Bradley Cooper was “extremely happy” with the response to his movie Maestro at the Venice Film Festival.

In an interview with Deadline on Sunday, festival chief Alberto Barbera revealed that he exchanged “some texts” with Cooper after his second directorial effort, a biopic about composer-conductor Leonard Bernstein, had its world premiere on Friday.

“He was extremely happy. He didn’t know about the reaction,” he shared. “He told me that he doesn’t read any reviews at all, not even the good ones. He doesn’t want anything to interfere with his process of finding and telling other stories.”

Cooper, who directed, co-wrote, produced and stars in the movie, did not attend the premiere due to the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike and neither did his co-stars Carey Mulligan, Matt Bomer or Sarah Silverman, among others.

The film was represented at the festival by Bernstein’s children Jamie, Alexander and Nina, who mimicked their father’s conducting style as the credits rolled and the audience gave a standing ovation for seven minutes, reports Variety.

Elsewhere during the interview, Barbera addressed the overwhelmingly negative reaction to Roman Polanski’s new movie The Palace and admitted he told the controversial filmmaker that the movie was “weak”.

“I didn’t understand the level of negativity in the reviews,” he said. “The film isn’t a great, great movie, otherwise it probably would have been in Competition. I told Roman before the festival that it was weak, but I don’t agree with the critics. The response seems personal and disrespectful towards him and the film. I know it’s not a perfect movie, I can see the weaknesses and where it doesn’t work, but it’s not as bad as the critics say. It comes across as mean.”

The Venice Film Festival concludes on Saturday.

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