moment.

CWC TV

In recognition of the extraordinary accomplishments of the Center’s namesakes, Dick Wolf and Marcy Carsey, the Carsey-Wolf Center is committed to examining television as an institution, industry, and cultural form. In our post-network, multi-channel, multi-media environment, understanding television demands understanding its past as well as its future, through exploration of individual episodes, mini-series, and documentaries.