Amy Adams & Nicole Kidman - Actors on Actors - Full Conversation

[Music] first of all we have to acknowledge that we've both worked with jean-marc vallée exactly you limited series exactly yeah which you you kind of had him first I think nice race had him first yes well yes the big little lies yeah the bigger you I'm yeah I read an article when I was working you guys when I had started working with him you guys were releasing big little lies at the time and an article about high the intensity of the work and he like lying a blanket over you at one time mmm-hmm having worked with him and understanding the demands that he puts on the actors what was that like for you playing that role like how playing Celeste yeah yeah yeah was intense actually it was incredibly intense but it was also very freeing because I'm the style in which he shoots I find very freeing for the firm I particularly for that and for what Alexander and I were trying to do with the relationship and he was capturing you know it was like on my slice of life where he's in there with the camera and cuz he operates the camera sometimes it was just so he's brilliant at editing there was a way in which he could just already picture what he needed and so I found it you know I was really exposed yeah but that was good what about you I it was challenging because it it does create this voyeuristic energy where you feel like somebody's young mark is being such a voyeur into the process and we all catch a character yeah who's very I mean both of our characters were intense and both vulnerable in different ways you know and and I think it was it was challenge endurance wise because I had so much to do that the way that he shot became such an endurance challenge because we were you know he goes over and over and over from but he never he never amazing in it I don't think you're me that you know thank you marketing and it's a hard character I feel like I have to say because I have a chance to say it I love you so much and I'm so excited and talk to you but I love you I want to play sisters I put that out there for anybody I was I told Nicole this earlier so I feel like I can say this but I always said that I wanted to be like Nicole Kidman but I understood that I was like corduroy to her silk so it's true that in my life I'm so corduroy I hate it but it's true to know yourself you're not I'd like to be a little bit of lace a little bit of leather see I can I be that yeah yeah you can be the end maybe pleather you know cruelty-free yeah yes exactly no I'm well anyway what do you know that we could we please places to see some point any writer-director we're putting it out there but the way that you continue to evolve as an actress is so inspiring and the way that you dive into characters I've talked about feeling like you you lose something when you act I I really feel like you put something of yourself not personality or anything like that just a piece of your soul of your spirit goes into these characters and it so comes through the screen and I'm just and use giant that's what disappoint and you're amazing but anyway there's the gotcha best taste and just every single character that you play which is why I just saw Vice yeah and once again like gobsmacked at your talent because you become her your house I'm she reminded me of my grandmother very much and so she felt really familiar to me so I was able to sort of find a place where she lived inside of truth for me cuz I I yeah grew up knowing women like Lynn yeah where self-starters and uncompromising and direct and not afraid to speak their truth and he was it kind of it was strangely empowering because I would go and set and have these debates with Adam as Lynn Cheney so we would talk about the political events of the day and I would you know imagine Lynn's point of view based on what I'd read about her so did you stay in character for most of it or you would just take on that so that you could see it through her lens exactly I would take that on and especially because Adam requires a lot of my improv exactly so I wanted to feel like I was loose inside of how I imagined she would approach that did you enjoy the same way you and Christian speak Shakespearean yeah yeah did you guys that what that was obviously wit that was written that I memorized that for yeah right see I had a contest with Christian to see who could memorize it first and he won of course he did I would have he might know I have a feeble brain like I he he won and that was with him working every day at two o'clock in the morning and getting make mice one I was not happy about it two times two times I have to drag you out of that jail like a filthy hobo I'm sorry laughs what what did you just say oh sorry Lenny you're sorry don't call me Lenny I have a tough time learning lines though to just follow that that's true I do actually I find it sometimes I have to put I literally have to put the time and if I want to be what and there's different directors right then require different so sometimes is improvising sometimes you can move around the the line and fill in and other times it is literally to the I mean to the rhythm to every piece of punctuation you take a breath when they want you to take them so if you had have you run that scope of absolutely I have people much to the writer chagrin where the words don't mean they're throwing out lines at you David O'Russell yeah throw lines to you in the middle of a scene and they're just saying them well in these intense situations yeah or I'm Aaron Sorkin who like seems very happy for yeah yeah yeah that was when I did a guest spot on Westwood but that every Westwood you know what I mean West Wing um yeah so so it was all over the place yeah but I love that do you love that this sort of that being able to work with Jen I always say as an actor you have to go in because people say what's your process that so well it changes every single film I agree I agree and I think it's so important