Put the Emmys and Golden Globes on alert, because Michael Douglas is coming. Earlier this week, Steven Soderbergh‘s “Behind The Candelabra” screened at the Cannes Film Festival and the conversation soon moved on from discussion of it being the director’s final feature (for now) to Douglas’ standout performance. It’s the best thing he’s done in probably a decade, if not longer, a completely transformative turn that’s really unlike anything he’s tackled before, in a movie that we described in our review as “decadently entertaining.” Well now you can get a little taste.
A new clip has arrived for the film and it gives away a small segment of the great introduction to Liberace, during the opening section of the movie. Liberace’s future lover Scott Thorson (Matt Damon) is brought by his friend Bob Black (Scott Bakula) to see the musician and star in action in his Las Vegas show. Douglas dazzles both literally and figuratively for the entire thing. We get to see a good portion of the stage show, with Douglas wonderfully inhabiting the showmanship Liberace had, and it gets amped up when the pianist takes it double time.
It’s a pretty nice little moment which you can watch below, along with an extended version of the behind-the-scenes featurette which dropped earlier this month, and after that a few brand new pics — “Behind The Candelabra” airs on Sunday at 9 PM on HBO.