- I read the script
and I will automatically have a gut feeling towards it.
The philosophies following that in combination
with how the dialogue goes with the director
who I'm gonna work with.
If those two align,
it's a very good start.
[cheerful upbeat music]
Hi everyone, my name is Rebecca Ferguson
and this is the timeline of my career.
[upbeat music]
The whole story I think about getting the role
in "Nya Tider, New Times,"
was I started off in a modeling agency
because my mom had forced me in to do this competition,
but I was far too short,
and obviously didn't look like a super model,
so I was put into the people category,
and that's when the soap opera looked for their actresses.
They went through the people catalog
and I was asked to do a casting
and I think I turned it down once or twice
until my mother pushed me into the rooms
and forced me to do it.
I think at the age of 15,
it was a good age to capture someone I think
because the work environment became second nature to me.
We were doing two and a half episodes a day
so you would receive all of your scripts on the Friday
for the entire week and then you studied during the weekend.
We had two sets shooting at the same time
and because I was the lead,
I had to run in between.
So I rehearsed then shot,
then rehearsed then shot and shot and rehearsed.
It was an intense learning skill in learning lines
and crying very fast.
- I draw the blade upon myself,
if you come one step closer
I will cut my throat and die, right here.
- Play acting.
- I will not be your mistress.
- This was my first ever casting that wasn't in Sweden.
And I did have approximately seven birth scenes, I think,
where I had to give birth in different variations.
You know, in bed, on all four, on two blocks of stones,
pushing balloons down, having my first casting abroad
and landing that role and then being nominated
with the most incredible actors,
it was terrifying and wonderful and odd and unimaginable.
- Take care of him for me.
[actors grunting]
- We've never met before, right?
- The casting for Mission was one of the most insane
[laughs] everything with Tom Cruise is insane, full stop,
having lunch, it's all just insane,
and that's why we love him.
But yeah, I was in the desert,
on a camel called Barbie, I remember,
and I was asked to meet Tom Cruise
and I was you know, from the camel, the same day,
I was on an airline arriving Luten Hoo
and there he was, so relaxed in
a lovely blue cashmere jumper,
blue jeans, and shoes.
How 'bout that?
Yeah, and it was just really weird,
we bonded, we laughed, we drank coffee,
it felt very normal, and I think
a couple of days later, they called and
said, "You got the role, but you can't tell
anyone, it's a secret, we'll let you know
when you can tell someone."
When I arrived back in Morocco,
after the meeting with Tom, they then
flew over the stunting, to test my skills on
martial arts and general moves,
if I had what it took to be able to train me
to a level that I could do my own stunts.
I apparently had skills, maybe from dance
or something, it felt very natural
so it felt very obvious that I would
be doing the stunts myself
[thrilling music]
- That was the first day of shooting and
I remember heights was an issue for me.
And Wayde put me in a harness and brought
me up two meters and slowly put me down,
and then brought me up to like four meters
and slowly dropped me down. And then he just
kept on bringing me up and up and up to 15 or
something and he just let go of the release
so I flew with total force down,
and then a soft landing.
I mean, I was petrified and excited,
and I wanted to hit him and I mean I was
so furious and I loved him.
And he said "This is the worst thing that would
ever happen if something malfunctions."
That feeling of an instant drop will be
nothing and that kind of took me to a stage
that I could do the jump.
But I remember swearing when I jumped up
and I stradled Tom and he held me and I just,
every single bad word I could say.
I just screamed in his ear and he
went "Great, are you ready then?"
[dramatic music]
[loud clattering]
- This afternoon when the police brought
Scott back home, she was across the street.
[sigh]
- And when she saw me she got aggressive.
- Aggressive how?
- What if Rachel killed Megan?
- Funnily enough, I had just accepted the role,
and I went on holiday and by the pool
there were 3 separate people reading the book
and my ego just wanted to run up and go
I'm Anna by the way.
