Ronny Sianturi
Fresh off receiving the prestigious Golden Eye award at the Zurich Film Festival, veteran American actor and filmmaker John Turturro took center stage on Sunday for an extensive, career-retrospective masterclass. The Emmy-winning star, whose prolific career spans over forty years of defining cinematic and television moments, captivated audiences in a conversation moderated by Deadline’s Melanie Goodfellow. With his newly minted Golden Eye trophy resting between them, Turturro touched upon his immigrant upbringing, his enduring collaborations with legendary directors like Spike Lee and the Coen brothers, and his upcoming awards trajectory for Noah Segan’s critically acclaimed drama, The Only Living Pickpocket in New York.
The appearance at Zurich highlights a particularly vibrant chapter for Turturro. As the 22nd edition of the festival runs from September 24 to October 4, Turturro joins an elite roster of 2026 honorees that includes fellow masterclass headliners Julianne Moore and Tom Hiddleston. Beyond celebrating past achievements, the festival provided a platform for the actor to address his current work, offering rare insights into his creative philosophy, his selective approach to scripts, and his trajectory in both American and European cinema.
Award Season Momentum and The Only Living Pickpocket in New York
Turturro’s latest cinematic vehicle, The Only Living Pickpocket in New York directed by Noah Segan, has been generating significant pre-release buzz following its favorable reception at the Sundance Film Festival. In the film, Turturro delivers a grounded, gripping performance as Harry, a seasoned pickpocket whose meticulously maintained existence is upended during a botched job, initiating a tense 36-hour descent into chaos.
Despite a career marked by critical acclaim and unforgettable performances—yet curiously devoid of an official Oscar nomination—Turturro finds himself once again thrust into the thick of the best actor race. Reflecting on the impending campaign trail, the actor maintained a pragmatic, unpretentious stance.
“I never really have gone the whole hog with it,” Turturro remarked regarding traditional Hollywood awards campaigning. “But now I’m the lead in the film, so I’m going to support the film because I love the film.”
He acknowledged that participating in awards conversations serves a practical purpose within the industry. “It’s helpful to help you do the next thing,” he explained. While he appreciates the external validation, Turturro emphasized that accolades are not his primary motivation. “Is it nice to be acknowledged? Great, but that’s not why you do it. Just because a film is really popular doesn’t mean it will have staying power, but it’s nice to be in the conversation. I don’t look upon myself as being a competitive person. I’m competitive with myself. I want to get the most out of what I can do, but it’s not sports!”
Admitting genuine surprise at the enthusiastic critical response out of Sundance, Turturro expressed a sense of fulfillment regarding the film’s reach. “Finally,” he thought upon seeing the reaction, “I’m in something that people will see.”
He noted that acting is unique among professions because practitioners can continually refine their craft through accumulated life experience. Drawing a distinction between the vitality of youth and the wisdom of maturity, Turturro highlighted how personal milestones shape his artistic output. “You may not be able to run as fast as you did when you were younger, but I have a lot of life experience, and as you get older, you accumulate that, and you can distill things in a way that you couldn’t do when you were young, because you didn’t really experience all those things. And now I’ve experienced life, death, loss, being a parent, being married—what it is to really love someone versus falling in love. That’s a huge difference.”
Television Triumphs: Severance Season 3 and The Night Of
While Turturro’s cinematic footprint is vast, his recent contributions to landmark television have introduced him to new generations of viewers. During the masterclass, the conversation naturally drifted toward his acclaimed work in HBO’s gripping crime miniseries The Night Of and Apple TV+’s dystopian workplace thriller Severance.
To the delight of fans in attendance, Turturro offered a coy confirmation regarding his return as Irving Bailiff in the upcoming third season of Severance, which stars Adam Scott. After a moment of hesitation, he confirmed his participation with a straightforward condition: “Yeah. As long as they give me interesting things to do, then I’m interested.”
Turturro used the moment to praise his longtime friend and co-star Christopher Walken, whose character, Burt Goodman, shared a poignant, understated romance with Turturro’s Irving in the show’s first season. Recalling his casting process, Turturro shared how he actively advocated for Walken to play his love interest.
“‘Who’s going to be my love interest?’” Turturro recalled asking producers. “And they were like, ‘All these younger guys.’ I said, ‘Well no, I’ve worked with Chris Walken,’ and I said, ‘I want Chris, because I love Chris.’ And I don’t have to act that I love him because I love him.”
Despite Walken famously admitting that he initially struggled to grasp the complex, high-concept narrative of Severance, Turturro acted as a steady anchor for his veteran peer. “I said, ‘Don’t worry about it. You just look at me.’ We have so much fun because I directed him like three times, and we’ve acted, and we’ve worked together a lot. And he’s a wonderful theater actor, and people obviously think he plays only strange [characters] but he can do a lot of different things. He’s also very sensitive, but he has a childlike joy in his work, and when that happens, anything is possible.”
Shifting focus to the gritty 2016 HBO drama The Night Of, which earned five Emmy Awards and featured Turturro as the tenacious, eczema-afflicted defense attorney John Stone alongside Riz Ahmed, the actor received warm applause from the Zurich audience.
“The Night Of is something I’m very proud of,” Turturro stated, noting that the series was adapted from a British format. “It was originally a BBC thing, which I actually never watched because I didn’t want to be influenced.”
He revealed that conversations regarding a second season ultimately stalled due to creative disagreements among the production team. “They couldn’t agree on what the story would be. But I loved doing it. It was one of those great experiences in my life.”
A Four-Decade Legacy of Independent and Mainstream Mastery
Turturro’s longevity in the entertainment industry is underpinned by a willingness to collaborate with visionary auteurs. Over a career spanning four decades, his filmography reads as a masterclass in modern cinema, featuring partnerships with Spike Lee, Joel and Ethan Coen, Martin Scorsese, Robert Redford, Robert De Niro, Nanni Moretti, and Pedro Almodóvar.
He first achieved international renown through his early work with Spike Lee, delivering unforgettable supporting performances in culturally seismic projects such as Do the Right Thing (1989) and Jungle Fever (1991). His artistic alliance with the Coen brothers further cemented his status as a premier character actor, yielding critical milestones in Miller’s Crossing (1990), Barton Fink (1991), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), and The Big Lebowski (1998), where he immortalized the eccentric bowling fanatic Jesus Quintana.
For his tour de force leading performance as a struggling playwright in Barton Fink, Turturro took home the Best Actor award at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival—a career-defining accolade he reflected upon during his time in Switzerland. Interestingly, Turturro observed that European cinematic landscapes often afford him more grounded, conventional characters than Hollywood studio systems, noting that he has repeatedly rejected American scripts that rely on gratuitous violence directed toward women.
The Zurich Film Festival Honor
Accepting the Golden Eye award on Saturday night, Turturro reflected on his enduring passion for storytelling by quoting Italian author Cesare Pavese.
“He once said that the only great thing in life is to begin. I still consider myself a beginner in many ways,” Turturro told the gala crowd. “I’m very fortunate. I wanted to make a living doing something that interested me and to do interesting work—to share that with an audience, [and that] wouldn’t diminish their intelligence at the same time. I consider this an encouragement to continue.”
As the Zurich Film Festival continues its 22nd run, featuring high-profile screenings and masterclasses that draw global cinema enthusiasts, John Turturro’s reflections serve as a testament to a career defined by artistic integrity, fearless collaboration, and an unwavering commitment to the craft of acting.