to have that adaptability because you never know the actor you're gonna be working with the director the what the day calls for so but do you do a lot of prep I do hmm I do a lot of properties yeah yeah yeah I imagine you do you strike me just sort of don't want to be I think the reason I do it is one I it's it's a gift when you're given a role any role but I also want to be able to I don't want to feel like I'm kind of skimming I don't want to feel like I'm if I if I turn this way I won't have the full I wanted the answer I won't know what I'm doing I hate that I hate so I want to know and be able to embody the person completely so that I'm ready well to improvise or even well it's just Mannu just anything to respond absent to be present to respond to what's around you present exactly because I always find that if if I go into a scene with an idea of how the scenes gonna go it never goes that way and that's when you get lost mmm is when you're trying to steer the scene I learned that I used to try to steer scenes and I would get really yeah panicky there was a scene in the master I shot with Joaquin and he wasn't waking up he was not waking up I was supposed to wake him up and he wasn't waking up and I was like oh you've gotta tell him to wake up his second ring you gotta wake him up I was psyched awesome I don't know what to do I freaked out because I was like no here's how the scene goes yeah I go over I shake out hey I wish I had I'd pour water on his head now I'd be like you want to play that game one thing here y'all oh wait yeah but he's like slap him I'm like I don't want to slap him like I was so yes Wow I didn't roll with it and I learned a lesson from that but yeah I mean eventually we got there but I I had in my head how the scene was going to go yeah night you had before which is now in in your phones the two that you did this year they're so vastly different yeah I'm how in the world did you have a lot of time in but in them no and how did you prep when you don't have that time do you like a dip boy erased and so I had time plenty of time leading up to that and I know Russell Crowe since I was really young so in terms of us building out just our marriage that wasn't very almost it was organic it was inbuilt and I think Joel probably cast us because he knew that as well but yeah I but I had a book I had a real person he had access to so much that I could absorb and then four weeks later I went into destroyer which was actually over by the time I started shooting I think it was six weeks but we did makeup tests and all of that yeah but it was some that was a lot it was overwhelming but I kind of one thing I love when you work a lot is the camera just becomes almost an extension like it doesn't become a nice struggle with shyness my one thing that I struggle is to get through my shyness because if I'm willing to speak up and not be obedient all the time and and then I then I'm free and then I do much better work but if I haven't worked for a long time my shyness comes back and I'm a little bit rigid almost and scared so it helped it helps me to work a lot because it frees me but then you're dealing with stamina yeah but strangely enough because destroyer required so much fatigue and so much kind of just beaten down that kind of worked for it and I just use always use my surroundings and member I never I try to never fight whatever's whatever I'm given you know which has been a process to get to that place where you go no it's mentor it's meant to be sunny today so it's pouring with rain suddenly the scenes so much better right I know but I learnt that early on from people like Jane Campion and and even Kubrick who he'd lose a location and he'd be like he'd shrug he would never stress about that stuff and he would create something better actually we broke up because I think it's true about me I think about men do you ever feel that you're in that place where you where it's not clicking in where you're not getting the character or you're you or you feel like for whatever reason you're out to sea and I think that happens to me when I'm trying to please somebody when I'm trying to please the director yeah when I want to do what he wants or make him happy or her happy I'm not thinking about the character anymore and it's whenever or if I'm worrying if I'm giving the scene partner what they need if I come out of the character I will get lost if I it but for me it's trying to please people that's when I start I start a yeah yeah I start a spiral and then if I start doing a take if I start looking at people I've had to train myself don't don't look mMmmm don't you mean after the take like you do it yeah I can you they call cut and I would immediately like look for them to tell me if it was okay ya know and I had to train myself how do you watch the monitor I don't neither do i I don't because I'll start some trick you know it's carrot okay so self-aware I can't I only do on it to be really honest I'll ask for playback if I literally cannot walk away from a scene right and the directors like I think we have it and I can tell the crews like I'm like no you know there's something else to my hair you know and how so then I'll ask to see it just so I can sleep because otherwise I'll stay up worried it was oh yeah it was two days after something on a film and I was going over the lines in my head and the actor I'm working with it's like what are you doing and I was like oh I'm sorry I was going over the scene he's like we've shot the scene I'm like I know I don't know what I'm doing yeah just one yeah right but I've gotten better about that and moving on and staying present in the moment of what we're filming do you do you find that because you were agreeing with me you I did you and look at the monitor do you still try to please though or I have yeah I have a police of personality so there'll be times when I yeah when I said we're not when I'm a good girl where I'm being really really