Greta Gerwig interviewed by Jesse Armstrong | BFI London Film Festival 2023 Screen Talk

so how you doing is this a whirlwind tour to the UK yes a bit but it's I mean it's wonderful this is I'm extremely nervous just to put that out there but I but I'm I'm ready to answer questions it's I'm going to do tough ones I'm gonna just I'm gonna get right in there um do you have a much of a relationship to the UK to London to England yes I do I actually well I filmed most of Barbie here so um I was I was I was here the whole time and I was actually um I based on I knew I wanted to work with um the costume designer Jacqueline Duran again who I'd worked with on Little Women and I and a a very wonderful um set designer is Sarah Greenwood who also works here so I knew I wanted to shoot here and then um and actually no one else knew that the movie I wanted to make was all took place inside of sound stages like they they thought oh you need an actual Beach and I was like no no nothing exists I need to build it and that's when I realize no one knows actually what's in your head at all so we're going to try and get in there um so with the Run of movies that you've directed since ladybird Little Women and Barbie as a director you've had three films in a row that have been critical successes audient hits and commercially successful for me and everyone else how do you do that I well I i' I mean I honestly I've I've just been in I've just been so lucky with how kind of the the thing in my heart has sort of corresponded to some some secret wish that seems to exist in in the world so I feel very um honestly it just makes me feel extremely connected to everyone I mean of course it's lovely to get um nice notices but um feeling an audience I answer something is the most gratifying thing because it I don't know it makes you you know feel less Alone um is that you know you make something that it might feel strange or will anybody else like this and then uh people say yes I I I would like it and I and so I just I I don't know I that's not an answer really it just it's just um it's moving well it's it's a tough it's a tough and maybe slightly factious question the sort of how do you do it it's hard right but unless uh phous way of asking it is like how do you is there something you feel inside you when you know that you're you must have had each of those points you know a number of things you could have pursued was there is if you got a a a load star a thing which makes you think oh no that that's the one this time for right now yeah in a way it's sort of um I'm not quite so uh it's almost like an inkling or a feeling I think you know I had I had um ladybird I was writing it for a number of years and I felt it sort of bubbling up inside and then um with Little Women and with Barbie it was um the it feels more like things reveal themselves to me I mean I I I loved the book of Little Women I had a relationship with Barbie there were things I was interested in but it's almost like some sense of just leaning in slightly to whatever an idea is that and it feels like you I honestly you really start sort of dreaming about it and then it kind of doesn't leave you alone and then that's the way that you you're pulled in but I'm not quite so um you know I don't always know something is going to be a good idea I just know I can't shake it yet and and that's the way I decide to sort of continue to pursue it um but it doesn't it's not strategic really I wasn't thinking like and then I'll make Barbie um like I mean it was sort of it was like I just kept leaning into it and it was something intriguing and and and sort of it felt kind of impossible and that was exciting um but it's a I don't I don't have a checklist or anything um and then there's always a point where I think I guess the biggest thing is once I have the script is like um I'll know that I like what the script I've written is so then it feels worth like I want to see it realized um but there's always a point when I'm writing a script when I think it's a simultaneous feeling of like this is sort of embarrassing for because I feel very exposed by it but I am also hoping that maybe I'm terrified no one feels this way but I also hope maybe other people do so it's kind of this um there's a slight feeling of like standing naked in front of your class and feeling a little nervous and you you started your career relatively young right and you know looking at it from right now it feels like this curve up towards success it doesn't always necessarily feel that to to to the person to whom it's happening H can you give us just a taste of what it's felt like in your career some were there any moments where you had uh decisions to make or there were paths you did or didn't take which have felt significant when you look back sure yeah no I I didn't feel um when I was graduating from school I I University and from yeah from um College I you you call it University but I feel like a faker when I say that my University Years nope we go to college um but when I was in college I I I decided I kind of at that point I kind of I I was working in um theater really but doing like lights and sound and I did stage management and I I just decided that the thing I really wanted to do was to be in in the worlds of either theater or film I love I love actors I love writers I love directors I love production designers I just I like show people I'm it they they feel like the community I just wanted to be part of and I figured I I would sort of do whatever anyone needed done which was um like it wasn't it wasn't so much like oh I have a sense of like it's got to be acting or it's got to be writing or it's got to be directing it was like how do I um how how what's what's necessary how how do I get in there and do anything um and so I think for me it was like uh it was a it was a progression towards directing but um I think it was not necessarily like it's that or a bust it was just like what can I do and I didn't get into um I applied for graduate school for playwriting and I didn't get in anywhere and um and then I I was lucky enough to sort of movies Independent films were kind of opening up in a certain way because of um digital being able to shoot