Timeline.
One year ago: Bradley Cooper buys the movie rights to American Sniper by Chris Kyle
February 8, 2013: Bradley Cooper meets with Vice President Biden to discuss mental health issues.
Reported by Entertainment Weekly
Cooper explained about how he heard about the death. “The first draft was coming in this week, and Thursday I was at Walter Reed hospital meeting with veterans who have post-traumatic stress disorder, among many other ailments; and then all of a sudden I hear this thing and I just can’t believe it. This man has two children, and he is an advocate for putting guns back in veterans’ hands, as a way of therapy [emphasis added].”
Coming to a theater near you: Bradley Cooper’s biopic of Chris Kyle
Reported by Entertainment Weekly
When asked about whether now was the appropriate time to make this movie happen, Cooper said it was, and added that in addition to producing, he planned on portraying Kyle. “I’m going to meet with the writers and producers today to talk about, number one what we can do for his family, and number two, how we can speed up the process and really try to make this movie,” he said. “His story first of all really needs to be told, and it’s also relevant on two fronts: gun control [emphasis added] and the need to address the many soldiers who are coming back with PTSD. Medicine has evolved to such a state — soldiers are coming back and they’re going to assimilate into the culture and if we don’t address the mental state along with the physical state it’s going to be a problem.”
Bradley Cooper, I will be watching to see how you portray Chris Kyle, represent his book, the serious issue of PTSD and how you relate it to gun control based on your own words.