Thursday, November 26, 2020
Kristen's interview with iNews (UK)
Kristen Stewart is outlining her ideal Christmas in Los Angeles. “I live by Thai Town and it’s the only food that’s available on Christmas Day,” she explains. “So I go to eat coconut soup early in the morning.” It’s not exactly chestnuts roasting on an open fire, but then, the 30-year-old former Twilight star has never done things conventionally.
This festive period, she stars in Happiest Season, which, on first sight, has everything you might expect from a Hollywood studio movie designed for the holidays: it is glitzy and twinkly, and the aspirational characters live in large houses with Christmas trees so big you would think they had been shipped direct from Norway. Only this Yuletide story is a little different.
Stewart plays Abby, who agrees to spend her Christmas with her girlfriend, Harper (Mackenzie Davis) – only to discover that Harper never came out to her conservative parents. No prizes for guessing that Happiest Season is a game of hide and seek, as Abby and Harper pretend to be roommates when they arrive, with Harper promising she’ll reveal all to her mother and father after the holidays.
A mainstream Christmas movie with a gay couple at its centre – not relegated to the support act – is something of a revelation. “I think it’s something that we’ll look back on and wonder why it hadn’t been reflected in our art a little earlier,” says Stewart. “Because obviously we have acknowledged queer existence in an open, cultural way… but do we see it in commercial film? No.”
It is no exaggeration to say Stewart is currently Hollywood’s highest-profile LGBTQ+ star. In 2017, when she hosted the US comedy show Saturday Night Live (SNL), she went into a riff in her opening monologue about Donald Trump (who had been tweeting about her break-up with her one-time Twilight co-star Robert Pattinson). “And Donald,” she declared, to hysterical cheers from the audience, “I’m so gay, dude.”
Watching that night was Happiest Season’s co-writer and director Clea DuVall, who came out several years before Stewart. “I’d always been such a fan of Kristen’s work… but when I saw her on SNL a few years ago, she was so funny and silly and warm,” she says. “It was this whole other side to her, and seeing that she was able to be so funny and so real made her perfect to play Abby.”
For Stewart, DuVall’s film signals a move into a more comic arena. Her comfort zone is tough-as-nails parts – Alzheimer’s tale Still Alice, the traumatic movie-star biopic Seberg, or the spiritual psychodrama Personal Shopper. She began in the heavyweight dramatic leagues, aged 12, when she caught attention in David Fincher’s Panic Room, playing Jodie Foster’s tomboy daughter.
So how was it finding her funny bone? “It was different, for sure,” she admits. “I was intimidated and really bowled over by the talented comedic actors we had around, but also encouraged, because they make it seem fun.” She breaks off, softly laughing at something that’s just struck her. “As lesbian as I am in the movie, I do play a character who’s the ‘straight man’.”
When we spoke over Zoom, with Stewart in LA, Happiest Season was all set for a major cinema release over Thanksgiving in the US. But with cinemas still shut due to the pandemic, the film is now being released online. In some ways that’s a major disappointment, but then again, the point of a film like Happiest Season is that it is revisited every Christmas. The idea that families might sit around and watch a mainstream lesbian romcom feels pleasingly radical.
“Little kids need to see Christmas movies where they might see themselves reflected in a broader sense,” says Stewart. “Let’s not marginalise the marginalised in art. Let’s allow there to be a lightness and a sort of ease and pleasure. There’s a delight to the movie that I think is really imperative to get across in this context.”
Talking to Stewart, you get the sense that being a role model has been thrust upon her. “It’s not a proactive thing I do,” she says. But how does she feel when fans tell her that her openness has helped them to come out? “Nothing makes me happier. But I’m not trying to push this stuff.” Her preference would be “a balanced and equal exchange” of experiences. “I am encouraged just as much by that.”
Raised in LA by parents in the entertainment industry – her father worked as a stage manager and TV producer, her mother as a script supervisor – Stewart wasn’t living amid the strict religious or conservative backdrops that some face when coming out. Still, she knew the confusion of understanding your own sexuality. “Growing up, trying to figure out whether it’s going to be OK is an experience I can definitely relate to,” she says.
