Bradley Cooper Earns High Praise From Steven Spielberg After He Watched ‘A Star Is Born’

Bradley Cooper received a few kind words from Hollywood royalty Steven Spielberg after the director watched Cooper’s Oscar-winning film A Star is Born. Spielberg bestowed a heavy responsibility on the star when he asked him to helm his Leonard Bernstein biopic, Maestro, but Cooper says the Amistad director was very absolute when he made his decision. 

The actor dished on how the moment came to be, telling the story during his appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Cooper hosted a showing to show an early draft of his film A Star is Born. He sent an invite to the three-time Academy Award winner with the confidence that seeing his directorial debut would lead him to land Maestro. 

“I’ll never forget this. He came, we were sitting there and I’m showing him A Star Is Born and he’s all the way on the other side on the front row, it’s a pretty huge screen,” Cooper told host Stephen Colbert. “It’s the scene where Jackson calls Ally up on the stage, it’s the biggest scene in the movie. And right as she just is going on the stage he gets up and I’m like, ‘Oh he’s going to the bathroom now?’ and I was like, ‘That’s it, it’s over. If he’s going to the bathroom at this point in the movie… and he gets up, he walks over, and I’m putting my head down and the next thing I know I feel his face here and he says, because it’s loud, ‘You’re f—ing directing Maestro!”

Clearly, his efforts didn’t go in vain. Classical music fans will be in good hands with the upcoming film as Cooper shares he’s also had a long and close relationship with the music genre. He even says at one point, he had a desire to be a conductor. He told Colbert that he spent “hundreds of hours” practicing conducting when he was younger. Cooper co-wrote the screenplay alongside Josh Singer. Leonard Bernstein will star in the film along with Jeremy Strong and Carrie Mulligan. Maestro is expected to premiere on Netflix in 2022.