Conversations with Alicia Vikander and Eddie Redmayne of THE DANISH GIRL

good evening ladies and gentlemen I loved seeing such a full room for this beautiful movie my name is Dave Karger I am the chief correspondent at Fandango you are a very lucky audience tonight because you are here for the final Q&A that the two stars of this movie are doing the entire season and I feel lucky to be here as well so please welcome both oscar-nominated actors stars of the Danish girl Eddie Redmayne and Alyssia vikander can you believe it's the end of the award season for the two of you I mean I talk so much for coming I spoke to the two of you the second week of September in the Toronto Film Festival when this movie had its premiere and now we're here five months later it's a joy to kind of bookend this whole process with the two of you so let's go back to almost a year ago you've just begun filming the Danish girl and you decide or the movie company decides to put out a photo of you Eddie as Lily because you're about to start doing the location work for the film and you want to make sure that the first impression that people have of you in this character is not some wide lens blurry shy so you put the shot out but because of that the movie is on all of our radar as a possible Oscar contending film for a year from then how did you guys both put that pressure out of your mind and focus on the task at hand which was to make a great film you're so good at asking new questions I just think but also with I need to say one thing about that photo because that was the first image that came out for the public and that was actually my photo that I referred to for the first couple of weeks that we rehearsed I had done a lot of costume fittings and things then I went to Eddie and I was like why haven't I ever seen you as Lily properly and I had only seen that photo so I had the same kind of I guess wonder next Haitian as everyone else and of course I had seen him embody it totally but it was it was such a big step the first time I wish I was actually doing a camera test and I had been five minutes in the room without noticing that Eddie was in there I thought this red had a woman turned around and I realized well were you trying to hide in plain sight and see if she wouldn't figure out who it was no such it you know what it was such a sort of delicate process those those first days because people quite often ask about but the first time of finding Lily but the amazing thing about this film is it was about 15 years in the making and and it took I was attached to it for four years and even in the sort of a year or two of preparing it was gentle steps of preparation there was no sort of a moment of of really finding Lily the hope the whole process was was was a sort of it was a really minut steps to seeing if we could discover who she was so there was never a sort of great revelatory moment but certainly that photo when it went out into the world you forget that you making films is such a personal thing and that you're in this intimate what feels quite safe environment and and then suddenly you put an image out into the world and and then there's judgment and it's real so it was a scary or scary thing so we let's remind people as if they need to be reminded you are still our reigning Best Actor Academy Award winner know phenom ed up for long I'm gonna milk it I'm gonna milk it so what is it like for you now to go to these award shows like the Critics Choice Awards or the Screen Actors Guild Awards and see your co-star Alyssia just take the spotlight it's it's pretty extraordinary because I know is is weirdly emotional actually being here at the end of this journey because from the moment I as I said I've been attached to this for a wee while and then Tom Hooper and I Tom called alizarin for an audition and I've never really experienced anything like it we did the scene which is the morning after on the ball and I was standing behind I was reading and Tom was standing behind the camera and what Alyssia did in that room was unlike anything I had ever really experienced it was incredibly moving and it suddenly brought the film this film that had been in our producer Gail's world for 15 years Gayle meatrix it came intimately an intensely to life and and I had old friend of mine domhnall gleeson had worked with Alessia many years before on a few years before on Anna Karenina and he had raved about how brilliant she was and in the early mark you know and they worked together on an ex machina exactly and and it's just one it was one of the great experiences because preparing to play a part you prepare in a vacuum and you do on on film you have many months of preparing but then when it comes to it you're actually just playing opposite the person and this is a chamber piece it really in many ways is a two-hander and just um it was a great gift getting to play with it so seeing all the acclaim is just wonderful and for you ELISA that's been this crazy thing we've talked about this before were you've been working quite steadily for the past two or three years but for some reason just with scheduling all five of the movies came out in this calendar year of 2015 as you were waiting and just being I'm sure impatient for these films to come out and now to look back and you have two BAFTA nominations in the same year and two Golden Globe nominations in the same year and a Screen Actors Guild Award and a Critics Choice Award and an Oscar nomination but this has to be so far beyond anything you could have imagined it is and first of all thank you darling oh my god well yes it's it's been um it's been a whirlwind this last year and I am I'm actually at the the Golden Globes I was able to have my parents there with and it was a bit funny my mom actually mentioned because of this fact that you said it's been a bit of a coincidence that some films that I've done over almost some of them three three and a half years ago came out last year and my mom was like yeah you know it's a lot of back home in Sweden a lot of my friends so I was like yeah we had her that I listed been out working there for a few years but I mean we never see anything nice we actually many things I've just been away from my home country but I mean it's it's just been a wonderful to find my habits it's like this film I'm so incredibly proud and you get three now and reunite with your colleagues and with Eddie who I did this film with and means so much both the experience of making it and now it's a finished product so it's it's been a wonderful time could you each recall there's so many beautiful moments and not a false note in this whole film can you each recall the one scene that you remember as being the toughest one to get right well I have I think that happens if I if I'm really engaged when I read a script and I did fall in love with like most people who had been close to this script