She dated men when she was younger – most famously Pattinson – but by 2013, she was in a relationship with visual effects producer Alicia Cargile. “When I was 22, I grew into understanding myself in a more ambiguous way,” she says. She felt pressure to “put a label on it” and define what she was. “I was like, ‘That doesn’t really work for me.’” Following a relationship with the model Stella Maxwell, she is currently dating screenwriter Dylan Meyer.
Even now, Stewart knows that being gay isn’t easy – “living in a world where holding the hand of the person you love can make you or others uncomfortable”. She explains that she has just got back from a small road trip. “I entered some, like, Trumpian territory, and I felt scared. I have experience of trying to shape what my experience looks like for others, for it to be digestible and not threatening.”
Stewart’s next role will be far tougher than Happiest Season: she is prepping to play Princess Diana in a new film by Pablo Larraín, said to be set over the weekend she resolves to leave Prince Charles. “I’ve not been as consumed by something in so long,” she recently told Access Hollywood.
Having directed shorts and videos already, she is also planning her feature debut with Lidia Yuknavitch’s memoir The Chronology of Water, which deals with the author’s bisexuality and addiction issues. The book contains “some of my favourite writing”, says Stewart. “The only reason to make it a movie is because I want people to see how I see it.”
Kristen's interview with Ruben V Nepales for 'Happiest Season' and mentions 'Spencer'
Similar quotes from previous outlets.
The interview was done during a round table with press.
The 'Happiest Season' star talks about her role – and personal experience – in a chat with Ruben Nepales
“I just fell in love with a girl for the first time.”
For Kristen Stewart, there was no big, dramatic coming out moment. The actress, who stars in queer holiday rom-com Happiest Season, plays Abby, who learns that her girlfriend Harper (Mackenzie Davis) has kept their relationship a secret from her family.
She talked candidly about the role – and her own experiences – in a recent video call.
In director Clea DuVall’s pioneering lesbian Christmas film on Hulu, Abby is ready to propose to Harper when the latter brings her to her family home. But Harper asks Abby to play straight because she has not come out as gay to her family.
“What I do love about this movie is how it advocates for the variation in the coming out stories,” said Kristen. “Everyone has had a completely different experience doing it.”
The actress, opening up about her sexuality, said her coming out was “was pretty unique in that I don’t think I really dealt with it. I don’t want this to come out the wrong way. But I didn’t really care how it was going to affect everyone. I also never had a moment when I actually came out. I just fell in love with a girl for the first time.”
“It wasn’t like this unburdening feeling. It really was more surprising. I felt like my life was opening up in a way that I never really considered realistically. So, rather than saying to my parents like, hey, I want to tell you guys, I hate to break it to you… (laughs).”
“I didn’t think of it in those terms because I am lucky as hell. I just didn’t think it was a bad thing. I was just like, there is this new person in my life. Having said that, I haven’t skirted all discomfort in terms of identity and sexuality.”
“Growing where I grew up, in the time that I grew up, I think you would have to be under the age of 20 and living in a city in the United States to ever really feel…You have to be like 15 years old and living in New York, Los Angeles or a metropolitan city in order to have felt truly untouched by really negative leering judgement.”
“I’m positive that I grew up thinking it would be not what I would have chosen, to be a lesbian. That’s like, harder. People think it’s gross and weird. There’s no way around that. So I can relate to the feeling of being different, and in the movie, sort of standing tall within that."
“Because I think Abby really knows herself and she really wants to help Harper destigmatize this feeling. But at the same time, it’s a really fringe feeling to feel as comfortable as I felt. I know what it feels like to talk to anyone who feels differently. It’s rampant. I’d say optimistically half the country doesn’t feel that way (laughs).”
“So it’s hard to say that I didn’t have a hard coming out story while still living in the world that we live in. But I was totally fine. I told my parents I had a girlfriend, I was in love with her and it was a new thing.”