on pretty goodlook things on digital cameras and that was a big transformation also um that Final Cut was on um computers okay so it was like this you had the ability to make a movie with less and so um theater ended up being a door that felt closed to me but movies felt kind of like the wild west and like you could do anything but I had day jobs until I was 26 okay so I didn't make a living at it for a long time and um and I think I think the thing I just kept doing was going to the thing that felt scariest and most alive and so and that at some point became writing and directing good I I keep I I keep feeling like you have the real answer and that I'm and that I'm somehow not you hitting every single one right it's just tick tick tick then I'm like oh no you got your own life wrong um we're going to do some clips um the first one I guess we would say that so as you mentioned you did those um lot a lot of movies like 10 11 12 independent movies in New York time um then you hit a run of maybe bigger movies Greenberg uh to roam with love but we're going to look at scene from Francis har which you co-wrote and came out in [Applause] 2012 oh my God he's like the most beautiful creature he's in the 90 percentile for height and 95 for weight even out later when they walk doesn't mean he'll be fat you're getting a phone call it's so funny when people have kids and they're all I used to be so focused on me and now I'm totally not it's like no it's still you it's half you it's a mini you I mean you made it I forgot to eat today the only time you ever hear the phrase I'm not here to make friends is on reality television sorry it's okay I'm so sorry no I'm I'm trying to not drink right now very sorry don't be sorry you're not the one who's bat [ __ ] crazy after four Vodka it's Janelle had a hard time giving it up when she was pregnant I did yeah I totally understand really hard I what do you do what what do you do it's such a stupid question I thought I'd ask it oh no I'm I'm a lawyer what do you do that's such a stupid question just kidding um uh it's kind of hard to explain because what you do is complicated uh because I don't don't really do it I'm a dancer I guess Francis and I are in the same company but Rachel's in the main company I'm an apprentice hopefully the touring company soon I have a meeting with Colleen on Monday morning oh cool yeah U but things are really great Rachel and I have a really cool apartment or Rachel does and I'm staying there for sixish weeks five right five yeah but everything's kind of up in the air right now I like being alone I just got back from Sacramento oh oh Andy and Janelle just got back from Paris six and a half hours on a plane with a baby won't be doing that again soon but it was Heaven do you ever get to Paris uh no not really um kind of once actually no what's that museum with the escalators and tubes the pomad yeah they have this great place in the sixth no it's just it's a little piar literally fantastic restant but it's a it's a really special place it's just so hard to get to spend any time there since I got the job with the journal and the baby I'd love to go to Paris I bet it's magic um my friend from college Abby who moved there with her boyfriend because he works at a bank in college she was one of the top five group of friends but then um Zoe became closer to the group and Abby kind of moved to the Outer Circle Sophie and Abby never totally got along and then she started dating Paul who I always thought would have dated any of us but he ended up with Abby well if you're ever there you'll be like for it to be you yeah I don't see myself getting there super soon but just now thanks thanks well that is a very sexy dress [ __ ] I sound like a gay grandmother Francis I think you know uh one of my colleagues at Goldman read patch Krauss yeah I know patch sup bro that's him nobody is better at anticipating the inflection points and patchy his girlfriend Sophie and I are the same person with different hair now really we went to college together and we used to take the train into the city on weekends and make bad decisions you got pregnant no what no she's a great lady I really like her so smart yeah I mean yeah I mean we're all smart yeah but she's book smart smart she's actually not she doesn't really read except for work which is the funny thing she seems like she reads a lot to me I read way more mhm I don't know why I'm shitalking Sophie she's basically the best person I know it's kind of crazy though right yeah which part Japan Japan yeah they're they're moving to Japan in a couple of weeks wait what patch got transferred he really cool position he's going to be the director of research for all the Asian markets for how long indefinitely but Sophia has a job at random house she quit oh the poest thing you feel so good I do a lot of yoga it's good for dance it's fun to go with somebody too have a [Applause] friend great yeah great scene um do you want do you want to just tell us what it's like going in on a day think I guess we're thinking about you as a director and then as an actor too I mean it's a it's a great scene what's it feel like for you going in on a day when you've got a big dialogue scene like that to to do how do you prepare as an actor what's your what's your preparation well I mean this movie which I I wrote with Noah bambach um and he directed it um obviously I'm I'm in it um we we had let's go a little deeper I'm just going to keep saying things that are true no um I but we have a I think um when I when I was starting out I had a lot of movies I did where the it was very improvisation heavy and then I sort of moved totally away from that and I think in some ways that was I've never gotten tired of the way writing sounds when it's spoken I I think it's a thing I first fell in love with so then it's the thing that I kind of gravitated towards when I started making my own work and when I wrote this with Noah and we made it it was the first time I felt like I'd made something that was the nearest representation of kind of what I was going for at that moment that I felt expressed something that I hadn't yet done to that point and um and so the the language is super precise like it's