[mouths "I'm Anna"]
But it was quite fun because it was so present,
it was such a popular book for the time.
I think, I was interested in the fact that
she was neurotic and caught in a very horrible
relationship that she was trying to get out of.
And I also, the idea of speaking American has
always been a challenging thought,
and I always do love a challenge.
And then also, to be honest,
one of my main reasons was I really wanted
to work with Em, Emily Blunt.
She is absolutely phenomenal, incredible incredible woman.
- I'm not, I'm gonna stand right here,
I'm not going to come closer,
I just need to talk to you.
- I don't want to hear anything you have to say.
- Just ridiculous!
- I'm very very sorry.
- I shouldn't have to hide in my own home,
it's humiliating and there are rules.
- I think she was just overexcited.
- You want to speak to her?
- Yes that is a very good idea, I shall say
"Florence, although you pay the rent on my apartment,
would you mind not visiting-"
- Oh shut up.
- [Rebecca] I did all the research I could
and couldn't stop listening, I mean,
it's spectacular. But to be honest,
I was so drawn to Meryl, I was so
flabbergasted and, not star struck,
because Meryl just doesn't evoke that,
she's so much more than for you to be starstruck.
It's more in awe, really, of who she is.
I'd come to set sometimes,
when I wasn't in the scene, just to see
what she was like and to study her as an actress.
[loud singing]
[snickering]
- And I have never met anyone so humble and kind,
she would walk out and have fun
with everyone there.
She would do this scene over and over again,
and little bit of a stand-up in between
just to keep everyone happy.
But God, I remember the first table read.
Simon, who play the pianist, they all sang.
They all did the performance at
the table read, and I didn't.
I remember thinking, "Where am I? Why am I in this?
What have they done?"
[chuckles]
It was all around an incredible experience.
- Well let's just try and be happy tonight ay?
- And I'm trying.
[laughs]
- Yes, you certainly are.
[somber music]
- I know what I feel is not scientific,
it's not rational.
I feel hate,
I feel pure
fucking
hate
for that thing.
- I remember walking around with
Daniel Espinosa, the director.
He was so extremely eloquent, very smart,
mathematical, philosophical, I mean,
the man plays chess to calm down.
I was excited about his brain,
I was excited about where he wanted to take this.
I also love being thrown into moments
that I have never been before.
I mean, I had to do harness work and
line works with rope, to hover and to look
like we were floating in the ISS,
International Space Center.
I found the floating quite difficult,
because what you don't understand is,
counter reactions to things.
If you push some things, something else moves
in a different direction.
There is never a stillness.
You're constantly hovering, so when
we were doing scenes and just talking,
we were sitting on big Pilates balls,
and kind of moving around, there was
never a moment where you could just be still.
And when you learn lines and when you
are having a discussion or when you are
listening to each other, I pause, I look,
I listen, but you can't,
and if someone is going to also now
throw in a third situation on giving you
something or water's coming, you're going to
have to push off from this angle, to grab
the water from this angle, to come back
to the conversation, so your brain
is literally trying to handle four or five
things at the same time.
What I think is interesting, is every film I do,
we can compare to a nature disaster.
Politics of today, it's all constantly on
the agenda, but you can also just simplify it,
with the fact that it's just a story.
It's a story about people being stuck in an
environment, and having something threatening them,
and them all reacting in different ways,
due to their past or due to their own torment.
And I think saw that this film
in a much more simpler way.
How we respond to threat and what is threat?
- [Male Actor] and this has been your plan all along?
To make sure that, that creature doesn't get to Earth.
- Course you are the American, I believe
I might have heard of you.
- Oh, well, if you've heard of me
all the way over here, I must
be doing something right.
- That or something very wrong.
- [Rebecca] I absolutely love bu slam,
and quirkiness, musical, I can,
I can, appreciate a musical.
I also can find musicals, kind of in
my face annoying when they sing all the information.