“I really felt like this was cool next step in my life. It just sort of opened up. It didn’t feel like I had realized something and unloaded.”
Kristen, who dated her Twilight series costar Robert Pattinson, Alice Cargile and Stella Maxwell, and whose reported current girlfriend is screenwriter Dylan Meyer, said in retrospect, “It really was me as an individual growing with the times. I wasn't really living in the closet. I was always like holding my girlfriend's hand in public. I told my parents and bla bla bla.”
“I like to make out with my girlfriend on the street all the time. I'm obviously gay but there was something about saying it, knowing that it was being heard and set on a platform like that, so it's amazing.”
The 30-year-old with the soulful green eyes replied when asked about her thoughts on marriage: “Yeah. I like traditions, declarations of any kind. I love a grand statement. It’s funny, the best thing in life is to know something because it’s such a rare feeling when you feel sure about something. Sticking a stake in the ground on that level is something that I do find attractive.”
“Having said that, I do have complicated feelings about this sanctimonious nature of it all. I would say I would get married in my own way but I wouldn’t necessarily do it. You can promise yourself to someone in front of a bunch of other people and not have to do it in the way that it’s been presented my whole life. But I still am really inspired by the commitment of it.”
Laughing, Kristen stressed that she wants the works: “Four walls, a strong door, a fireplace to keep you warm. Of course, I want a family. I want all the things that all normal people want.”
Kristen is encouraged by what she sees in social media. “I am inspired and turned on by the idea that I see more (queer) presence in social media that are prouder. People younger than me inspire me more than the generation that I came from. So, to be honest, I am lucky to be able to reflect this perspective in my choices of film."
'Happiest Season' stars (from left) Kristen Stewart, Mackenzie Davis, Alison Brie, Victor Garber and Mary Steenburgen. Still courtesy of Hulu
“People are spending money on movies like this (Happiest Season) because of the younger generation, not necessarily because of me, but the growth that it has inspired. It’s the desire and the gap that has inspired filling it. I’m so thankful just to even be a part of that exchange. It works both ways.”
On the coincidence of queer films like Happiest Season, Ammonite and The Prom being released during this time, Kristen opined, “I grew up in a time when no one would ever dream of making this movie commercially. It would be a fringe-y sort of smaller movie for people in the margins. I have grown up with people that might feel that way. I know the difference between the world that we live in now and even the one that we lived in a very short number of years ago.”
“It's optimistic to assume that queerness has been normalized in every household across America, because it totally has not. Obviously, there's a lot of division here. To wrap up a message like this in such cozy clothes and deliver it with true compassion and warmth is a nice way to try and bridge that gap.”
“You'd have to be a bad person to not like the story (laughs). You'd pretty much have to be an asshole to not like the story. We had some of those but that's okay. There are many ways to participate in a discussion. This is not argumentative.”
“People need help,” Kristen emphasized about the challenges of making gay fare. “The responsibility of more self-realized queer people who tell stories is to lead the horse to the water. You can't make them drink but you can definitely present something that's filled with positivity, love and acceptance. And just hope that it rubs off.”
“I feel really lucky to be in a movie that is not shy. It’s very self-realized. It has an ease like I didn't want to represent a gay couple that didn't feel lived in and comfortable with themselves in their own story. It's like yes, Mackenzie's character is coming out and she's having a hard time doing that with her family.”
“But in her own life, Mackenzie is a very self-realized, really accomplished woman. She really knows herself. These two women have immense respect for each other. I thought it was really important to represent a gay couple that didn't necessarily feel alternative or fringe-y.”
“They just look like us. They are not like overtly obsessed with gay culture. They are just very naturally themselves and they're in love with each other.”
Happiest Season also stars Dan Levy, Alison Brie, Aubrey Plaza, Mary Steenburgen and Victor Garber.
The first American actress to win a Cesar, France’s Oscar equivalent – with credits that include Clouds of Sils Maria, Personal Shopper and Seberg – is preparing to play next Princess Diana.