written to sound casual but it's it's not casual and it's very um it's it's like if you miss a word the Rhythm goes off um so I think um for me with this one I'd spent time writing it with Noah and he always thought I was going to play Francis but I kind of had this um in a way I almost needed to not imagine myself playing Francis in order to write it because it was too scary otherwise and then um and then I I mean for me the language is sort of everything I I would say it's in a way as an actor I actually get confused when the language is not as important because I don't know how to get into it in a in a way so um for me it's like the the language provides everything because you can obviously there's different ways to play moments but they have um they have this sort of musical sadness which I am always interested in and I I I mean I love that scene I love everyone in it and um when I look at it it's actually reminds me I haven't acted like that in a while and I don't know that I could anymore in that same way because it just um you know you get into a particular Zone as either a writer or a performer or a director and it felt like I was living in a a space that was very uh I felt who I was as an actor felt extremely um accessible to me then and I um I mean I'd love to be able to do it again but I feel sort of out of that head space right now but yeah Noah and I in particular because I've worked with him four times as a actor and we get into um almost like it's our own language or our own world or our own channel and he'll give very specific color like a note just shading this way or that way um and it's a very pleasurable thing to get into but we can do it it can go we he does lots of takes so yeah yeah dozens and dozens of takes how many might you have done of that I think we shot that scene for two days so um yeah I I mean actually for Francis there was a there was a scene with um the character Sophie and I in a bathroom I think we did 50 takes of it um and I I wrote a piece for the T New York Times where I went through every single take um it was one shot so it had to be it wasn't like there was coverage or anything um and I went through every single one and I and tried to talk about like what was my experience of making it and then when I was looking at it what's what's my I can see what wasn't quite right about it um so yeah it's I mean I think as a performer just I always feel safest when there's language that I understand and so youut you so learning lines are super important and yes and and yeah and I think that's also the way that I get into to my physical self in it is um once I have the language then it settles enough in my body that I stop being I mean I don't know my experience of being an actor is just being um I saw I saw one of these sort of situations um with the The Darden Brothers the filmmakers and they said something like they were talking about rehearsing with their actors and they said it takes about two weeks for actors to not be embarrassed of their bodies and I I thought that's that's right there's something embarrassing about making choices as a character that you kind of have to work through and let go so I I I feel like once I have the language and I let it settle and once I get over the discomfort of of um you know making bold choices but um yeah it all kind of comes through words but you you trained as a dancer as well yes I did dance not not like Francis danced but I loved dancing dancing and and that's obviously physical but you you you feel verbal and do you think the is that does that physicality that training did that help when you moved into directing in terms of thinking about where bodies go in space and so on yes it did and it also um I think uh it it choreographing groups of people came naturally to me um because of that and then seeing the camera as another person that was um dancing in the space um I felt like with ladybird I was I was actually I I kind of made rules for myself about how I was going to move the camera and not move the camera because um well I kind of had an image of ladybird like that I wanted it to be almost like um the stain glass painting or stained glass windows and churches where it's like each scene of all of the things they're like no he's fallen wait he got up you know like each scene is like a different and I sort of because it's Catholic school and all of that I was sort of like thinking of everything as like sort of a presentation within uh a frame um and I think I also gave myself that rule because because I it was you know I was scared and it was overwhelming so I was like okay think of every shot as composed like composed within this and um I didn't move the camera very much because I I didn't it felt wrong but then when I got to Little Women I had the opposite feeling I felt like I wanted the camera to be alive and curious and a dancer like I almost wanted the camera to start young and then get older like the girls did so there was a lot more movement I tend to like cameras that move on uh you know either on a dolly either on a track more than I like steady cam because I get kind of confused about where we're meant to be but I like sort of composing shots that move on Wheels um I love Wheels great invention um but and then yeah and then when I got to um but I wanted it to feel more sort of caught and then when we got to Barbie I kind of wanted it to be again presentational but out of a totally different um like drawing from a different aesthetic which was more you know Sound Stage musicals and um that look and feel but I think how the camera is breathing to me and and moving and interacting or not interacting or holding back or coming in is it's in it's as important of blocking as anything and it's not just for what the image is on screen which of course I care about but what is what's almost the philosophy of the how the camera is moving all the time and that feels um yeah more delicate uh and and I think but I think coming at it from dancing helps me think about it um so it's less a machine and more of a person should we have a look at um a clip from ladybird now and we can see how still you kept the frame in this one pretty still [Laughter] guys do you think