Leslie Bibb admitted to Jenna Bush Hager that she looks at her father, George W. Bush, differently thanks to her longtime partner, Sam Rockwell.
“I said it was really weird for me ‘cause when Sam was playing your dad, I never thought George Bush was, like, sexy,” Bibb, 50, shared on the Thursday, March 27, episode of Today With Jenna & Friends, referring to Rockwell’s portrayal of the former President in the 2018 film Vice. “But then, suddenly, I was like, ‘What’s happening?’ He’s in a western shirt and he’s got this cute way of talking and he was eating chicken wings.”
The film — which follows the political career of Bush’s Vice President, Dick Cheney — features a scene of Rockwell’s Bush asking Cheney (Christian Bale) to be his presidential running mate while snacking on chicken wings. (Bush Hager, 43, and her twin sister, Barbara, are the only children of the 43rd president and his wife, Laura.)
“He was doing this thing and he looked like a cowboy,” Bibb said of her partner’s performance. “I love a good cowboy. And I was like, ‘Wow, yeah. George Bush is a [cowboy].’”
Bush Hager, 43, was amused by Bibb’s comments, jokingly telling her that she should have asked Rockwell, 56, to “bring that costume home.”
Rockwell’s portrayal of Bush scored him multiple accolades, including his second Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. The film earned a total of eight Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, and took home one for Best Makeup and Hairstyling.
Bibb and Rockwell have been together since 2007 but have never married. The pair previously shared the screen together in 2010’s Iron Man 2. Bibb currently stars on season 3 of HBO’s The White Lotus, and Rockwell made a memorable cameo during the show’s March 16 episode. His character, Frank, made shocking revelations about his sexual experimentation and addiction during a conversation with his friend, Rick (Walton Goggins).
On Today, Bibb revealed that Rockwell wasn’t initially approached for the small role, as he was set to film a movie in South Africa while she was in Thailand for the show.
“But I was like, ‘There’s this monologue that this guy Frank says and I think it is what the whole show, the whole season, is about. It’s so incredible. I think it’s one of the best things I’ve ever read and will probably go down as one of the best things on television,” she stated. “And I was like, ‘I hope they get a good actor.’”
Bibb was then approached by the show’s creator, Mike White, and executive producer David Bernad about Rockwell playing the part. “I was, like, on a treadmill walking. I was like, ‘If he doesn’t do it, you can’t get mad at me,’ ‘cause I was like, ‘He’s gonna do what he’s gonna do,’” she said. “But I thought Sammy just slayed it.”
Getting to film in the same location as her partner was something for which Bibb said she “didn’t realize how grateful I was gonna be,” adding, “There was context now, because when he came to Bangkok, he understood if I talked about the heat or if I talked about something that was going on on set. He had direct context.”