In filmmaker Pablo Larrain’s drama, Spencer, Kristen will portray Diana in a specific moment (three days, to be exact) during the Christmas holidays at the Sandringham estate in which she reflects on whether to leave her marriage to Prince Charles.
It’s a challenge, since Emma Corrin is earning praises for her portrayal of Lady Di in the current season of The Crown. Kristen admitted that she is a big fan of the series.
“I am obsessed with The Crown,” she said. “It’s so brilliant. I have been through the first three seasons and I was waiting for the fourth one to come out. I’ve already seen half of it. It has even taken a step up from where it was.”
“I have this accompaniment to something that I am already so consumed by. I have this visual, sort of emotional aid. I literally go to sleep with (Princess Diana’s) interviews on so I just have her voice in my head. So I never really feel like I am doing an impression.”
“I’m just consuming everything without specificity in order to intrinsically feel her and not feel the pressure of always doing an impression. The people that you know the best in your life, when you tell stories about them, you can immediately drop into the sound of their voice.”
“I want to know her (Diana). I don’t want to do a bad impression. I just really want to feel her as much as I can. So my preparation for her really has just been emotional.”
“I wish that the state of the world was in every way more open. Currently, everything is fairly locked down. I wanted to go to Sandringham and see the places where Diana lived, these monumental spaces that you can feel so small in. I’m going there through The Crown (laughs). I’m like, I can’t go to London but I’m going there through research as much as I can. I have a brilliant dialect coach.”
“I cannot wait to go on this dreamy ride with Pablo because the movie takes place over three days. There are no salacious details. There’s no new information representing. It really is just like an imagining of a three day period when maybe it was heaviest on her.”
“It’s a really internal experience. Therefore, I’m just trying to open myself to her as much as I can. So when we get there, I can completely forget about the accent and all of the stuff that I’m worried about now.”
On Emma’s performance in particular, Kristen was effusive: “Emma killed it and she should be very proud of herself. I love the show. Emma is incredible. It’s so moving. I’m sure that gossipy weirdos would want to know, oh, there are two people playing Diana at the same time. I do play her at a later stage, when she’s almost 30.”
“I think that Emma gets right up to the age that I’m about to start. I play just a year after The Crown’s storyline ends, which for us is lucky (laughs). So there’s no crossover.”
“I’ve now consumed pretty much all there is to consume, video-wise. Every interview that you can actually hear or see, I go to sleep with it on.”
Joining her on this Spencer journey is someone named Cole. “My dog is named Cole,” Kristen said about the beautiful black dog behind her. “She’s my best friend. We do everything together. I’m trying to get her a doggie passport so she can come with me to go do Diana. I can’t imagine doing that without her. She’s my life support system.”
Wednesday, November 25, 2020
Kristen and Mackenzie Davis' interview with Pride Source
Kristen Stewart is waving around what appears to be a joint. Even her “Happiest Season” co-star Mackenzie Davis, who’s seen on Zoom with Stewart, doesn’t quite know exactly what Stewart has lit. “Oh my god,” Davis says. “I thought that was a blunt.”
It is actually Palo Santo, a South American tree that translates to “holy wood.” But for a moment, Stewart gets silly and pretends her soothing wood stick is an actual joint, moving it toward her mouth as if she’s going to smoke it. They both crack up at the thought of Stewart maybe getting blazed during our interview. “Just cleansing the energy!” Stewart assures.
After her “Twilight” years, a “Charlie’s Angels” reboot and a range of indies, Stewart’s latest movie, “Happiest Season,” feels a lot like taking a whiff of some Palo Santo – an energy-cleanser. For 102 festive minutes, it restores some of the downer pandemic energy of 2020 with comfort, joy and the promise of a yuletide so gay it makes sense that Clea DuVall, the openly lesbian actress who starred in the 1999 queer camp classic “But I’m a Cheerleader,” directed and co-wrote it.