well-behaved and really good that can sometimes not work for me because I have other ideas I have like a crazy imagination and ideas and sometimes I'll just be like oh that's just - Wow and now what I've trained myself to do is just do it so I always go and I never ask I just you'll just do it yeah because then it's being true Daz a character and who I am absolutely what I'm feeling and your instinct um yeah come here feeling yeah and I block everything out yeah I love it and I love exploring and mining um so and yeah and I love obsessive directors I love to artists that are just like okay I love the passion so yeah anyone that people think is difficult I usually do not think is difficult I'm okay with difficult as long as they're nice yeah do you know what I mean cause like it's my dress I'm trying to get this yeah trying to get that no screen you don't like yell again and not I should I haven't really ever worked with yellows so I'm sort of but I also have a huge understanding of the artistic process and I'm and I like the idea of the set being sacred I agree so there's a sacredness to what goes on there and obviously if someone's feeling exploited or violated or something where you have to everything has to be talked about so it's safe but I also believe there is a sacredness to the artistic bubble mm-hmm so I rarely reveal you know I would never reveal somebody sick or what they've told me or what how you've come up with a secret way right because that's entire to reveal process in that way isn't it and it's also there's so much trust between if we're acting together how we get there right absolutely it's what I did when I did catch me if you can I was I had that instinct not to talk about the scenes or the process yeah and there were some talk shows I didn't get on because I wouldn't tell any Leo stories I was like I can't tell you the Hat Rider tell you the Hat right yeah and yeah it was funny because I just felt that the set was such a sacred place and exactly what you're saying and you have a beautiful voice that led me to thinking because you have a beautiful singing voice you also have a beautiful sing no no because you sang I in I came and saw you in the park oh did you yeah oh my gosh yeah do you know that was when I realized I might have the worst stage fright of anyone but I would have seen it was doing I had the best time did you I really did do that because it really is it so hard to schedule yes you did into the woods I did in the park and he said her and I saw you when you sang amazing well not only that I sang on stage I was so intimidated with Jessie Mueller who could be one of the most gifted singing singers line out there she her boyce is so beautiful and natural and the way that she can act through a song is yeah but used to do nothing not like Josie you 2-bit trust me she's so amazing and so I it was it was a magical time yet you should do it if have you done anything in the park no you should definitely drawn to it yeah they do the Shakespeare in the Park and Shakespeare no I've done Shakespeare I just have never done it in the park I've never done in two ants I've never done it I did it in Australia but I haven't done it in London or New York but I love stage would you do another play I would right now I think it's hard because of the time my daughter I have a hard time thinking about committing to something for that period of time and it has to be that's why the pocket is not good because it's a limited exactly honor I'm scared if I'm being really honest I do I like using my daughter as an excuse sorry audio I think I'm scared but you didn't think I'm scared I was singing and you know moving around right I think I just did what I did in London yeah you were talking about your experience was it in the the I did a thing called photograph I did the Blue Room I did another play recently photograph 51 about rosalind Franklin who was she discovered DNA what and um she didn't end up winning a Nobel Prize for it because anyway it's so you can make that movie no no but um but in terms you should make that movie but in time you switch off halfway through and see people confuse the heck out I think I'm pretty sure that's not a that's not Carl just don't tell them but the play is amazing I'm not doing the play I did the play and then they wanted me to do it in New York but I couldn't because of my kids yeah it's a huge commitment even in London when I did it I was like wow this is asking a lot of my family yeah and I'd be like if I was single I'd be off doing this now you know I have such a voracious appetite for playing characters and exploring the world but there's also under no circumstances will I jeopardize my family yeah you know your but it is and it's I don't I don't regret any decision that I made that prioritized my daughter on my relationship I just haven't because that's what you left with yeah I mean we have we have work we have it it's beautiful but ultimately I'm for me I want to have I don't want to have missed it you know and I and I have a fantastic relationship with my husband but it's a really hard thing balancing all of that I find it do not talked about enough I have people do it we're talking now that motherhood and working and because I love what I do and I love acting and I really and it's so fulfilling right mm-hmm but I love my children and I love my husband and so they it's a constant push-pull with that got to segue from that as you're talking about the women I cannot imagine directing can you imagine I know I still could use all my struggle with it sanest now I'm having to not be there because I'm on shooting this is when we're doing destroyer everyday in her hours you know you do have squared n hours and then you're doing location scouts and you're in the editing Bay and you're watching all the dailies like I go home and cook a chicken and I'm still exhausted you know so my female directors have it I mean if they have children or families that's a hard