Maggie Gyllenhaal craved a challenge, and she found it in Elena Ferrantes unnatural mother.
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Her work is now Oscar-nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay.
The rights were unavailable, so I was asked to considerThe Lost Daughterinstead.
She breaks the agreement, and it feels like the shattering of something.
Obviously in a book, you could do whatever you like.
Cinematically, it was a risk.
What is its purpose in the storytelling?
And how do I express that purpose as non-literally as possible?
How do I express it with as fewwordsas possible?
Certainly not with words that ever say what the event is.
Im compelled by the challenge of how can you use as few words as possible.
I had never seen it before.
I didnt see all of them.
I jumped around in the order.
And they were all like, Do I have any packages?
No, sorry maam.
Or, Id like to apply for the job of the milkman!
All the storytelling was told inside of the filmmaking.
I think thats what I aspire to.
In the movies I like, youre going, Okay, where am I?
How am I supposed to relate to you?
How do you relate to these other people?
Do I like you?
The way youve chosen to do it here turns the viewing experience into something more like a detective story.
What is her deal?
is the question I kept asking during that opening section.
I love that movie.
How is he related to … Im so lost that I dont care.How do you walk that line?
And then, How do we express what its about?
It can have an ease to it if we agree on what its about.
That scene I would call it theeventof that scene is revealing a secret.
In fact, it was expressed many, many different ways.
There were times when Olivia was totally impassive, there were times when she was full of rage.
And all of them told the story.
Its funny, we did tons of shot listings with Helene.
She asked me questions about light.
It turns out I haveverystrong feelings about light!
Instead of it being an imaginary place, youre in a real place.
And it changes again of course when you have real human beings there.
I said, Helene, Im an actress.
Despite already having made lists of shots ahead of time?We were playing jazz the whole time.
We were moving and shifting, and we really came up with a visual language together.
There were a couple days we budgeted for aRonin operator, which is a camera thats like a Steadicam.
But when the operator arrived, I was like, This is wrong.
This does not feel like my movie anymore!
What was wrong with it?
Was it too smooth?It was not Helene!
I got like a $50,000 price tag for staging the car accident Leda gets into at the beginning.
I was like, Fuck it.
I dont need to see the car accident.
Theyre both great actresses, and they both could have done it, but it limits expression.
So anyway, back to the Ronin.
I was like, Helene, I just want you to shoot it.
She doesnt want to.
She says its going to look like an elephant is holding the camera.
I said, I dont care.
I want you to shoot it.
Its almost like you want to turn your head to see more and you cant.
And all of a sudden I was like, There.
Thats really how we worked.
Not the stupid version of that Im not as interested in objectifying fantasies and sexuality.
So much of the beginning of the film, Dakotas being adored and observed.
Theres a lot of people watching; Olivias Leda does a lot of watching in the film.
Objects and props are often important tools to help actors focus and clarify their performances.
And wow, do we have a fantastic selection in this film: A hat.
Several oranges that peel like a snake.
You keep coming back to these objects over and over, examining them from different angles.
In many cases, there are different actors and sometimes different configurations of actors interacting with them.
I watched him decide what to do ahead of the shoot.
Guys, I need fish, and I need bread crumbs, and I need this and this.
All of a sudden, Jeff has an obstacle in a scene where there wasnt much of an obstacle.
Shit, its burning.
Part of your job as an actor is to create the circumstances.
Where are you coming from?
Where have you just been?
Where are you going?
What do you need?
Whats in your hands?
When I write, I often give a shot to create those kinds of circumstances to begin with.
And some of the most beautiful things in the movie came from my actors.
I didnt feel there was some sort of Chekhovian function to the hatpin.
Forgive me if you intended for them to and I just missed it.
But maybe there is some reason youre drawn to something for a while and repelled by something else.
Its much more a conversation of the unconscious.
Maybe this is the point where we dive into the unspeakable.
Im a parent to five.
To put it mildly, your movie doesnt endorse that.I think its an unreasonable expectation.
In my experience, having children is the biggest thing that has ever happened to me.
I would say the most challenging, but that implies only difficulty.
Theres no way to come to parenting as anything other than a total beginner.
The film is trying to be friendly and say its okay!
And even though it will be painful to look at some of these things, were here for you.
Oh my god!I recount that just to say, Look, were choosing a verychallenging heroine!
Were choosing someone who does the most aberrant, transgressive thing!
He said, Did people ask about the likability of Robert De Niros character inTaxi Driver?
But its different, I told him, because Travis Bickle is mentally ill. Can you relate to this person?
Can you be brave enough to consider that you might have some ways of relating to her?
And to further complicate that, she doesnt leave her children forever.
She leaves her children and then comes back.
And yet the damage inflicted by the leaving is still immense.Its very complicated.
Is this gonna pass?
I also see Leda in that scene as a kind of therapist.
It was interesting because youve seen how deep Ledas need is.
Shes sleeping with the doll right before that!
Its massive her need and her heat and her desire and her hunger.
But then when we were reading the scene, Olivia just seemed a little cold.
I thought that was really interesting, and I nudged her more and more that way.
I added a line at a certain point, where Leda says, Okay.
I didnt tell her how to say it.
Do you want the keys?
If you want the keys, take the keys.
If you dont want the keys.
And then we cut in close on Olivia.
People have also said to me, Why doesnt she just lie and say I found the doll?
Maybe because she has an overwhelming need to confess?
Shes really a hero.
We meet her when she is basically in a life-or-death situation, metaphorically.
Always in those darkest hidden parts of ourselves, theres a little bit of life.
And she does it.
She goes down into it.
So of course she has to tell the truth that she took the doll.
And in fact, ultimately, she does tell Nina, No, it doesnt pass.
I think Nina stabs Leda because shewantsit to pass, shewantsit to get better.
And the truth is, life is … that bit fromThe Princess Bride:Life is pain, highness!
Anyone who tells you differently is selling something!
Or at least, lifeincludespain.
You get better at living with both pain and pleasure.
The other line I wanted to ask you about is Im an unnatural mother.Thats a straight Ferrante lift.
They said, Its too literary.
But I didnt cut it because I dont think itsliteral.
I think its the opposite of literal.
I think its an impossible puzzle that reverberates on itself.
So how do you reconcile those things?
Well, thats the character.
Thats an idea worth thinking about.
Thats a person, I think, worth spending two hours with.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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