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Donald Glover knows what its like to be watched and hated and praised and obsessed over.
He has even seemed to court it, doing things (remember that self-interview?)
She seems really warm.
We wanted her to be Marissa, and she was like, Can I be the crazy one?
And I was like,Oh.
The fact that shewantedto do it was a lot of it.
Its probably a fun role to have, but its not an easy thing to do.
You asked her to watchThe Piano Teacher, the 2001 Michael Haneke movie, before you met.
Why?I was like, This is what youre getting into.
How does this make you feel?
A lot of people are very aware of their brand; theyre not trying to become great actors.
And in their defense, theres not a lot of upside to it anymore.
Its like being a craftsman who makes skillets well, Amazon exists.
Why would you spend time on an artisanal skillet?
But I was trying to make aplacewhere she could do whatever she wanted if she wanted to actually act.
Isabelle Huppert inThe Piano Teacherwas the most interesting character study Id seen in a minute.
Me and my brother were like, Well, who is that now?
Whos a young version of that?
Whos willing to do that?
She said it gave her pause, like,Can I really do this?Im glad.
That was the point.
It wasnt to scare her, but we never wanted to lie about what this was.
There was going to be someone else who would be willing to do this.
I dont know if theyd be able to do as great a job as Dominique did.
And I mean that honestly; Im really glad it was her.
But theres always somebody whos willing to take the risk.
And Im more interested in the risk.
Its just easy to make shit now.
Its easier to produce it.
And I am not interested in putting an audience on a slow methadone drip of content.
Im more interested in trying to give someone pause.
Well, this is extremelynota slow methadone drip of content.
It was really about like, Hey, are you willing to work?
Its not going to be easy.
Even on set, it was a lot.
But Im a rational person.
She really was lost a lot of the time.
We specifically didnt even let her know her own backstory.
I felt like if she knew it, she would be telegraphing it unconsciously to the audience.
I didnt want us to understand why Dre was doing this.
I didnt think that would be as much fun as just being this strange being.
I wanted her performance to be brutal.
Its just a raw thing.
I think actors in general, they want to get layered performances.
And I dont think Dre is that layered.
Its like a dream, these images your brains creating.
We wanted you to imprint your own idea on it.
I kept telling her, Youre not regular people.
You dont have to find the humanity in your character.
Thats the audiences job.
Dom was purposefully lost for us to get that raw reaction.
Shes a special actor.
Definitely one of the best Ive worked with.
I kept telling her, Think of it more like an animal and less like a person.
Thats what I wanted to have with her, and she really nailed that.
You do reveal some backstory eventually.
We meet her former foster parents and find out how she met Marissa.
We had people come in who had been in cults or around cults.
But we never answered it.
NXIVM?Yeah, that one.
It wasnt a former NXIVM person; it was just somebody who was around it.
He probably liked Nicki Minaj but obviously wasnt so tied to her.
He was like,Oh, I got to get rid of this account.
Let me use this.
We also thought a lot about how people are used or affected by accounts that might be bots.
If somebodys unhinged and they feel like theyre part of a community, what happens?
How is this wiring us?
We have people who are famous in the writers room and people youd barely know.
Everybody had a story about how they were roasted.
It was actually quite technical because youre dealing with blood and heavy objects in peoples faces.
So I was like, Were going to rehearse it a couple of times.
I felt like the tension really amplified the scene.
it’s possible for you to feel it through the lens.
It feels intense because it was like,Thats all we get.
Drew Daniels, the cinematographer, did an amazing job.
And Damson Idris and Dominique, they were on it.
They were not fuckin around.
After we yelled Cut!
everybody clapped and we all hugged and everything.
And then they were like, Theres a hair in the gate.
And I was like,No.
It was like someone had shot us.
It was just dead silence.
Well, using film does make it different.
You feel it immediately.That was a last-minute decision.
And I wanted this show to be Tumblr ready.
I wanna talk about the fantasy element.
Anything that works, we will take it.
Ill leave it at that.
Trying to anticipate or quell it is like trying to react to the ocean.
I mean, it might be fun for some of them.
Theres no judgment on any of these characters.