I look like I'm from Sacramento you are from Sacramento you don't have to do that well it's nice to make things neat and clean you ready go home ready her hand moved behind his head and supported it her fingers moved gently in his hair she looked up and across the bar and her lips came together and smiled mysteriously you've been listening to The Grapes of Wrath by John Stein if you our College trip took 21 hours and 5 minutes hey when wa let's just sit with what we heard are you serious well we don't have to constantly be entertaining ourselves do we I wish I could live through something aren't you nope the only exciting thing about 2002 is that it's a paland Drome okay fine well yours is the worst life of all so you win oh so now you're mad no it's just you're being ridiculous because you have a great life I'm sorry I'm not perfect no one's asking you to be perfect just consider it would do I don't even want to go to school in this state anyway I hate California I want to go to the east coast your dad and I will barely be able to afford instate tuition there are loans your brother you're very smart brother he can't even find a job he and Shelly work they have job they bag at the grocery store that is not a career and they went to Berkeley your father's company is laying off people right and left did you even know that no of course you don't because you don't think about anybody but yourself an Immaculate Heart is already a luxury Immaculate fart you wanted that not me Miguel saw someone knifed in front of him at sack high is that what you want so you're telling me that you want to see somebody knifed right in front of you I saw that I want to go where culture is like New York or at least Connecticut or New Hampshire where writers live in the wood into those schools anyway mom you can't even pass your driver's because you wouldn't let me practice the way that you work or the or the way that you don't work you're not even worth state tuition Christine my name is ladybird uh well actually it's not and it's ridiculous call me lady bir like you would just you should just go to City College you know with your work ethic just go to City College and then to jail and then back to City College and then maybe you'd learn to pull yourself up and I'd expect everybody to do everything um I want to ask you about the editing and that but first of all will you just indulge me as a writer and just tell me you that's a solo credit yes yeah and just will you tell us just give us two minutes on your writing routine where you like to work and how you work as a writer um oh well I yeah I mean um writing is um it's like the thing that I I I most enjoy having done and that feels painful while I'm doing it um is writing feels painful to me I in some deep way like it it's um do you agree with this yeah I'm afraid so because it's sort of great when you've done it and it's yeah it's can have nice moments but it's anyway go on yeah no it's like it I don't know it's sort of like I mean first of all you're by yourself and it's quiet and um and like every voice you've ever had in your head that tells you like you you're not very good is Extremely Loud and then you're like no no just wait and then you write something and it's not so good and the voices are like well and you're like I've got to keep going um and so it's just like negotiation I feel like uh the way I work is I tend to I work uh I I I kind of collect things over time like um I mean at least this is sort of so far it's like I'll collect little moments or things or lines or something that feels interesting to me and this is whether I'm adapting something or or writing something totally from scratch and then and then that pile will will grow and then it starts to feel like it has some shape underneath it I mean I I'll work um I tend to I like working in public but I at some point it felt like I was doing performance art because I was like right in my screenplay and I was like oh no and then I then I feel like people were like what you working on and I'm like nothing good um uh so but I I did I I always like writing in libraries because um I like people people's energy but they don't let like it when you fall asleep in a library um which I I often fall asleep when I'm writing or I that sounds sort of while but I I do I feel like I write for a while and then like part part of me gets very tired and I like put my head on the desk and I um I nap for like um 10 minutes and then I kind of jolt awake and I um but I feel like I always have to sneak sneak up on writing like it's not something like if I approach it head on it's too scary so I feel like I'm always creating these strategies to sneak up on it like waking up doing it first thing before you're like the voices have woken up they get up later um so you're like you're not awake yet I'll get some out and then um and then kind of trying to like in between moments because when I started writing when I was writing um Francis um I I would write in makeup on sets or like different things like it was sort of kind of this like illicit romance I was having and it was like Stolen Moments which was a way to kind of trick myself into it so it's like a lot of different um different things there is a wonderful moment when you've got enough stuff and the thing seems to want to exist when it sort of all uh it's not there yet but it's kind of all like shimmering in front of you and you can kind of feel what the whole thing is and that's a great moment and then it feels like it's all coming extremely fast and it's like you're in the dream um but everything leading up to that moment is like if someone was like try to saw off your toe with this laptop you're like I don't want to that's that's too hard and it's good it's uh and good good tips I know lots of writers who who need that sneaky up thing uh writing late at night or at times when they can feel that internal editor turned off a bit or no one's around um yeah and the edit that we we we didn't have the next very next shot which I think is a either cast or a yeah and it's it's a really hard cut it's funny it it also lets you know oh God this thing which could have killed someone it's actually it's okay it's okay yeah um