Josh O’Connor Says ‘There’s a Kindness’ to Working With ‘Mastermind’ Director Kelly Reichardt and Responds to Paul Mescal Calling Him ‘Silly’: ‘I Am’

Josh O’Connor heaped praise on his “The Mastermind” director Kelly Reichardt during the film’s Cannes press conference on Saturday, saying “there’s a kindness” to working with her “which you don’t often get.”

“I don’t know that I was necessarily aware of it at the time but there is something in working with Kelly,” O’Connor said. “There’s a kindness to working with Kelly which you don’t often get. I find that really informs a performance.”

O’Connor, who is in a second Cannes competition film with “The History of Sound” alongside Paul Mescal, was also asked to respond to his co-star calling him “silly” at that film’s presser earlier in the week. O’Connor missed “The History of Sound” premiere and press conference due to the filming of Steven Spielberg’s next movie.

“It sounds kind of coy but Josh is just incredibly silly to me,” Mescal said on Thursday. “We got fixated on this diet during the shooting process but we also became fixated on having eight jolly ranchers a day … There’s a microcosm to our relationship that I think of Josh and I think of jolly ranchers.”

O’Connor responded: “Regarding Paul, I am silly. And we did — every Friday we used to eat candy, that was our treat.”

“The Mastermind,” which stars O’Connor as an art thief on the run and Alana Haim as his wife, earned a 5.5-minute standing ovation at its premiere on Thursday night. After the clapping subsided, director Reichardt told the crowd, “America’s in a ditch right now, but maybe we’ll get out of it. But in the meantime we have the movies.”

According to its official synopsis, “The Mastermind” takes place “in a sedate corner of Massachusetts circa 1970” as “an unemployed carpenter turned amateur art thief plans his first big heist. When things go haywire, his life unravels.” Alongside O’Connor and Haim, the film also stars John Magaro, Hope Davis, Bill Camp, Gaby Hoffmann, Eli Gelb, Cole Doman, Javion Allen, Matthew Maher, Rhenzy Feliz and Ryan Homchick. In addition to directing, Reichardt also penned the script.