The film is the first of its kind: a major studio-backed holiday rom-com with a queer love story at its center. In the movie, Stewart stars as Abby, whose girlfriend, Harper (Davis, adored by the LGBTQ community for playing queer in “San Junipero” episode of “Black Mirror”), invites her home for Christmas. At first, she’s not sure about meeting Harper’s family, but then decides she’s all in. Abby even plans to propose to her (with guidance from BFF John, played by Dan Levy). But what Abby doesn’t know until they’re en route: Harper hasn’t come out to her family.
Shot in February just before the film industry was forced to shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic, the movie was originally slated for a wide theatrical release backed by Sony’s TriStar Pictures. But with many theaters still shuttered, “Happiest Season” has found a new (streaming) home for the holidays on Hulu.
During our recent Zoom call, Stewart and Davis talked about moving beyond the fetishizing of lesbian relationships, why they love gay bars and how Stewart plans to continue to use her A-list power to radicalize conventional genres with queerness.
As a kid, could you have imagined a world in which a movie like this existed?
Kristen Stewart: Yeah! That’s kind of why it seems a little bit overdue now. But we have a bunch of really rad stories, like fringy independent films that I grew up with that didn’t lack in joy or sort of splendor, even Clea’s movie that I love so much, “But I’m a Cheerleader.” They’re very much together and happy and run off into the sunset. But that’s a tiny, little movie and not everyone has seen it, and it’s so nice to think that you don’t have to go out and search for this movie. It’s inviting, it’s warm, it’s open. And yeah, helpful!
I was into strange movies when I was little; that’s not the most normal thing, do you know what I mean? “But I’m a Cheerleader” is seminal and it’s iconic, but I wish it was bigger and this is, so that’s rad.
This is a big year. You’re part of a queer Christmas movie movement. Lifetime, Hulu, Hallmark are all doing them. There’s a bunch of them coming out.
Mackenzie Davis: Hallmark’s doing a (queer) Christmas movie?
Stewart: Ohh… really? But we want to be the only one!
Davis: No, no, no. We’re the first. No. I’m just shocked that Hallmark is doing that. They are historically not progressive, to say the least. Ha! That’s so cool.
Stewart: You know what’s cool? Now they have to be, or else they get left behind! Ha!
Kristen, this movie is a big deal to a lot of LGBTQ people. But for you, what is the significance that you are an openly queer A-lister playing a queer character in a major studio queer Christmas movie?
Stewart: It’s really fun. I love playing characters that feel sort of further away from my natural wheelhouse because I like to expand my horizon, and also kind of deeply explore uncharted territory within myself that exists but might not be the most obvious.
But what feels great is leaning fully into what’s easy and obvious and comfortable when it is supported and recognized and loved. I’ve never had that on such a big movie that people were willing to put so much money into. Because that is a huge risk! And, like, the fact that people are taking risks for, well… look, it’s not a huge risk. It’s that the time calls for it. And there’s a huge gaping desire for it. And that is something I feel because I live in this world.
So the fact that I got to play this part after being in so many big movies where I never feel like I’m not being myself or trying to pass or anything like that, but I do feel like I’m ambitious about hitting marks that people don’t think I can hit. So this one was not that, this was the opposite of that. It was, no, no, no; I get to be the star of a big movie, and also get to be this person? It felt great.
With “Runaways,” I remember a lot of talk about your kiss with Dakota Fanning. It seems dated to be talking about a girl-on-girl kiss at this point. Obviously you two kiss in this movie, but with “Happiest Season,” do you get the impression that people and the press are less like, “A gay kiss! What was that like?” and is that a relief?
Stewart: Yeah, nobody’s asked that.
Davis: Oh, god. It hasn’t been brought up. Culture’s moved so fast after not moving (laughs) at all for a very long time. But in the last 10 years it feels like so much has changed.
Stewart: No, nobody has fetishized it in (that) way. I have experience with that being, like, “So tell me about the …,” especially depending on who it’s coming from. You sit down with some news outlet man who’s been a news outlet man for, like, 50 years…
Davis: Ha!