and you've committed to working with female directors once every 18 months right or with an 18 I made up I don't know the parameters legit the cam Film Festival I love that to do to work with a female director over 18 months because I actually saw the statistics and they were unbelievably dire and I just went the only way you can change this and Meryl Streep and I were and there was Cate Blanchet Oh a bunch of us were sitting around a table I could have like she do I was like one night strangely enough it was after the Oscars and instead of going to the parties we all went and just had a bite to eat and out of it came the conversation of how do we support women and how do we support particularly you know to build more female directors female crews in this industry what do we actually do and that was when it was said we just actually have to start to say yes yes I want to fit I want a woman to direct this and so that's where I went okay I'm gonna make this pledge publicly and I think I've exceeded it actually that's amazing yeah well I appreciate that and I am so appreciate you three years I feel like I'm wrapping up I so appreciate you and your but I do I feel like you I mean like I'm so excited don't want it to end so I'm like yeah there's I've got so much to ask you but also just you know we don't get enough time to talk to each other celebrate each other and you know and work with each other and really get to know you're amazing you're amazing and you continue or an actually answer your bar and I will love it because there's nothing I love more than a bar that's raised and it's exciting and if you're in it yes I will see it I'm the one who's bad it's not you all right I lied I still who wash welcome to the DC Universe I know I think I'm I stay at a DC Universe now but I was in it for a while yeah I think I think they're revamping that I don't know the details but you know they were led to really discuss anything to do with it until it's out right there yeah oh yeah so I'm sort of going what do I say about Aquaman right now that you're in it I'm in it yeah I'm in it and James Wan directed it and Jason Momoa plays my son and yeah I play a queen which was kind of odd she turned out appropriate I think I was like I gotta wear that crown I want to put on that suit did you love it I actually loved it because my daughters were so interested yeah and they're not usually they're interested I've played a princess so I could have been that's a that was fun yeah my daughter my daughter's I watched you play a princess how are you're very popular in our household my daughter so can you please go do a movie that I can see it is none of the movies I've done recently she's like can i watch sharp objects I'm like oh god we know never never what about when I'm 16 I'm like no no their little eyes know they're going to though and then and then it'll be wonderful conversations I think yeah it'll be fast about Allen Ravel us in a weird way right well yeah I mean boast myself emotionally inside of roles and yeah she's really gonna I'm actually scared of how to explain some of the choices and you know it's an interesting it is it's incredibly exposing and vulnerable it is lonely it was funny she was on set via the I was shooting woman in the window with that yeah Jo right and my perfectionism was taking over and I thought like you know and I forgot she was there and I'm not a big swearer except if I'm messing up and then I don't know what happens and I was like oh and there's oh sorry off Jana I'm sorry it's just mom sorry realize she's never heard me say the f-word until that day and there must have been 15 Wow like to myself but I might do you know and then I thought oh no so I've already started the explanation of like yeah mommy and character yeah and yeah but she's mine ever be swearing character yeah so and they've never I don't swear really in real well white in front of her anyway I don't swear you don't swear no in character I need to it's almost like I let loose in character but no I don't forget were the father that never never never I've never heard him cuz ever I didn't even have adopted it yeah my dad had gone before road rage was identified as road car which another than that no my Papa never yeah I filled out your homework for you I was only in the gang for a year or so until I went down for drugs God Sam to prison haha how are things change do you think okay it's interesting I I like that there's an awareness of inequality and I look forward to the day we're not talking about it because it doesn't exist hmm and I think we're working towards that but I think I think I've changed a lot mmm like I don't know how do you feel like you've changed I mean of course you've changed since you first started but um I feel like I've been in this thing just why I've been in this industry since I was 14 what yeah what age did you start working I did not start working in Los Angeles till I was 24 and then didn't really start accumulating more roles until I was in my 30s so it's only it's been about it's been about two years and it's just crazy yeah I don't it's like 14 years of really doing a lot of work and yeah I think I've been I think I at first I was so sick so I just sort of took everything and yeah really greedy and so and also this as I liked when we had another thing where we were talking and I was talking to some other actresses and we were talking about just working where you it takes the onus off everything has to be fantastic I mean yeah we work that's what we do we explore we try things we fail we get back up but you age doing of everything has to be I just I like I like the idea of not of trying things I'm a big Trier I'll do my best I'll give up my all and I've had things that have failed abysmally that have gone way beyond my expectation so I've had that kind of rollercoaster mm-hmm I've definitely changed a lot my journey but I love the journey I know right nice I still want to work with you I I