Four-time Oscar nominee Noah Baumbach sat down during a roundtable interview to discuss Jay Kelly and crafting a montage sequence in the film featuring actor George Clooney. The roundtable followed an earlier press conference with Baumbach, George Clooney, Adam Sandler, Laura Dern, and Emily Mortimer. The conversation came days before Jay Kelly started its limited theatrical release, ahead of its Netflix release in a few weeks.

Jay Kelly, the new film from Noah Baumbach, is a dramedy that follows movie star Jay Kelly (George Clooney) on a journey of self-discovery as he confronts both his past and present, accompanied by his devoted manager Ron Sukenick (Adam Sandler). The film blends humor and heart, delivering a story that is at once intimate and epic, exploring the fine line between triumphs and regrets.

Directed by Noah Baumbach and co-written by Baumbach and Emily Mortimer, Jay Kelly stars George Clooney, Adam Sandler, Laura Dern, Billy Crudup, Riley Keough, Grace Edwards, Stacy Keach, Jim Broadbent, Patrick Wilson, Eve Hewson, Greta Gerwig, Alba Rohrwacher, Josh Hamilton, Lenny Henry, Emily Mortimer, Nicôle Lecky, Thaddea Graham, Isla Fisher, Louis Partridge, and Charlie Rowe.

Netflix and Noah Baumbach have become a match made in heaven. Jay Kelly follows The Meyerowitz Stories, Marriage Story, and White Noise.

The following features spoilers for Jay Kelly.

I love that my hometown of Louisville was mentioned in the film, even if it’s just one of the five pronunciations. But can you talk about putting that montage together at the end and were there any clips that you all wanted to include, but couldn’t get the rights to or couldn’t find time for in the right spot?

Noah Baumbach: No, I mean we cut the montage based on—I guess—several factors that I sort of considered. One was I wanted to show him young to older—don’t tell George—and so that was part of it. Part of it was I only wanted to use scenes that he was in, not to bring in other—because again, Jay is real as well as George’s real—so to keep it sort of him isolated, so you’re not thinking about other actors. Also, George’s joke is that he was never that successful in any one genre, so he actually got to do lots of different genres.

But in truth, he’s so versatile, he did every kind of movie, so you have comedy, drama, romance, action, science fiction. It’s all the black and white, colors—it was sort of thinking that way, too, because in some ways, it became even a celebration of what movies can be. All the different pleasures we can get from movies. Those were the main things, and then it was kind of like a rhythm in the editorial as well.

Netflix will release Jay Kelly in theaters on November 14, 2025 and streaming on December 5.

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