You know, I understand that you're hungry
and you're going to take the bus.
What got me to fall in love with this was
the director, who basically walked up with
a beanie on his head and a television under his arm.
I love the fact that he didn't think that
I would have a television.
He said "You just stay here, where's your TV room?"
And I said "Upstairs, and hi."
And he went "Go away, don't worry about it,
come upstairs in a bit."
And I thought "This dude," and I said to
my boyfriend, "can you just stay,
just don't go anywhere."
And he just started, he just started
telling the story about P. T. Barnum.
Painted the most stunning picture
and I thought, "I'm happy to be a teacup,
in this film, I actually don't care
who I am," and then I happen to become Jenny Lind,
who obviously was someone I knew about.
So when I went on board I said "I'm really happy to
sing," and they said "We've got it covered."
And I thought "No, I know you got it covered,
but when I act it, I'm going to have to sing."
And because I went to music school,
I trained, and I got my voice ready,
and I did every take singing.
I said "Is it possible to merge them?"
I tried to push for my own voice to be
in this film, then I thought "Don't,
you're not even close."
I obviously don't have Lauren's
incredible, effortless tones.
I listened to the way that she paused
and sang, but she also bodied my movements,
so it was a complete merge of her voice and
my breathing and my movements and my singing.
- [Female Actress] ♪All the shine of a thousand spotlights, ♪
all the stars we steal from the night sky,
will never be enough.
Never be enough. ♪
- It was really fun and I would see Hugh in all
the oddities train together, and I would always
feel a little bit left out.
A little bit like Jenny, probably.
I wanted to be in the gang, in the cool gang.
Such a fun shoot,
Hugh is a really really close
friend, which means, the environment,
is a complete utter safe space, you can do
silly choices, you can challenge each other,
you can throw curve balls, you can discuss
things, and test limits, because when you're
that close, you know limits.
He's a thespian.
- People come to my show for the
pleasure of being hoodwinked.
Just once, I'd love to give them something real.
- Now tell me where he is.
- I can't help you.
- I will get to him one way or another.
Please don't make me go through you.
- I was about six months pregnant, I think,
and I was quite big, and I still
was doing the stunts, so yes, we had buckets,
on the set, I would throw up, and to be honest,
I would hide those buckets.
No one really knew about it, because I knew
that if I would tell them, then
they would call it a day.
I do actually have a story, but I'm not sure
if I should share.
It's about a fanny fart, that's literally
when we fart with our fannies.
I'm going to go for it, I don't care.
Shawn Harris is one of the actors.
He is awkward, uncomfortable, so
terrifyingly scary and he knows it.
And then I kind of fell in love with him
in the second film, we got a good connection.
And there's a scene where I can do my famous
killer thigh move, when I jump up and
I wrap a leg around.
Since I'm ridiculously pregnant and
boobs out to here, they forklift me up.
I have I think four stunt guys lifting me up on him.
And I do the twist and he kind of lies
down on the ground, I have to position myself,
positioning yourself on top of someone's face
when you are pregnant, not sexy.
And I then have to grab my leg around his neck
and I pull my leg, and the biggest fanny fart
comes out and he's literally caught
between boobs and my big tummy.
And all I heard was, "Get me out of here!"
[laughs]
And I sadly enough said, "I can't, just deal with it.
I can't move babes."
[church bells]
[car revs up]
[gunshot]
[kid groaning]
- NO please let me go, I won't tell, I won't tell-
[shushing]
- [Rebecca] Playing evil is not difficult,
I need to attack it in a way that goes even darker.
Now for me to be a mother, to be honest,
someone asked me this, and said,
"How are you going to do this?"
And I thought, "I don't really compare them,
they're not interesting, I have a wonderful
son at home, they are the same age,
I have also very clear things I need to be
doing, the way I have to, you know,
chop him up.
That my head is quite focused on the task ahead.