Stewart: … and you’re like, “Don’t ask me that.” Wow, that’s so weird. Makes me feel really weird. Yeah, we haven’t had that.
Davis: I just wanted to change the subject so badly when Matt Lauer (asked) Anne Hathaway about when she was not wearing any underwear. It’s like the absolute worst moment I’ve ever witnessed.
Even though this is based on Clea’s story, it will be relatable to a lot of queer people, like myself. What parts of this Abby-Harper dynamic of coming out and self-acceptance did you identify with the most?
Stewart: Look, doing things that are really normal and natural to you physically and then having to sort of curb those instincts around people because you don’t want to make other people uncomfortable so you are willing to make yourself so uncomfortable for other people’s benefit is something that I have done (and) probably still (do).
I tried to go on a houseboat trip recently and it was in northern California, like around Tahoe. It’s a really Trumpian area up there, and I was like, “We gotta get the fuck outta here.” I was holding my girlfriend’s hand, just walking around. I’m not saying every single person… I don’t even know what I’m saying. But I didn’t feel safe. I don’t mean to imply that I know where that would’ve gone, but even just emotionally, it was a violent experience.
In the movie, it’s really nice to be able to laugh at certain feelings that are more heavy because when you repossess and then sort of release a feeling, it feels cool and triumphant and like I’ve won something back. There were things in the movie – just little moments – where we have to drop each other’s hands or, even though we know we’re lying for just a brief period, the lie hurts and, yeah, I’ve never gone home with someone and had to lie.
I’ve never specifically had to keep myself in a closet with a person, but all of that, as somebody who’s grown up queer – not to put any whatever limits on my own sexuality – I’ve dealt with that forever. And that’s triggering. But, specifically, just the general experience of being gay and thinking that maybe people think you’re gross or weird is something that is nice to laugh at in this environment.
In the film, you’re at a gay bar and “RuPaul’s Drag Race” contestants BenDeLaCreme and Jinkx Monsoon are performing. What’s the best time you’ve had at a gay bar?
Stewart: Even before I knew I was gay – even before I had a girlfriend! – I was like, “Oh my god, this is the most fun I’ve ever had at a bar ever! Why are you all the best people?!”
Davis: Yeah, being a female and experiencing men at bars and being in a space where you can…
Stewart: Dance!
Davis: … be completely unleashed and not fucking worry about anybody touching you or approaching you or coming up behind you is especially – when I was younger it was just such a safe, incredible feeling. It felt very great. And also not worrying about how you looked because nobody wanted to fuck you.
Stewart: Ha! I know! You never want to take up space where you don’t belong, but it’s typically not an alienating group, not to generalize, and it’s such a nice feeling to go into a queer bar and be like, “Doesn’t matter, whatever, no one’s coming for you.”
Kristen, after playing queer in “Charlie’s Angels” and now in “Happiest Season,” do you plan to continue radicalizing conventional genres with queerness? Basically, will you continue trying to actively make Hollywood gayer?
Stewart: Yeah! Yeah, naturally. But, like, it’s funny when you start just applying restrictive rules on who is allowed to have what perspectives. I still want to play straight sometimes, if that’s OK! Ha! But I will say that, primarily, it’s really important for me to really pick and choose those opportunities and not have it be the default-given setting that someone is straight in a movie when maybe it’s not a romantic movie.
If it’s not about the romance, then why am I playing straight? Because it’s normal? Well, that’s a ridiculous idea. Because in “Charlie’s” I didn’t have any romantic (interest). I had no one in the movie. But I just thought it was important to drop an Easter egg and be like, “No, that doesn’t mean you can have me, boys.”
Clea Duvall talks 'Happiest Season' and mentions Kristen
NATASHA LYONNE: Hello, Clea DuVall.
CLEA DUVALL: Hello, Natasha Lyonne.
LYONNE: Huge fan of the movie. Very excited to talk to you about it, and very excited for the world to see it. It really exemplifies your vision for how you want to see the world change, and you did such a beautiful job on it and I’m so proud to be your BFF.
DUVALL: Thank you.
