Duncan Roberts: You have said that Rusty Boys was made to provide older actors with good roles. How did they react to this opportunity?

Andy Bausch: That’s not the main reason I chose to make a senior citizen comedy. But the thought of being able to give maybe a last major role to some of the oldies, to put them together in a film with younger actors, was something I liked a lot. Fernand Fox and Pol Greisch, the two oldest “rusty boys”, were on board immediately. They never questioned anything--there was deep trust and, in the evening of the last day of shooting, both of them told me how they loved it and how they felt younger during the two-month shoot.

DR: What inspired you to work with Frank Feitler on the script? How did that collaboration work?

AB: I was asked by the Film Fund to write a second version of the script by working together with another scriptwriter. The only Luxembourg writer I respect and like to work with is Frank Feitler. You mustn’t forget that in the 90s we wrote several scripts together, “Three Steps to Heaven”, a German TV film for ZDF… and we even worked on some films that were never made, even a Western. It was easy and the team work was admirable. It just felt like the last time we worked together. Frank is considered an intellectual writer, sure, but he is as much cowboy as me. And we like the same drinks.

DR: How do you feel you have developed as a director since “Troublemaker” all those years ago?

AB: Technically a lot, I guess. After 11 feature films, 13 feature documentaries and a dozen films for German TV, you simply feel confident. I always was an actor’s director and people like to work with me, so, sure over the years I developed in my storytelling and my screenplays, but I hope that I have managed to maintain a style… a Bausch style. Sometimes you just tell stories and direct with gut instinct. I just think if my crew and I have fun on the set, later on the audience will have fun too.

This article was first published in the February 2017 issue of Delano magazine. Be the first to read Delano articles on paper before they’re posted online, plus read exclusive features and interviews that only appear in the print edition, by subscribing online.