Is she like you? Nelly? You know,
I thought no, and then I’ve had friends who’ve seen the movie be like, “Oh,
that’s totally you!” And I was like, “I don’t know whether I should be like offended by that.”
Other than the obvious fact that we’re both actors I didn’t see us having anything in common.
Um, but, in hindsight, yes, maybe we have a little more in common than I thought.
Tell us about working with Damien Chazelle. He’s brilliant. I mean, for someone as young as
him to have the breadth of knowledge he has and to be such an insanely good director it’s just
thrilling and exciting and I loved it. I loved it, I loved every single day on that set.
And when you get a director like that, do you ever kind of… presumably you don’t ever
look back and compare your directors, compare your directing styles. I mean,
are there types of direction that you prefer over others? Do you like to be left alone to get
on with it or do you want direction? No, I want-- I like direction. And again
it’s not so much, it is… I do compare them, it is interesting to like line everyone up
and kind of be like, “Oh, that seemed to work really well and that didn’t.”
I’ll be asking who your favourite is in a minute.
Yeah, a little bit. No, but no, it’s just interesting to see what works and what doesn’t
work. But the variables change every time because every time you’re playing a different character
and you’re in a different movie. It just … Damien on a totally different film I don’t know how he
directs on that. But for Babylon, the way he directed was to be both incredibly specific and
precise and technical about some things and then a complete, you know, freestyle, a free-for-all
in other ways. You know, kind of the way Scorsese was like in Wolf Of Wall Street, “Everyone, go. Go
crazy!” He would do that, and then he would also be incredibly specific. Like, “I need you on that
line and on that word, and I need the inflection to go up there, and, nope, say it again.” But I’d
say what I can say for every director that I’ve worked with. The thing that I appreciate most
is a director that expects a lot from me. The only thing I don’t like-- I like all different
kind of directing techniques, love it all. The ones where they leave alone or not or whatever.
The only thing I don’t like is if someone doesn’t expect a lot from me, if that makes sense. You
know, if I do this take and they’re like, “Lovely, that was good, ok, let’s move on,” I’m like,
“What? That wasn’t good, that was just ok and you’re gonna move on? Like, no,
like push me! Tell me that it needs… You know, I’ll give you everything. Just
don’t settle because I’m not gonna settle.” That’s the only thing.
Do you know, when you’ve done a good performance?
MR: Yeah, you can feel it, and you can feel-- Do you know at the time, or..?
Some things you don’t know at the time and then you see it on screen and you’re like,
“Wow, that really worked.” Other times, it’s just you get that move magic moment and like,
maybe the crew claps or something like that. And you can tell like everyone—there’s like a buzz in
the air. Suddenly, things are kind of crackling and you’re just like, “Ooh, wow, we just tapped
into something, that was crazy.” And is she like you?
Nelly? You know, I thought no, and then I’ve had friends who’ve seen the movie be like,
“Oh, that’s totally you!” And I was like, “I don’t know whether I should be like offended by that.”
Other than the obvious fact that we’re both actors I didn’t see us having anything in common.
Um, but, in hindsight, yes, maybe we have a little more in common than I thought.
And presumably, it’s an incredibly meta experience.
It is making a movie about making a movie, because…
Also with some people who aren’t normally actors.
Yes, yes. Totally, totally. But like things like that scene that you just saw, you can’t help but
re-enacting it. Like you know, in the scene, Ruth comes up, the director, and she’ll be
like “Can I get you to like, just one tear, and on that line, and then I’m gonna do a lighting
thing.” And then my character’s like “Yeah, sure. No problem.” We’d do it again and again. But we’d
shoot that and then Damien would come up and be like, “I hate to ask this of you, but--
you crushed it, but if I can just even get two tears, but one to fall down your right cheek
and then one to fall down your left cheek, is that too much to ask?” And I’d be like,
“Yeah, sure I’ll do it,” and he’d be like, “Ok great.” You know, it was like us doing
the scene doing the scene. It was kind of… it was insane. And that happened numerous
times on the set because there are numerous times where you see actors making a movie in the film.