Q&A: Clooney on 'Midnight Sky' and his twilight as an actor

NEW YORK (AP) — How has George Clooney been handling isolation? Aside from spending time with his wife, Amal Clooney, and their 3-year-old twins, and editing his new film “The Midnight Sky,” he's relied on, like many others, a text chain with pals and Zoom. He just got off one with Matt Damon and John Krasinski.

“In some ways, we keep more in touch now than we did before,” says Clooney, speaking by phone from London.

“The Midnight Sky,” which Clooney directed and stars in, is an apocalyptic sci-fi drama with some striking solitude. A thickly bearded Clooney plays an astronomer with terminal cancer living at the Barbeau Observatory in the Arctic Circle. It’s 2049. When cataclysm covers the globe, he — and a young, unspeaking girl (Caoilinn Springall) — are potentially all that remains, along with the returning crew of a space expedition to a Jupiter moon.

Debuting Wednesday on Netflix, “The Midnight Sky,” based on Lily Brooks-Dalton's novel “Good Morning, Midnight," is Clooney's seventh film as director and his biggest scaled production yet. In an interview with The Associated Press, the 59-year-old actor-filmmaker discussed his new movie, the arc of his career and his latest novelty device of choice. Answers have been edited for length and clarity.

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AP: You finished shooting “The Midnight Sky” in February, right before the pandemic began. How has your year been since?

Clooney: I’m kind of doing what everyone’s doing. Washing dishes and doing laundry and mopping floors. Mostly I just wish I was able to see my mom and dad, and that kind of thing. They’re social creatures and it’s not as much fun when they can’t be out with their old friends.

AP: It's been years since you were the lead in a film. Why?

Clooney: Things change for...