Germany<\/a>, but is one maybe people can still think about. The socialist idea.\u201d<\/p>\nH\u00fcller wipes her eyes. Finally, she laughs. \u201cYou\u2019re going to say I cried, aren\u2019t you? I can see the headline.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Fatherland H\u00fcller plays Erika Mann, who drives her father through newly divided postwar Germany. Photograph: Grzybowska Agata\/Agata Grzybowska<\/p>\n
And yet she has always been open about the nuance to the East Germany she remembers from childhood \u2013 a place defined by more than the Stasi men of cold war thrillers. \u201cWhat fascinates me is that in East and West were two systems that for a certain time could have learned from each other.\u201d She apologises again; I\u2019m not sure why. \u201cIt is this situation we live in now. I feel like I\u2019m on thin ice.\u201d<\/p>\n
Inevitably, we come to the far-right Alternative f\u00fcr Deutschland (AfD). The subject is doubly unavoidable in light of Fatherland. The Manns originally fled the country in 1933 and they would end up in the US. \u201cIt\u2019s no secret there are similarities now,\u201d H\u00fcller says. \u201cFascism doesn\u2019t arrive overnight. It gets here slowly, in little doses.\u201d Her tone turns businesslike. \u201cThe question is what we do about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
We all contain multitudes, but H\u00fcller more than most. At home in Leipzig, she is a co-founder of the experimental Farn Kollektiv theatre group; a politically engaged woman of 48, she is the single mother to a teenage daughter. She is also deadpan funny. An account of her excellent safety record as a driver is a comic treasure. \u201cThat should be your headline. \u2018Sandra H\u00fcller \u2013 a clean licence.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
She is also a movie actor with snowballing momentum. In 2024, she astonished twice over as the wife of the commandant of Auschwitz in The Zone of Interest and a woman suspected of murdering her husband in Anatomy of a Fall. The latter saw her Oscar-nominated. Now, after Project Hail Mary, Digger and Fatherland, there will also be Rose, a stark 17th century fable in which she plays a war veteran \u2013 who is, in fact, a woman passing as a man. Oscar talk is simmering once more. America is freshly excited.<\/p>\n
\u201cOK, so what is happening is that I made very different movies at different times, but they\u2019re all coming out together. It\u2019s nothing I control.\u201d What is good, she says, is that, with her as the common thread, Hollywood marketing budgets end up spotlighting the likes of Fatherland too. \u201cOn the other hand, I struggle with seeing myself as someone special. I still consider myself part of a group. That is actually the highest praise I can give myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
Curiously, a collective spirit might also apply to the fifth film H\u00fcller is strongly rumoured to be in this year: Marvel relaunch Avengers: Doomsday. Whatever else Marvel movies represent, they have a reputation for an oddly egalitarian vibe on set. I wonder aloud if that\u2019s true. \u201cMe too!\u201d She gives an impish tilt of the head. Ah. For the record, then, H\u00fcller still may or may not be part of the new Avengers.<\/p>\n
But in theory, a Marvel film might feel unexpectedly non-hierarchical? \u201cI heard that as well! Which would show having a lot of money available doesn\u2019t have to mean abusing your power. And that would be a great thing. In theory.\u201d<\/p>\n
If the thought of H\u00fcller doing Marvel takes getting used to, it makes more sense after Project Hail Mary. In a deft piece of Hollywood feelgood, she proved the perfect foil for Ryan Gosling\u2019s reluctant spaceman as stone-faced mission controller Eva Stratt. The air of ultra-competence was very Sandra H\u00fcller for Beginners. The film even harked back to her 2016 breakthrough in skewed German comedy Toni Erdmann. H\u00fcller has a glorious singing voice. Then, she karaoked Whitney Houston\u2019s Greatest Love of All. Now, it was Harry Styles\u2019 Sign of the Times.<\/p>\n
\u2018I love watching people invent\u2019 \u2026 H\u00fcller. Photograph: Victoria Stevens<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I think Eva Stratt made some people uncomfortable. It can feel unusual to be governed by a woman.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, making Project Hail Mary was another pleasant surprise \u2013 her first Hollywood set where the directors \u2013 Phil Lord and Christopher Miller \u2013 actually lightened the mood. \u201cThey made sure we could actually play. Have fun.\u201d She did, though, find it strange being wrangled by runners on the kind of blockbuster where producers want to know where a star is at all times. (Unlike almost every actor on her level, H\u00fcller doesn\u2019t even have an assistant.) \u201cBut you can always hide in the bathroom.\u201d<\/p>\n
Would she spend more time in the US than necessary? \u201cNot right now. No. It\u2019s a workplace.\u201d Anyway, she says, she likes where she lives. \u201cIt\u2019s simple. America is just very far away.\u201d And she smiles.<\/p>\n
She believes audiences embraced Project Hail Mary because the film-makers sought to unite them, inside a cinema at least. \u201cAnd entertain them without the usual things \u2013 death and weapons. So you have a story about a human with a task that lets them be bigger than themselves. That inspired people.\u201d<\/p>\n