think my head would explode I think I could tell you go so intense just from talking to you and so deep he drove us all I got I guess it gets around in a way like I go team into it beautiful to do that isn't it it is I don't know any other why do you reinter yeah I can I have tried project because I'm having a bit of a reentry this time a little difficult re-entering this time in a different way than I had before so yeah I'm actually just looking for a different the hook I find it like you go through a portal and Anna sight comes out the other side and sometimes I I shed it so quickly and other times I grieve and I'll grieve the loss of the experience or the character or I'll grieve it and I can tell when I'm gonna creep it yeah but there's others and it has nothing to do with whether the how it how it turns out yeah so yeah it's just to do with my own connection to them mhm - to the character and then there's a couple of times maybe four or five times I've had it where it's actually entered me into my every part of me and I find that a little frightening yeah because then I'm wearing Wow I'm like in some weird place here that's really I'm not quite sure what I am or Who I am and my identity gets a little lost and then I come back and I'm like oh here I am I'm back in real life we're gonna discuss this right now well you smell like vomit and cheap booze here's my plan either you stand up straight and you get your back straight and you have the courage to become someone or I'm gone did you have trouble no I didn't Lynn Cheney I didn't I I'm I think that Lynn Cheney's a character I think because she exists in the world like she doesn't belong to me almost and I didn't own her in the same way you know I I owned her intellectually and emotionally but not like a spiritually whereas when I played a character more like Camille that one I think it's when I when I dive into the type of the part of my psyche that I work really hard not to live in yeah that's when I have a really hard time yeah that my total saying or like women in the window where you know Joe writes like I want to examine the truth about anxiety and I was like oh yeah I think really for three months we're gonna do this so um so that's harder to shake but that's just I just got chills yeah I think cuz we anxiety is a really uncomfortable place to live I mean if you're with your characters from destroyer and boy race did you find that either of them were harder to shake or do you find if a character is closer to home or somebody that you own like I'm talking a lot at you the boy erased I felt very close to in terms of wanting the the affection and the love and and actually where she ends up is so beautiful so emotionally I was able to she's she's also quite fluid so that was I was able to even though she does something terrible to her son she does it without any malicious bone in her body she is she did it cause she thought it was the most loving thing to do and it was it was wrong and she's acknowledged that was wrong the destroyer character on the other hand it was so rage-filled and depressed and unable to express anything so everything was held in and that's actually so that for me was I was like what have I done and my husband actually said yeah when does this thing end because this needs to end soon because there's no yeah and he's never said that to me we interesting Darren was like that with Lynne Cheney but that's because I would come home and I like because she has an opinion energy in our film about everything she has something to say and I really enjoyed that right now I would have said I was like well that's how you're gonna Mel right that you know maybe I got I really enjoyed like she cuz I well I know there were people know this room her like you don't keep your opinions but I try to be I'm always it's the pleaser in me and I just didn't get the sense that she was a pleaser and it was so freeing to be oh she's just like yeah you don't like me alright yeah you know personality yeah they say that comes with age anyway yeah to most people right I mean my mom's 79 and she's like no I can say whatever I want you don't like it fine no I still kind of care about hurting someone's food is it's like my greatest fear is that I say something that it I don't mean to hurt someone's feelings and it hurts someone's feelings and then I think about it and then do you wake up in the middle of the night and worry about that yeah yeah yeah I always say why worry when you can obsess that's kind of what I say and I mean are you awake up in the middle of the night person yeah me too yeah I have a little pat by my bed and I write things down with my nightlight to try and get them off my mind but it doesn't always work see I just maybe I turn on like dr. Phil oh that's fine I should start right there nice scribble and then I can't understand anything I've written in the morning cuz I like play candy crush for two hours and then wonder why boy fire but that's because I'm trying I'm trying to avoid anxiety I'm trying to avoid discomfort and I think I think inside roles what I sense from you and what I love is that you really go into discomfort and you're in you allow for that to be okay inside of the characters I can't wait to see the anxiety ridden woman in the window don't even I get anxiety just thinking about it [Music] you

Channel: Variety

Views: 339,485

Rating: 4.9547873 out of 5

Keywords: Variety, Variety Studio, Amy Adams, Nicole Kidman, Boy Erased, Vice, Destroyer

Id: 0rqRLe5MQKA

Length: 34min 14sec (2054 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 23 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/Arghifth]

It was nice to see nicole complimenting amy for sharp objects. Was anyone else disappointed by little to non support that sharp objects got from big little lies ladies? Not that they were obligated to do so but still...

[u/readandrant]

They both talk about what it's like working with Jean-Marc in the first 3 mins.