right um you've had the same editor on the the last three films you've directed can you talk to us about your how how how do you Do You Love the edit is it a good time yeah I mean the edit is actually I mean everything no more soaring off of body parts yeah no I mean writing writing I think is the most painful but it's the thing I mean I it sounds like you know sort of it it's a thing you got to go into the first of all the treasur is always guarded by the dragon like they are not just leaving treasure around so you got to go to and and you don't go in with other people you go in alone and it sucks and that's like right it's like you got to go and then you've got it and then you're like oh I get to go get actors and a DP like it's like then it's so fun like you've got this treasure and then you get to keep making the movie which is wonderful so it's just the writing part where it's my experience of it and maybe one day I'll love it I wish I could like just but it's scary for me I don't know maybe it's anyway um so so when I'm editing it does have it's wonderful because it's I I love my editor I've worked with him on all three movies and um you know you have to you're sitting together for months on end and you are you're one of those you're a you don't give him a bunch of notes and then go and walk around the block you you're in there and watch him cut cut yeah yeah I watch him cut um uh and I I was going to say we've never gotten annoyed with each other but I don't actually know if that's true for him um I know it's true for me I I I mean he's just um he's very calm he's very rigorous he's um he's he he really takes on when we start showing it notes and feedback in a way that you know I've really like almost like learned from him how to do it which um I I I think I you know instead of resisting it he really leans into like and then what part didn't work for you and why and and I part my probably my ego is like Don't just run away run away and just don't ask um and he's like no we have to really dig in and find out what's what's not working and um so I feel like I've gained a lot from him but I think as a writer and I think that this goes to the sort of precision is of of writing is um like I I like that cut at the end after she falls out of the car and then it cuts to the cast that was written in the script that was a cut so a lot of cuts I have I write in because I that's I think in a way because I started off an independent film you can spend ages working on your script and it's free like that part's free yeah so you can really try to get very precise with it as you know so that you know what you want to um what you want to shoot and and be kind of um Critical with it of it and and and work it and I think I also got that from writing with Noah Bach who's extremely like um he's ruthless with his scripts so I think that that was the other so I kind of had that as a template and you don't have a ton of material that's not been seen you don't you don't write overly long I do but then I cut but then you cut script not not not not in the in the edit yeah most of my movies are pretty near close what the scripts look like I mean yeah there's some some things missing but but I I tend to really write like things unfold the way they unfold I don't I I don't I find it again in the edit but I find it as it was in the script if that makes sense yeah um yeah listen we I want to leave plenty of time to talk about Barbie which is obviously I mean we're all cists here and we want to talk about truo but I think we can call Barbie's a monster hit so we need we need time to talk about it okay um so but I want to just very quickly touch on Little Women so let's see Little Women clip we can just ch chat about that and then we'll have a some time to talk about Barbie okay get ready for camera moves y'all is that how you speak on Set uh yeah just like that I'm a failure Joe is in New York being a writer and I'm a failure that's quite a statement to make it 20 well Rome took all the vanity out of me and Paris made me realize I'd never be a genius so I'm giving up all my foolish artistic hopes why should you give up Amy you have so much talent talent is in genius and no amount of energy can make it so I want to be great or nothing and I will not be some commonplace Dober and I don't intend to try anymore what women are allowed into the club of geniuses anyway the brones H that's it yes I think so and who always declare as genius men I suppose I'm cutting down the competition that's a very complicated argument to make me feel better do you know do you feel better I do think male or female I am of middling Talent middling Talent then may I ask your last portrait be of me all right now that you've given up all your foolish artistic hopes what are you going to do with your life polish up all my other talents and become an ornament to society that's where Fred vaugh comes in I suppose don't make fun I said his name you're not engaged I hope no but you will be if he goes down properly on one KN most likely yes he's Rich richer than you even I understand Queens of society can't get on without money although it does sound odd from the mouth of one of your mother's girls I've always known I would marry Rich why should I be ashamed of that there's nothing to be ashamed of as long as you love him well I believe we have some power over who we love it isn't something that just happens to a person I think the poets might disagree well I'm not a poet I'm just a woman and as a woman there's no way for me to make my own money not enough to earn a living or to support my family and if I had my own money which I don't that money would belong to my husband the moment we got married and if we had children they would be his not mine they would be his property so don't sit there and tell me that marriage isn't an economic proposition because it is may not be for you but it most certainly is for me oh that's Fred can you unbutton me please thank you how do I look do I look all right look beautiful you are [Applause] beautiful yeah it not a huge amount in that but the know overall people will remember no but it's breathing oh oh we're talking about the camera other yeah no it just it