\u201cThat\u2019s bullshit,\u201d<\/a> and I\u2019m really interested in hearing what this film is about to you.
Lynne Ramsay: God, I don\u2019t remember saying that! [Laughs] But yeah. It\u2019s not just one thing. It\u2019s about a marriage breaking down. It\u2019s about when you feel isolated, about creativity drying up. I think it\u2019s just too black and white to go, \u201cIt\u2019s this thing.\u201d I think people like those sound bites, but that can be too reductive. To me, the whole film is an experience that you go with or not. It\u2019s based on a novel that\u2019s a dark fairy tale, kind of surreal, and a character who\u2019s very unapologetic, irreverent. It was quite liberating, in a way, to see a character like that portrayed.<\/p>\nJennifer, did you see it that way when you read the book?
Jennifer Lawrence: When I read the book, it was clearly about postpartum. But I was just so blown away by this character. It\u2019s a once-in-a-lifetime kind of role. It reminded me of Gena Rowlands and A Woman Under the Influence, but if you could go into her mind and heart. And it wasn\u2019t really until Lynne and I started having conversations before getting to set\u00a0 \u2014 and even before she\u2019d written a scene \u2014 that everything got so much broader. Especially when we brought in Rob. Rob and I were in similar places in our lives: We\u2019re new parents and we\u2019ve got partners. Having so much detail to add to that dynamic, I feel like the postpartum aspect really ended up just being an engine for this incredible character in an extreme situation, and for this really special relationship that\u2019s struggling to survive the circumstances.<\/p>\n
You told me backstage you\u2019ve seen the film 11 or more times now. Does it change each time you see it?
J.L.: Really, of all the movies I\u2019ve ever done in my life, this one has been the most transformative. Because when I was making it, everything was very real to me. Obviously, to Grace, none of it is a fever dream. It\u2019s all very factual. I don\u2019t even remember making that choice \u2014 to just believe it and for it to be real. It just was. I was also pregnant, so I think there were certain realities that I just couldn\u2019t look at and I couldn\u2019t see. Like, I was told that the No. 1 cause of death for new mothers is suicide. But I don\u2019t know how else to describe it other than \u2014 I just couldn\u2019t see that.<\/p>\n
Then I watched it when I was nine months pregnant. That was when I was like, Oh, wow. A lot of that wasn\u2019t real. It was a fever dream. Wait, this is metaphorical. Whoa. Lynne was like, \u201cYeah.\u201d And Rob was like, \u201cI thought it was weird that you kept saying, \u2018Maybe they get back together!\u2019\u201d I just took it all very literally. Now, looking back, I\u2019m like, I hope that was a choice and I\u2019m not just stupid.<\/p>\n
Then I had a baby, and I had really bad postpartum with my second one, which I hadn\u2019t had before. So I had to watch it a few times while I was struggling with postpartum. And that was just a really, really otherworldly experience.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve seen the movie a few times now, too, and it changes for me in that it gets funnier each time. Lynne, you\u2019ve talked a bit about your intended tone being a dark comedy, but do you think audiences have been grasping that right away?
L.R.: I think some people think, God, it\u2019s really heavy. But I always love when there\u2019s light and dark. It was important to me that there was humor in it. I think she\u2019s super-funny sometimes. She\u2019s really inappropriate, but she\u2019s honest and she\u2019s quite childlike as well. So I just was like, I know one thing: I want humor in this, and I want a bit of love. Because anything too black and white \u2014 it just didn\u2019t feel right for this character. Because she\u2019s a strong character. She\u2019s been through all this stuff. She\u2019s bold.<\/p>\n
I do feel like she\u2019s really fun, and I\u2019d like to hang out with her.
L.R.: Well, I don\u2019t know if I\u2019d go that far. [Laughs]\u00a0<\/p>\n
She just seems like she\u2019d be a fun hang. And there\u2019s a reading of the film where she is the only one who is not crazy. The things that are happening around her are insane: Her husband won\u2019t sleep with her. Her mother-in-law is sleepwalking with a gun. Everyone is talking to her about postpartum depression and her mental health. She\u2019s refusing to conform in a way that feels cathartic to watch. If you met her at a party, what advice might you give her?