Which I also found quite interesting for
the role, it's like fileting sushi really.
It wasn't until the moment that Jacob started
screaming, I realized how, how much it affected me.
I'm behind the scenes, I'm waiting for the sound
or the noise that I know is my entrance,
and he started making this squealing,
sort of animalistic, guttural screams,
and I nearly burst out crying, behind the camera,
and I knew that I was suppose to enter.
So I'm standing, wiping tears from my face,
and here I am two seconds later saying,
"Oh I don't compare, it's not difficult,
I'm just bloody acting, aren't I?"
I went motherly, was my choice.
I cradled him, to play someone embracing a child,
and shushing them, and lullabying them into
safety, before killing them would probably be
the most abhorrent, horrendous thing,
I could ever imagine, but Jacob sold that.
He made that scene.
[whispers]
- Damn, I thought he had another few minutes in him.
- I wanted to mimic a little bit of
facial movements like Jack Nicholson did when
he walks up the stairs.
But I needed it to be mine, not his,
and we hadn't really decided how
she reacts in here, but I was playing her,
a character that had these tentacle emotions.
So I tried to access that when I was walking,
and sensing all the characters that have been
in this house previously.
I remember touching the walls,
and the I remember walking and then he said,
"to your right is the elevator."
I remember just thinking, "Well hi there."
I remember just sort of communicating to
this memory of something I could feel.
It was just, for me, wonderful.
[dramatic music]
- [Male Actor] We are House of Atreides.
There is no call we do not answer.
[punches]
The emperor asks us to bring peace to Arrakis,
House of Atreides accepts!
[exciting music]
- [Rebecca] I was very knowledgeable on
Denny's work, which was enough to have a
meeting with him, and he walked me through
the story and thrown into his childhood
dream, and to be a part of someone's nostalgic
sort of memory of something, is
even better.
And after that, obviously, I got the book up,
I read scripts.
I wasn't difficult in the sense that Denny,
had a vision, and then within that,
he gave me space to play, and to bring
my own idea of a scene.
Then I had, you know, the most exquisite actors
to work against, I mean, Timothee Chalamet,
Charlotte Rampling, Stella Skarsgard,
I mean, just so many.
- Will you protect Paul?
- With my life.
[dramatic music]
- [Rebecca] There are two separate versions
of deserts that were needed for the film.
So we have the rocky, hilly, mountainy locations
of Wadi Rum, and then we went to Abu Dhabi,
but it was so hot that we could only film
from 5:30 until 7:00am, until the sun came up.
Because the heat was so hot, the cameras
would literally melt.
And we were in these suits, which was manageable
when it was that hour, but then later on,
it was unbearable.
- [Male Actor] Well, if I'm not the future of,
House of Atreides.
[whirling wind]
- [Rebecca] I remember one of the scenes,
I didn't really understand how large these
sandworms were going to be.
I remember there was a scene where we were running,
and we had one nearby and Denny says, "Look at it!"
And I remember just thinking, "Oh no! There it is,"
and he goes, "No. No. Look up," and I went,
"Oh no," and he goes "No, look up!"
I kept on going
[chuckles]
I remember thinking, "Wow the scale of this is
pretty insane."
I think I evolve constantly with each
job that I do.
Sometimes, I think you just need to
shake it up a bit.
Why do I act in a certain way?
Why do I have certain ticks and mannerisms?
Which puts me in very stereotypical roles.
So I need to change my action,
to be offered the roles, that I'm also after.
I very rarely feel pressure when
it comes to making a film.
I deliver a character, I have fun doing it,
to bring it back, for example to Tom, Cruise,
he always makes movies for the audience.
Every time, if you are next to him on set,
he will ask the question,
"How will the audience receive this?"
"Do they understand the art?"
He constantly thinks about them,
I constantly think about myself.
Because I just think about a character,
I create a character, I have fun with a character.
Overall, I just want people to have a great
experience and to enjoy the film.