f like yeah well it just follows them as they go like meaning it's not just static and they're moving within it it's just it's allowing it to breathe but this is when they're older um when they're younger it's swir yeah everyone who knows the film will I think know what you're talking about in terms of how you would this is a sad camera like there really should be a glossery for the technical terms you're throwing at them but um look it up side camera no um but I think everyone who knows the film will'll see that how you attacked it and let that camera have all that flare and also you did the same thing with The Narrative of you know what is especially in the US a real venerable text that's been done on stage and been shot a few times do was it the love of the material how did you how did you make yourself feel so free to adapt it well I mean Successful way in a way it came out the sort of same way we were talking about like I mean I'd read the book a lot when I was young um it was my one of my favorite books um and then I hadn't read it again until I was about 30 and I just you know it's like when you revisit something that meant something to you when you were young and then you encounter it when you're older it just there were things in it that I never heard or that I didn't I didn't register and I think mostly when people think about Little Women what they're thinking about is the first half of the book which is when they're girls and it was the second half of the book that I was like this is incredible and I particularly the character of Amy I mean so many of the lines I just took straight from the text is is her saying I want to be great or nothing that's what she says and I always felt that she'd been treated to this as this frivolous character like she was not um she wasn't as serious as Joe it was just sort of a hobby and I thought no it's not this meant something to her and that she sort of has and and I think I mean what she's saying of like you know realizing the limitations of her own talent and her own ability ities I've that's I mean that's painful I mean that's a painful grownup thing to um go through so I think I I started taking these moments that were speaking to me differently and really what I saw was this kind of conversation between them as adults them as children and then who Louisa May Alcott actually was and what her sister and her life actually was and in a way the fact that it had been adapted so many times up until this point became almost like I wasn't just adapting the text as text I was adapting every version of it like there was kind of an ER text which is a memory and so even like when we shot in our movie when she sees Professor bear under the umbrella I made a a flip book of every film adaptation that had the two of them under an umbrella because it's part of this memory of what that means and it it's made up I mean she never it was in the book but she never you know she never got married she never had children her publisher wanted her to end it this way and she did because it was an economic decision and what's funny about that scene is I remember when I I I wrote that scene and you know just you get notes along the way and and people were like oh why are they talking about art like it should be like about falling in love and I was like well sometimes talking about art is falling in love um and I but I do feel like you know it it's something that um you know I just the only way I can describe it it's almost like the thing starts glowing like I can see um you know maybe I'm thinking of like is it like in The Da Vinci Code where like texts start glowing or is that just like like and I'm like I'm seeing a pattern you know I I don't know if that's true I guess I was I was thinking about your insistence on well not insistence but the film's giving due weight to all the sisters and in particular Amy and Joe right and maybe there's a parallel there with I don't know different ways of being a woman and uh insisting on or requesting their requesting that um possibility and Barbie so should we watch a bit of Barbie yes yes it's a song will you just give us it's been such a remarkable sensation can you give us a sense of what it's felt like to be I went to see it in SoHo and the crowd was almost like nothing I'd seen before in terms of the anticipation and the warmth in the room have you have you felt that yourself have you been to screenings and you've felt that from audiences yeah I I it's incred I mean it's incredible it's sort of like I mean I I was invited to to go on this journey originally Margot Robbie came to me and said you know would you like to to write this and then um once no and I had written the script as she I said I wanted to direct it and and then we just you know she was obviously the producer and the star and um with her and uh David Heyman and uh Tom mly it like really just put together this incredible team of people and the process of making it was such Joy I mean every person on screen every actor every crew member it was like the most joyful set I've ever been on and I think that was true for a lot of people it felt that way and I don't know I if it was the pink or um you know the music but it was infectious it was like and so the the process was so joyful that um you know I thought well if I can make a movie movie that say h h you know half or quarter as fun to watch as it was to make I think I think maybe we've got a shot and so to see that reflected back is the most it's sort of what I said at the beginning it's like this incredible sense of like you know the song that's in my heart is in other people's heart and that just um it felt extraordinary and and really um on the opening weekend I was in New York City and I um I was I went around to different the and sort of stood in the back and then also like Turned Up the Volume if I felt it was playing it maybe not the perfect level and inquired about bulbs in the screens and everyone's like get her out of here at first um but it but it it it's it was just it was the most thrilling thing you know I I I love going to movies I you know grew up going to movies and it wasn't really until I was in college that I I started going to like that I