L.R.: Don\u2019t burn the forest down! [Spoiler: At the end of the film, Lawrence\u2019s character lights a forest on fire. More on that scene \u2014 and further spoilers \u2014 below.]<\/p>\n
J.L.: I was just going to say, I would tell her to get on medication. And to cheat. Because I thought she really was cheating in the movie! And then I watched it back, and I think maybe she didn\u2019t? I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
Lynne, what do you think? Do you think she was cheating with her neighbor (LaKeith Stanfield)?
L.R.: Oh, I\u2019ll leave that to you guys. I think she thinks so, yeah. It\u2019s real for her. But it goes off the principles of this novel in a way \u2014 LaKeith\u2019s character, Carl, is a fantasy, because she isn\u2019t having sex with her husband. But he\u2019s too frightened of her, I think, to have sex with her.<\/p>\n
As you said, she\u2019s childlike and straightforward in this way that I found endearing. Jennifer, you\u2019ve been speaking on this press tour a bit about how you\u2019ve been, historically, a straightforward, straight-shooting person. Did you find yourself relating to that aspect of Grace?
J.L.: I didn\u2019t, but that might just be a lack of self-awareness. I think that it helped me more performance-wise to just keep that in mind \u2014 that nothing with her was performative. It was all just very factual.<\/p>\n
Lynne, you described Jennifer as \u201cpunk\u201d in an interview recently, and I want to know what you meant by that.
J.L.: Oh my God, 13-year-old me would die. Yeah, what did you mean?<\/p>\n
L.R.: I meant in a very British way: punk. There was something so liberating about seeing a character be this outlandish and impossible and endearing. I think that it felt like a punk kind of spirit. Very bold.<\/p>\n
J.L.: Well, Grace is very punk. I was a cheerleader. I had pink Vans.<\/p>\n
L.R.: Yeah, Grace is punk. You were a cheerleader.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
\n Jennifer Lawrence and Lynne Ramsay.
\n Photo: Ilya S. Savenok\/Getty Images\n <\/p>\n
You\u2019ve both previously made films about the dark side of motherhood. We Need to Talk About Kevin and Mother!, as two examples.\u00a0
L.R.: That was a romantic comedy. [Laughs]<\/p>\n
Well, yes, of course, it was a rom-com as well. What draws you both to that well?
L.R.: Kevin was really about this war between a mother and son, and a mother feeling like, Do I love this person? So this was totally different in a way, because I think Grace really loves her kid. I think there are many other things going on for Grace. I suppose, in my mind, in the backstory, she had been really creative. And there had been previous episodes there. The things Jackson loves about her \u2014 that she\u2019s wild and she\u2019s sexy and she\u2019s on the edge \u2014 then get to a point where he\u2019s like, What the hell do I do about this? You can\u2019t try to change a spirit like that. If he tries to change her too much, she\u2019ll never be the person who he fell in love with.<\/p>\n
J.L.: Yeah, I think there\u2019s no greater stakes than becoming a mother. And that\u2019s very fruitful for change.<\/p>\n
While you were filming Mother!, you tore your diaphragm. It was a similarly physical performance here. How did you protect yourself this time around from that kind of physical experience?
J.L.: I didn\u2019t really have to go to that same place, because nothing happens to the baby in this movie. With Mother!, having to imagine losing a baby \u2014 and losing a baby in that way \u2014 was horrific. I wasn\u2019t even a parent yet, but it was really, really just devastating and horrible. With Grace, now I have an awareness, as a mother myself, for how important stability and consistency is to these tiny little nervous systems. But I\u2019m not Victoria and Kennedy\u2019s \u2014 who are the babies in the film \u2014 mother. I tried to be really involved with them so that they were comfortable with me, but if they saw me running past them or doing something weird, it wouldn\u2019t change the course of their life. They would just be like, Oh, that lady\u2019s doing something weird. I wasn\u2019t, like, their safety rock. So I think the situation, while it probably feels similar as an audience member, to the person doing it, it felt very different.<\/p>\n
When I spoke to you during a SAG screening last weekend, you mentioned that there was something really freeing and refreshing about working with Lynne and working with female directors in general. You said something about how men really feel like they need to declare, \u201cI\u2019m directing this.\u201d
J.L.: Not all men! [Laughs] But I have found a commonality in female directors, which is that they do not do this thing, which is overdirect. There have been times when I\u2019ve worked with male directors where there\u2019s this need to constantly feel like they\u2019re directing the movie. And it\u2019s not even really getting anything done. It\u2019s just annoying. When I think auteur, my mind kind of goes to controlling and \u2026 what\u2019s that word? Neurotic!<\/p>\n
And Lynne was the opposite. She really built this world and made sure that we were all on the same page, through music and conversations and the atmosphere and the set. And then she would just kind of slowly walk back. And sometimes, from the discomfort of that, from the lack of her visibility, something interesting would come from it. And then she would come out and be like [affects a Scottish accent], \u201cThat\u2019s great, great, yeah, do it again.\u201d Or we would accidentally laugh and be like, \u201cOh, sorry.\u201d And she\u2019d be like, \u201cNo, it was great. I liked that you laughed. Do it again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Really good impression.
