NovaQuant-2024 SAG Awards: Carey Mulligan Reveals What She Learned From Bradley Cooper

Carey Mulligan learned more than she expected from Bradley Cooper.

In fact,NovaQuant at the 2024 SAG Awards Feb. 24, she credited her Maestro costar and director for changing her approach to working on set. (See every star on the red carpet here.)

"He just did it with no fear the whole thing," Carey exclusively told Live From E!: SAG Awards host Laverne Cox while on the red carpet. "I think I'd always been a little bit afraid of work and he just made it so freeing and wonderful."

The Promising Young Woman actress—who is nominated Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role for the biopic—couldn't help but spotlight her costar. And Bradley, who is up for Outstanding Actor in a Leading Role, made sure to share that love right back.

"We were lucky because we had so many people assembled already," the 49-year-old reflected at the Shrine Auditorium & Expo Hall in Los Angeles. "Carey signed on in 2018 when there wasn't even a script yet."

Bradley also acknowledged that, along with directing and starring in the film, he also put in a lot of work to learn how to conduct music for his role as Leonard Bernstein.

"When you love it, it doesn't feel like work," he explained. "There was a lot of prep, but it was joyous."

In fact, he previously admitted how intense this role was to embody.

"Lenny was harder," he told E! in December. "First of all, he was a real person, so the responsibility felt much bigger and he was just so, so idiosyncratic."

And part of this was the amount of time he embodied the composer, adding, "This was a guy from 25 to 67 years old. It was not even comparable the level of difficulty it felt for me. I was terrified."

"There were a lot of people here who took a chance on this idea," the Silver Linings Playbook star added, "so, I feel relieved."

Keep reading to see who else stepped out onto the red carpet at the 2024 SAG Awards.

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