started getting an education in more um Art House Cinema and like Cinema as a kind of as a history um but growing up I'd go to you know big movies at the big movie theater and um I think a part of me had always wanted to recreate that feeling from childhood of of um being in a dark room with a bunch of people and it's it felt sort of like Hollywood or something you know and um so it it it was just Mo so moving to me that that was the thing that people experienced and I mean now when we watched that right it feels like oh that was the way that you make a Barbie movie it feels like that's the obvious and only way to make a Barbie movie but before you had made the Barbie movie it must have been quite a swing it must have been that's it's a very bold set of choices that you took and how did you know did you just start feeling writer and writer as you wrote and conceived yeah yeah yes I mean I I love the script we wrote and that again I I think I don't know if I said this exactly but for me it is it's like once you've got a piece of writing that feels great that's when there's a reason to make a movie so I love the script we wrote but um yeah I mean when I I mean I think this sequence in particular is just filled with choices that thrilled me and made me so happy but then when i' come home or like driving home from the end of the day I'd think oh no I can't take it back I mean like when they arrive on the beach and I had every one of those Kens pretend to move in slow motion we're not shooting it in slow motion they're just going like and then I just encouraged me I was like that could be just the most Dreadful choice and no one will understand it it will just be embarrassing for everyone and and and also with like I mean there's so many things in it like even the the whole dream ballet it just said in the script like and then it becomes a dream ballet and they work it out through dance and there was like a big meeting that it was like do you need this and I was like I everything in me needs this and and and they were like what is what do you even mean what is it what is a dream ballet and I was like a dream ballet where do I begin um I was like the greatest dream ballet of all time is in Singing in the Rain which has a dream ballet inside of a dream ballet yes it is literally he says J Kelly is saying I'm going to pitch this thing to you and then you kind of go into his mind which is a dream ballet and then inside that he sees Sid Sharice on the stairs and then they go into another one and it's like the L and I was like if people could follow that in Singing in the Rain I think we'll be fine I think people will know what this is so that was kind of like a big reference point but it I I think even even though everything felt right to me and was giving me so much joy in the way we were doing it it was also like yeah every day I thought oh no this could go this could be just terrible but now I've committed so I guess I I hope I am taking these wonderful people to a good place and not and not um a bad one so yeah but it was definitely scary yes um I'm well I'm I I also feel very um the call out of the BBC's PR and Prejudice was entirely for me that's my experience um and I was very honored that they said yes to that um that was a it was a big deal um it was it was it was they don't always say yes to to um because you know but anyway anyway um so thank you to Jennifer El and Colin F that was very lovely um I yeah I mean the writing the sort of embroidering it with things that were really specific was part of the fun of everything I mean I would say probably in all my films but in particular this one because it's Barbie it felt so much more um kind of naughty in a good way that we were putting in references that you know there's like a proce joke in the movie and there's like a joke about the band's pavement which is exactly I mean explains its popularity exactly exactly but I was I was a screening that you know someone like I one of the ones I was standing in the back and and like she's he's like remember Bruce Barbie that did not sell and one lady was like ah and I was like it was for you um actually one thing that I thought was going to be like a such a i I like I in Little Women I was like when he's like what women are LED into the club of geniuses anyway when she's like the brontes I was like that's a howler not one no I was like well is they do they got in I mean the men were like well we'll give it to them and they did some good writing um uh anyway but I I I think I do I do enjoy having things that feel sort of specific and strange and you know um it's like it's like it you know those Al hfield like character the paintings he did it's a um he did drawings for the New Yorker they were or they all hanging in anyway they look them up they're great but he used to hide his daughter's name in in everyone her name was nah so you can look and it's in the hair somewhere it's her name and I feel like doing jokes that feel extremely specific it always feels like hiding Nina in a in a painting yes um yes well I I will say I didn't necessarily that's beautiful and thank you and I didn't necessarily intend for those to be that way I mean it sort of in in some ways I think um I'm a little bit of a stranger to myself in in like a writing process because I don't always know the thing I'm interested in while I'm in it and then I look at it later and I'm like you're interested in girls but like it to me it each time I'm like oh this feels so different um but I do I am actually extremely interested in in in in girl the lives of girls and women as um short story is that I like um is titled but I I think it's um it's something that I keep being uh uh drawn to and I certainly haven't tired of it but it's not it's not a sort of a thesis in a way um but yes I'm working on something right now but I'm in I'm in um the writing process and it's hard and I'm having nightmares I'm having recur recurring nightmares I'm please make your films um uh make them um yeah I would say I I mean in a way it's sort of the number I would say first finding things that I loved was um the you know really loving something was the beginning of it and starting when I started to see real