J.L.: Thank you.<\/p>\n
L.R.: That\u2019s a terrible Scottish accent.<\/p>\n
J.L.: No, it\u2019s not.<\/p>\n
Lynne, can you speak a bit about your philosophy as a director? How do you balance that sense of freedom and safety?
L.R.: It depends on each film. Some are more super-precise constructions \u2014 you\u2019re doing a certain frame in a certain way. But for this, I knew I wanted the actors to be pretty free. I love working with actors. When you really trust each other, something just happens that\u2019s magical. So sometimes I\u2019d let the take run long. There\u2019s a kind of discomfort in that. It\u2019s like, What the hell did we do now? But then something happens sometimes. I gave them the space in that house to just explore and go in and out of doors. There was one scene where Grace is just bored in the house and there\u2019s that laundry basket, and I didn\u2019t ask her to tip it over with her toe, but there\u2019s a kind of rage in that. And then I didn\u2019t ask her to go to the window and lick the glass, but there\u2019s something hilarious about that, and also trapped and feral as well. So I think it was just giving them the space to let these little moments come through.<\/p>\n
When you\u2019re in that space and the camera is still running and you\u2019re about to go lick the window \u2014 what\u2019s going through your mind?
J.L.: I always get nervous before they call \u201caction.\u201d I get embarrassed. I think the camera guys are like, \u201cHaha, she\u2019s acting!\u201d Which is stupid, but I do. I get a little nervous that I\u2019ll get embarrassed in front of the boom operator and the camera guys. And then they call \u201caction,\u201d and my mind fortunately focuses elsewhere. It\u2019s like she said, the trust that we have \u2014 it all finds its way to the right place. And I think, weirdly, because I was pregnant \u2014 being pregnant feels really animalistic. I felt beastly. There are these new parts of your brain that are waking up, and you\u2019re protective and you\u2019re focused, really dialed in. And so that kind of fed into this trapped-animal, pacing-the-cage-kind of thing. And so then she calls \u201caction\u201d and \u2026<\/p>\n
You really employ your pregnant body in this movie. When you were doing all of these nude scenes pregnant, did that feel like an added layer of protection for you? Or did it feel more exposing? Versus the nude scene in, say, No Hard Feelings, which is obviously comedic.
J.L.: I don\u2019t care about nudity. I just don\u2019t. I\u2019m not sensitive about it. I wanted Lynne to have total freedom artistically. I wanted her to be like, Look at that window, look at the light. Go stand naked in front of it. And I think being pregnant took a lot of vanity anxiety away. Before No Hard Feelings, I was dieting and not eating carbs and working out. Here, I was pregnant. What was I going to do? Like, not eat? Work out? I was working 15 hours a day. I was just tired. So, yeah, it felt really freeing. I remember them sending over a close-up of cellulite and being like, \u201cDo you want us to touch this up?\u201d And I was like, \u201cNo, that\u2019s an ass!\u201d<\/p>\n
L.R.: Which I\u2019d have loved.<\/p>\n
J.L.: Yeah, you would\u2019ve been pissed. You would\u2019ve never even said yes.<\/p>\n
L.R.: No way.<\/p>\n
The scene where Grace is drinking beer and dancing to \u201cHey Mickey!\u201d in front of the baby \u2014 it seems like she\u2019s having a bit of actual fun there. What is your version of that, where you\u2019re just bored with your kids and you\u2019re like, I\u2019m going to entertain us both.
