In the days, weeks and months after the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, a 27-year-old man who lost his legs in the attack became the public face of the city’s resilience — the face of “Boston Strong.”
Jeff Bauman wrote about his experiences in the 2014 book “Stronger,” and this week a film based on the book, starring Jake Gyllenhaal as Bauman, is opening. Here & Now‘s Robin Young speaks with Gyllenhaal and Bauman (@Jeffmbauman) about the film.
Interview Highlights
Gyllenhaal, on how he wanted to approach portraying Bauman
Jake Gyllenhaal: “I mean, obviously I think it’s important when you initially from afar see the photograph, you’re struck by the event, and it was moving and angering and all of those things. But I think what a movie can do is get into the specifics of who a human being really is, and what I was interested in was being able to portray the pain that Jeff went through as best as we could, which inevitably led to I think the joy and the love between particularly Jeff and [Jeff’s then-girlfriend Erin Hurley] and his family. So it was just, it was important to get the specifics, and really understand who Jeff is as a person even before the event. We say, and I’ve said a few times across from him in interviews, there’s this idea I had: If all of his family and if Erin loved him for his legs, he’d be in big trouble (laughs). So I think that idea was essential in this movie, and I think getting the experience right, as well as the joy and hope.”
Bauman, on struggling to find his way after the bombing
Jeff Bauman: “I mean, I sort of always kinda struggled with that my whole life, like with school and just kinda being frustrated with what I wanted to do in my life. And especially when I lost my legs I was like, ‘Man, now what?’ I was lost, I was really lost, ‘What am I gonna do?’ I was aimless, and had no idea what was ahead of me. You saw me a couple times throughout that journey. I was doing OK, but I was still, inside I was lost, just like I think anybody … I mean, anybody that goes through something traumatic is kinda like, ‘Whoa,’ like their life is flipped upside down. And then you have all these things to worry about and deal with, like the future.”
“Admittedly for me just playing someone like Jeff, there’s just a side of it that you just can’t help but feel fraudulent. You know you don’t carry with you that same history and that same strength.”
Jake Gyllenhaal
Gyllenhaal, on Bauman’s experience of becoming a symbol and whether he’s faced similar situations as an actor
JG: “Well, I mean, it’s an absurd comparison just given the circumstance that Jeff went through and, you know, being an actor. But I think there is a certain type of attention, and I think a certain … you’re in a way forced to perform, sometimes perform yourself and the idea people have of you. And I think that’s always an interesting dilemma of identity, particularly for someone like Jeff and the character I play of Jeff in the movie where, not only you’re trying to recalibrate your life and trying to figure out how to exist in the physical world without two legs — which changes your identity and all of the specifics of that, recalibrating your nervous system to try and figure out how to walk in these [Genium prosthetic legs] and all of those things. And then, all of a sudden people are giving you a whole new identity, which is, there’s a line in the movie and I think Jeff said it often, ‘I was just standing there,’ and now all of a sudden I’m, someone’s deeming me a hero.
“And I think actually there are two reasons I realize this, why people feel that way: One is because [Jeff] did play a large role in identifying the bomber, and that’s part of it. But I think essentially the idea of being a symbol for people is something that I can see Jeff having grown into.”
Bauman, on his relationship with Carlos Arredondo
JB: “He’s like the least selfish pers
