If you thought Peter Sarsgaard and Maggie Gyllenhaal met on the set of an indie movie — or maybe at a convention for people with a double A in their last name — you’d be wrong.
“I met Maggie at a dinner party, and I didn’t even know she was an actress,” Sarsgaard, 52, admits to PEOPLE of the fateful evening in 2001. “I didn’t know anything about her, but it was immediate,” he adds of her appeal.
He says, “Then Secretary it came out maybe six months later, and I was like, ‘Oh, wow. Alright. She is not like any other actress in the world.’ ”
Sarsgaard — who recently won Best Actor at the Venice International Film Festival for Memoryin which he plays a man with early onset dementia — says that after a few years of dating Maggie, he was offered a role in the film Jarhead with her future brother-in-law Jake Gyllenhaal, 42.
Jake Gyllenhaal congratulates his brother-in-law Peter Sarsgaard on the award for the best actor in Venice: ‘I love you’
“I think the reason I did it was because I wanted to get to know him better,” Sarsgaard says of Jake.
After he married Maggie (46) in 2009 (they share daughters Ramona (17) and Gloria (12), his former colleague became his brother in real life. “And then we got to know each other a little too well!” he says with a laugh.
During their two-decade relationship, the married duo also worked together several times, including on Broadway, where Maggie directed Sarsgaard Seagulland the 2020s The lost daughter. (For that, she won an award at the Venice Film Festival, for best director.)
“I love working with her,” says Sarsgaard. “She’s a great director, and I think that comes from being a great host in general and knowing what people need. Some people need to be told where to go, other people need to be left alone, and she’s incredibly sensitive to that.”
He says he also loved working with Jessica Chastain, his co-star Memory. “We didn’t hang out afterwards, we barely talked when we finished filming,” he says when asked if they became best friends.
Peter Sarsgaard and Jessica Chastain in memory.
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“We were just too busy, and we’re both people with multiple kids and husband and wife,” he says, noting that he just wanted to get back to his Brooklyn home after they were done for the day.
He adds that the project was shot in five weeks, partly because Chastain was such an excellent actress: “We barely rehearsed, we would just shoot scenes,” he says. “She has tremendous film experience and was an ideal partner. With many other people it wouldn’t have worked, I think.”
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Sarsgaard says he is proud of their film, and even more proud that he and Maggie won awards for their work in Venice. “What’s amazing is that they were brought out of semi-darkness,” he says Memory and The lost daughter.
“For me, awards are for highlighting things that would otherwise be hidden, and are more important for smaller films. Also, who doesn’t like to win something?” he says with a laugh. “It’s as if that day is your birthday! The only thing is that you have to learn to accept something, which is not a thing for most people. It’s not mine!”
For more on Peter Sarsgaard, pick up this week’s issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday.
Memory it’s in theaters on December 22.
Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education