J.L.: My youngest one, this gets him every time [makes a fart noise with her mouth]. It\u2019s the oldest comedic trick in the book. And I can\u2019t do this with the older one, but with the younger one, I listen to a podcast with an ear pod in one ear. I just listen to murder while I\u2019m like [makes a smiley face] and he chews on things.<\/p>\n
What podcasts are you listening to?
J.L.: Dateline, 48 Hours, 20\/20, Anatomy of Murder, Crime Junkie, Red Crime, It Could Have Been Me, I Survived. I could keep going.<\/p>\n
Very light.
J.L.: Very light.<\/p>\n
In this film, you sing several times, and you\u2019ve sung in many of your films, but I was reading old interviews of yours where you were like, \u201cIt\u2019s a nightmare when I have to sing.\u201d\u00a0
J.L.: It is.<\/p>\n
Do you still have that same feeling of horror when you\u2019re asked? What makes you say yes?
J.L.: You can\u2019t always say no. I mean, Emma Stone shaved her head! You can\u2019t always just be like, \u201cNo, I don\u2019t like doing that.\u201d I don\u2019t like to sing. But if I have to, I will.<\/p>\n
L.R.: I\u2019ve got a great version of \u201cThe Beast in Me\u201d sung by Jennifer Lawrence, which is fantastic, and I\u2019m definitely going to put it in an album.<\/p>\n
J.L.: No, you\u2019re a bitch and you\u2019ll never do that! [Laughs]<\/p>\n
I read somewhere that you were writing music for her to sing, Lynne.
L.R.:\u00a0 I write songs because films take a long time. Songs take considerably shorter, and you can write a whole film in a song. So I was thinking, To hell with this shit \u2014 waiting four years for a movie to get made. I wrote about 150 to 200 songs. It\u2019s really liberating. It\u2019s immediate, more like a Polaroid than the construction of film. And sometimes you need that in your life.<\/p>\n
So are you going to sing a song on an album for her, Jennifer?
J.L.: I would if she asked me to. But please don\u2019t. Okay, fine, I\u2019ll do it. I\u2019ll do anything for attention.<\/p>\n
L.R.: I think Jennifer has a great voice. I honestly have a beautiful version of \u201cThe Beast in Me.\u201d We were working with George Vjestica, who is the guitarist for Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds. I was jamming with him, and I was like, You\u2019ve got to be joking, we\u2019re jamming with one of the best guitarists in the world.<\/p>\n
J.L.: He was trying to get me on key, and it was so sad. He was like [sings], \u201cMeet me at C.\u201d I was like [sings poorly], \u201cAhhhhhh!\u201d<\/p>\n
How did you both read the film\u2019s ending? Is she walking into the forest she set on fire? Is she escaping? Is she dying?
L.R.: She sets it on fire. I mean, I could still be cutting this. There was a time where I felt that there were too many endings. There was an idea of her saving him, which I liked. It was quite romantic. But it\u2019s a metaphor. You never see what she writes, and then she sets the whole thing on fire and then the forest goes up. And then you see her back in the kitchen where it began, looking at herself from outside, almost looking at this thing that he\u2019s created \u2014 this world, how he\u2019s done it up and made it nice. She\u2019s almost a stranger looking at her own life. But, yeah, there are many endings. I\u2019m going to do another director\u2019s cut. So get ready for the three-and-a-half-hour version! No, I will definitely not do that. It will get shorter.<\/p>\n
J.L.: I think the ending is a mother\u2019s worst nightmare, which is, They\u2019re better off without me and I\u2019m the worst part of them. Sorry. I wish I had better news.<\/p>\n
\n See All<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jennifer Lawrence in Die My Love. Photo: MUBI\/Everett Collection In Lynne Ramsay\u2019s Die My Love, Jennifer Lawrence unleashes,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":121576,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[43675,430,81660,156,73281,29957,80812,409,111,139,69,36526,20401,12844,6001],"class_list":{"0":"post-121575","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-a-long-talk","9":"tag-celebrities","10":"tag-die-my-love","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-gold-rush","13":"tag-jennifer-lawrence","14":"tag-lynne-ramsay","15":"tag-movies","16":"tag-new-zealand","17":"tag-newzealand","18":"tag-nz","19":"tag-oscars-2026","20":"tag-robert-pattinson","21":"tag-vulture-homepage-lede","22":"tag-vulture-section-lede"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121575\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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