But what about their response to Digger? Directed by Alejandro Gonz\u00e1lez I\u00f1\u00e1rritu, with Tom Cruise as a cartoonish oil tycoon, the movie got poor reviews, then did cataclysmically at the box office. Can we talk about it? \u201cSure!\u201d she says brightly. \u201cI mean, we expected a strong reaction. It\u2019s a polarising movie. And a political movie, which we weren\u2019t able to say in interviews. For whatever reason.\u201d A beat. \u201cBut personally \u2013 I was surprised by the harshness of the rejection. People really hated it!\u201d<\/p>\n
H\u00fcller, though, says she loves it. \u201cYears from now, it will be seen as a document of our times.\u201d But time won\u2019t be able to fix a problem like the thinness of her role as the sister of Cruise\u2019s character. There should have been more of her, I say. \u201cWell, there was.\u201d Naturally, she smiles. Ah. (Again.) More rumours put forward that her role was heavily cut by I\u00f1\u00e1rritu. \u201cYou\u2019d have to talk to Alejandro.\u201d Are they still friendly? \u201cOf course!\u201d<\/p>\n
At the movie\u2019s royal gala premiere in London, the audience spent hours watching on screen the introductions of Prince William and Catherine, Princess of Wales, to the cast and many others. I tell H\u00fcller a cameraman briefly focused on her, waiting in a red carpet frock with a look that suggested a looming medical procedure. The memory clearly tickles her.<\/p>\n
So what was she thinking? \u201cWell, I thought of the people in the cinema, waiting for us to start the movie, and not being able to leave. Also, my feet really hurt.\u201d But she has a surprise in store. \u201cI mean, I\u2019ve never met any royalty in my life, so I was also fangirling.\u201d Really? H\u00fcller seems an unlikely monarchist. \u201cI don\u2019t find the monarchy interesting. But they are fascinating, remarkable personalities.\u201d So what did she finally talk about with the royal couple? \u201cOh, I can\u2019t remember. I was in shock!\u201d Would she like to meet them again? \u201cOf course! I want to have tea with them! I want to talk about everything with them!\u201d<\/p>\n
H\u00fcller is now hooting with laughter.<\/p>\n
If we do include the Avengers, her fifth film of this most productive year is Rose. Like Fatherland, it is a story of the German past, in black and white. And yet, after fun with royals and Ryan Gosling, Rose now brings her back to modern Germany. It was filmed in Saxony-Anhalt, \u201cwhere a certain party recently won power\u201d. (This is the German state where the AfD claimed 43.8% of the vote in September.)<\/p>\n
In preparation to play a character passing as male, H\u00fcller says she watched men more closely than she ever had before. The result was a study of all that goes into being read as male. \u201cHonestly, it left me astonished. I realised that as a woman, I rarely enter a room and think of it as a battleground. But male behaviour is so related to that. Where is the enemy and how can I defeat him?\u201d<\/p>\n
So do men make bad socialists? \u201cNo! Some of the most famous socialists have been men.\u201d Could that be why we don\u2019t have socialism, though? She grins and wags a finger. \u201cYou forgot Mamdani?\u201d She also has a related point. \u201cOne advantage of being born in the GDR and seeing it fall apart, or reunified, however you want to call it, is you learn no system is for ever. And that is interesting in a time when the things we\u2019ve done so long don\u2019t work any more. So maybe it is good to think of different ways they could work in future.\u201d<\/p>\n
H\u00fcller is having to rethink the present too. Despite still seeing herself as a theatre actor who sometimes makes films, her German stage career is now on hold \u2013 at least in front of the curtain. Fame complicates. \u201cIf you are part of an ensemble but people come to see you as if the others matter less, I don\u2019t enjoy that.\u201d But she has a workaround. Farn are now creating two new plays she will instead direct. (\u201cOne is about revenge. The other goodbyes.\u201d) So far, she says, the new role has been a pleasure. \u201cI love the discussions. I love watching people invent. And we will see how long this wave continues.\u201d<\/p>\n
She tells me she is also curious how my piece will turn out. In Germany, she says, interview subjects give notes on a draft before anything goes to print. We don\u2019t do that in the UK, I say. \u201cI know. But as the interviewed person, it gives you a feeling of being respected. Not that I don\u2019t feel respected here. Anyway, I never change much.\u201d She smiles. \u201cSometimes just a comma.\u201d So will she read this? \u201cNo, because I have no say.\u201d<\/p>\n
And yes, she agrees, laughing, that means I can write whatever I want.<\/p>\n
Fatherland is out in the UK and US on 23 October, and in Australia on 17 November. Rose is out on 11 December in the US, and 5 February in the UK<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sandra H\u00fcller is crying, and it feels very strange. A wildly gifted actor, she can convey every human…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":891677,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[236,88],"class_list":["post-891676","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891676","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=891676"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891676\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/891677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=891676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=891676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=891676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}