films Real Cinema from like authors that I could identify like in in college those were there were big moments for me where I suddenly realized Cinema had its own language and its own um kind of set of impossible rules but that they all got broken it was just like I I suddenly started seeing Cinema for what it is which is an art form um and so that love was the first thing and then I actually had it was like this combination of um you know having being able to make things with my friends and people who around me even before it was something that was kind of possible to to make a career out of which was um which was lucky but I also think findable like people who who who love the same things you love and hate the same things you hate um and um have this sort of same frustrations and excitement um Community I think is extremely important um and then I was given gifts by uh other filmmakers who um were you know ahead of me I mean obviously Noah who's my my partner in life and also art was a huge part of that um but also um you know certain directors I had worked with um Rebecca Miller or Mike Mills were really um encouraging and then just at this moment I realized that one of them is and I've told this story to her I realized Sally Potter is here and um I'm sort of emotional saying this but she she was someone who looked at me and saw that I wanted to direct and it was before I had done it and we were at a dinner and I was asking her about writing and she said why don't you ask me what you really want to ask me I was like what do what do I want to ask you and she said you really want to ask me about uh directing and I was like how do you know and she said because it's written all over you it's very obvious and I and I but I felt like I had the privilege of being seen by people so I feel like finding Community finding commu your community and then looking for your angels I think they'll come I mean I and I've just been blessed to see to have those people come across my path and um and I think you'll find them [Applause] yeah well I mean honestly it's sort of the same process really it's um I mean with Barbie um I kind of you know I I no one I wrote it together but initially it was like I just had all these different moments like I had this you know I kind of went back and thought about I was like well I must have a someone just totally destroy a Barbie like cut all the like I was like that's true yes and then I was thinking about just all the things we do with bar Barbie I thought about like how when I was a kid and I'd look at Barbie's at the toy store and they were behind their boxes and they were um perfect and they hair like the biggest Barbie was the one with the biggest hair and the box was w it wasn't narrow it was wide for her hair and like and there was something about that that I was like I want I was just collecting sort of whatever moments and Gathering them into something and then um and then I I just kept doing that and then I had enough of those moments that then I put it in front of Noah and then he was like oh this maybe there's something here and then we started kind of going back and forth with it but I I have to say it hasn't really changed for me I haven't become it doesn't um I've never quite figured out how to do it another way if I could figure out how to like properly outline or like know where I'm going before I'm going there I'd do it it seems less um you know halfhazard but um yeah it does feel like I I just gather things and then I I kind of get a sense of it and then I and then I Forge forward with what I've seemed to have worked out oh yeah well um I I do I love act I love acting um and I I again it sort of depends on what it is it does feel like similarly process of gathering like little moments little things that feel important to me for a character for I I mean I just the last time I did it was for Noah in white noise and um that I I mean it's a sort of heightened World in white noise it's a they're not quite psychological characters in the same way that you know like a Tennesse Williams character is it's a it's a it's almost exists more in a literary sense but I feel like since the whole movie and the book was kind of about this this kind of the mechanism we Ed to avoid the reality of death I I I ended up reading just tons of death Literature Like I mean I mean and things I had avoided because I knew I wouldn't like to know um like at the the death of even ilich like which I studiously avoided and then I I finally was like just read it it's like 50 pages and I did and it's devast there was a reason I was avoiding it um it's great and it's setting because it feels true um so I kind of I I tend to go to like reading music you know I I played a character in um in uh Jackie uh which was a movie directed by Papa and I played um Nancy Tuckerman who was a real person so I did sort of research there but also the way he was shooting it was so um almost like um poetic and gestural that was less about you know nailing a thing and more about being open to this um process so I think as an actor in some ways I try to really put myself uh in I I I like being in the hands of a director and and giving kind of over to what they want in a way I'm not I'm the opposite of um that's why I've never acted in my own films and I wouldn't want to because I don't I don't like I like giving over when I act and I I would I would deny myself the pleasure of both things if I did it because I love watching actors act and I love giving to director and if I had to act in my own thing I wouldn't get any of it um so I won't do that well ladies and gentlemen thank you very much thank you for your generous and thoughtful answers ladies and [Applause] gentlemen

Channel: BFI

Views: 58,734

Keywords: British Film Institute (Publisher), British, film, institute, films, movie, movies, cinema, BFI, culture, Greta Gerwig, Barbie, Oscars, awards, Academy Awards, Margot Robbie, Little Women, Ryan Gosling, women, Frances Ha, Hannah Takes the Stairs, writing, directing, acting, screenwriting, Noah Baumbach, Succession, Jesse Armstrong, TV, Television

Id: joUKN8ezVio

Length: 60min 29sec (3629 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 29 2023