by it and it was particularly one scene that stood out and I think it listened to Coxon had done alright is such a beautiful job with it's it's one girder comes back from the UM from her gallery opening in Paris and she she confronts as she meets Lily and it's the scene where they've been on this journey together and she's totally of aware of what's happening and she sees things for what they were on that's also something that I I really had my Gerda for but it's a scene where she she knows that suddenly things have changed it's a change then has been inevitable and it's happening and but it's that thing of being afraid of losing the person you love of being close to one another suddenly she says we used to do these things together and and she also find the can of confront sense open opens up with emotions of telling her emotional truth which is I want my husband back and also the kind of guilt and saying that knowing what the truth is knowing that she's with I think that I got so moved by it so then you treasure that scene and I even put a mark in my calendar of that date we were gonna shoot and I'd like build up my anxiety of making it throughout this shoot but also it ends up always being those scenes that are the most exciting and terrifying to do how about you I think for me there was preparing for the film a lot of my research was meeting trans women and trying to relate contemporary experience to what Lily's story was almost a hundred years ago and and checking verifying but the scenes that were in the film still felt authentic and one trans woman here in Los Angeles actually it was incredibly generous with her story to educate me told me how before she had come out she her favorite day of the year was Halloween because that meant that she could get dressed up as her true gender be herself without scrutiny or without and and she described going to a club as a woman in Los Angeles and being in a corner in the dark hiding and and this man coming over to her and sort of hitting on her and for her the way in which she described this extraordinary mixture of fuel adrenaline and excitement of being seen for who she was mixed with the utter fear this man the violence that might occur or the discrimination that might occur if he saw her for who she was at that time would have been a combination of emotions and it was something that I think Lucinda had caught so well in that in that ball scene and and when someone has given you with extraordinary generosity that that that experience related to you you felt a sense of responsibility to get it right in that scene so I think for me that was probably the most complicated that is an electric sequence to me that I just even thinking about that moment is so great okay I'm going to embarrassed have each of you embarrassed the other for each of you what is your favorite moment of the other ones performance I can actually say it because we just took we didn't know you just talked about just us it's a bit when when the curtain um is dividing them in bed and and and Alice just says I put my hand against the curtain and go that was you and that goes it was not long ago we were married and I said oh that was you and I know and she goes I know it was but actually it was you and me and she taps this my finger very very delicately and I found it of really it was it came out of nowhere when we were shooting it was always find that very very moving well I actually I mean you helped me and that's a I was terrified of my favorite scene that I had it was it was easy because of you in that scene I didn't have to do much so I remember how how how wonderful feeling it is to work with someone who's like taking on a new route every time so that one but it's also what I remember when we we both saw the film in full the first time you don't want to see a film for twice I'm a devotee each other's hand sitting then suddenly as an actor you're you're invited every even me to see scenes that I went in and I read and I remember it's that scene when Lily goes to see this dancer in Copenhagen and now it was one of my favorite scenes and I hadn't never seen it before and it totally got to me and it's that suddenly was so pure that it was just two women looking at each other and I think you just you are Thalia amazing in that time I was just quiet okay so you all submitted questions before the screening and I want to race through a bunch because you had a lot of good ones this is from Keeley field raise your hand Keeley hi kili kili had a couple questions I'm gonna ask your number two question number two question is for you Eddie is there an actor or actress that you admire that you would like to work with the most and why so many so um you know what I was lucky enough to meet Marion Cotillard last year and there are a couple of actors and actresses that you see a so cool there's something about I don't know I saw l'avion Rose and and I remember leaving that that film going go to might as well all give up because that is so staggering so I think she's probably top of that list Alyssa this is a question for you from Delilah raise your hand Delilah oh well we can't see you because there's tall men in front of you but we're gonna I we hear you this is for you Alyssa who did you study acting with and what do you feel contributed most to your success as an actress oh I I hope that I would I think it's it's all about every person that you meet along the way I think acting is trying to gain as much experience and I think that's why it's the wonderful thing of aging and kind of gather more I still feel young and I want to learn more but then I I guess I was actually I was very jet like this morning and about four and and there was a beautiful day so I walked outside or you call hike hearing otherwise known as a walk and I I was on the phone with a woman called Lisa Lange said it was my first director I made two feature films back home in Sweden with him that I really hope I'm gonna work with again and she has in one way become you know she she was the one who'd dead she saw me and dead it trust me and with work and I was terrified but she kind of held my hand and I was the beginning in a way and it was so she I have a lot to give to that woman and I'm so grateful that she's been with me although where we great here's a question for the two of you from Colton hi Colton Colton says as actors just starting out in your careers how did you find the fine line of making choices in your roles that were authentic enough yet also bold enough to set you apart and that's got to be hard especially when you're just beginning what do I would say so that is um it's for me it was through making mistakes and I remember I did a film early on and I was playing American and I was so excited to have got this job and terrified we were shooting on big sets in New York there were amazing actors involved and you could see sort of money everywhere and that sort of pressure of that and suddenly there was a camera about three inches away from me and I was so terrified and so convinced that I was going to get fired for having a bad accent but basically I played an accent now my performance in that film is so awful because you just see me trying not to get fired like you know and and and I and I ever since then when I saw that back I was like never I'd rather get fired than do something really boring and beige and and sort of really limited again so I suppose I always just try and surprise yourself a wee bit you have to remind me cuz I heard the question is something that has been really well when you're just starting out how do you kind of walk that line between having your performances feel authentic but also be bold and different to set you apart I kind of have that fear still yet I think it's a very good question something someone asked me what I think I had learned if I have learned anything now I have made a couple of films and in the beginning I was so terrified of making mistakes like you said that I was pushing myself and you know that it's such time limit and you know that you think that everyone's looking at you and judging you and you won everything so bad and it was actually an act I work with like I don't know my second or third year in and he did that thing of suddenly just stopped and this was a very famous actor that I looked up he was like I just don't feel this number knows can we just take five minutes and everyone just stopped and he was like if anyone wants just quiet and then we can continue again and that's think the thing of daring to actually speak up and say that you know what I haven't really found this yet I don't feel really comfortable that was a big step I was like wow I felt so lonely in that fear and I think that's also something that you learn that if you can share that suddenly it kind of becomes a bit easier and you can kind of hold hands and laugh about it hopefully okay here's a question from Preston who's ten years old where are you pressed it oh you're right here in the front hi hi I'm not really sure you should have been watching this movie but you're here and I loved your question it's simple but it's also I think very important it's for I'm gonna ask you for both of you what inspired you to become an actor I think it's um it comes down to kind of the the essence of just I love drugs and I love film and I love theater and the S has come from it's hard to know a moment when I I don't think I chose to love what I do it's just possible part of who I am and my personality and I I had a mom who all she is an actress so I was kind of without knowing I was introduced to theater and storytelling from a very young age and I was back there in the wing and looked up and watched it and I think in one way that's the inspiration started then and it has been it was her and her colleagues and then people that I met along the way you I think I was I was probably your age and I was at school in London and they were auditioning for a theatre version of Oliver the musical and they're in Oliver the musical they're about 700 children and I managed to somehow blag one of those parts as workhouse boy number 40 and the best thing about it was I got to leave school every day remember the confidence of walking okay so I'm leaving class now off to the West End probably really irritating but that being on those state those theatres behind the scene at the London behind the scenes at London Palladium these sort of dark dim lit very romantic extraordinary places that that's for me where I got the I got the bug so just to be clear your message to ten-year-old Preston is to drop now school okay right just wanted to be clear on that sorry I want to end with one last question which is now that so many people have seen this movie in so many different countries and communities of all age ranges what is your favorite thing that someone has said to you after seeing this movie I think it's um well III have we met a lot of people in preparing for this film a lot of people from the transgender community and for me preparing for God I met a lot of people who were friends and families loved ones partners for people transitioning and I think those personal relationships that you make with these people who gave so much of themselves and open up about that personal experiences and and their relationships and stories when when I had a woman at the premiere who had travelled for five hours we had only I had read one of her books called my husband is a woman and I just called up a few months early while we were filming to tell her that I just really wanted to tell her thank you and I was a higher ELISA week and I'm an actress and I'm making this film when I was introduced to your book and I felt such a connection with my idea of my character with your experience even though it's a contemporary one and and and she did something that I know a lot of people to you also did she was like well hello Alyssia she's um she said please ask me anything and we ended up having a three-hour conversation on the phone and I haven't had never met this woman and I I continue to have a relationship and been emailing with her when she arrived and saw it at the premiere and she came there with her spouse which he still weighs and and and she felt like he'd translated what her story was that was but I think that's also why this film will always be I have a very personal relationship to many films but this will be special because it's actual human connections I've met with people but this film could be part of translating part of that story has been pretty cool I mean really similar to an issue last year with a theory of everything when you were promoting that film it was about making that film it was about what Stephen and Jane and their family thought those were the people whose opinion you cared about and similarly exactly as it is she was saying there was a couple here in Los Angeles called cadence and Trista who when I was preparing for the film really opened their hearts in the most extraordinary way and and whilst this isn't their story specifically there were so many elements of it which they taught me through and when they came to the premiere similarly it was about the I was so nervous I was a wreck but their kindness and generosity towards the film was certainly the most I think perhaps the most rewarding aspect for us well I speak for the whole room when I say thank you and congratulations on this beautiful film Eddie Redmayne and ELISA thank you so much

Channel: SAG-AFTRA Foundation

Views: 17,556

Rating: 4.9448276 out of 5

Keywords: SAG Foundation, SAG-AFTRA Foundation, Acting, Actors, Alicia Vikander, Eddie Redmayne, The Danish Girl, Q&A, Interview

Id: 71e9z0ECDiw

Length: 23min 33sec (1413 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 11 2016