LYONNE: How did you come up with the idea for it?
DUVALL: I’m a huge fan of Christmas movies, but I’ve never seen my experience represented. After The Intervention, which you and I made together, when I started thinking about what I wanted to do next, this film felt like a great opportunity to tell a universal story from a new perspective. I had this idea that was sort of based on my own experiences of going home with people and being the “friend,” or me asking people to be the “friend.” I’ve definitely been on every side of this. The story just unfolded for me and I wrote an outline for it. When I was working on Veep, I met Mary Holland. She and I had this very easy rapport and she made me laugh and she’s such a talented actor and such a great comedian. I asked her if she wanted to work with me on writing the script and she said yes. And then we took my outline and ran with it.
LYONNE: How many years ago did you write that first seed of the idea? I think it’s so helpful for the kids at home to know how long it really takes to bring a dream to life.
DUVALL: I wrote it right after we made our movie, which must have been in 2015.
LYONNE: And now it’s 2027, for context.
DUVALL: Yeah.
LYONNE: Wow, so 12 years, huh?
DUVALL: Yeah, 12 years ago.
LYONNE: That’s really something. So it took you about four years in what we’ll call human math. I’m grateful that you continue to refer to The Intervention as our movie, even though the reader should be aware that it’s strictly Clea’s movie as the writer, director, producer, and star of the film. What tools or knowledge did you bring with you to Happiest Season that you didn’t have when you made your first feature?
DUVALL: What I learned very quickly on The Intervention is that acting and directing is not really something that I want to do. Going into Happiest Season knowing there was never a point where I was going to be in it was very liberating, and allowed me to take any attention off myself and put everything into the film and to be able to support my cast and crew in a way that, on The Intervention, I just didn’t have the bandwidth to do. I’m an actor who really relies on my directors to help make sure I’m on the right track, and to not have that is very destabilizing.
LYONNE: I identify with that. On this Sarah Cooper thing that I just directed [the Netflix special Sarah Cooper: Everything’s Fine], if I had to go from de-masking to being on camera it would have been really scary. To be completely inside any one of those jobs is so all-consuming. Have you had any experiences like the one we see in the film?
DUVALL: I’ve spent the majority of my Christmases with other people’s families. It’s a very odd thing. You really see sides of your partner that you don’t see for the rest of the year.
LYONNE: How did you go about casting Mackenzie [Davis] and Kristen [Stewart], who are both so great in this movie that it feels like, “Are they dating in real life?” What’s so great about them as a couple is that they both are such complicated, incredible women, in addition to being, as respectfully as I could say, incredibly hot women. What a fucking ultimate couple.
DUVALL: Kristen was the first person I cast. Even though this is a romantic comedy and it’s very light and warm, it’s really about something. I wanted to hire actors who could play the complexity of what was happening underneath everything else. Kristen is someone who I really admired and who I think always makes such interesting, bold choices in terms of projects that she takes on. I sent her the script and she was in Germany filming Charlie’s Angels, so I went out there to meet with her and we spent two very late nights going through the script and talking about the movie and the character. I already knew that she was who I wanted, but after sending this to her, she was the only person who could play that part.
LYONNE: I’ve seen you play Mafia with Mackenzie. I know that she really excels at that game, and so do you. Did you guys meet playing Mafia?
DUVALL: I actually had not met Mackenzie before this movie. I remember seeing her for the first time in The Martian, and the second she came on the screen, I was like, “Who is this incredible human being?” I just wanted more of her. Anything she was in, I would watch. She has this incredible ability to create women I’ve never seen before. It’s such an exciting thing when I see an actor who brings a character that represents a completely new kind of human being. I feel like Mackenzie always does that, and Harper is a very difficult part, because she’s asking a lot of Abby and the audience. We’re also meeting her at this turning point in her life where she’s maybe not making the decisions we want her to be making, but they’re necessary and they’re messy. Being able to have an actor who’s able to play all the different layers of that and still maintain their own humanity, I thought that was really beautiful.
LYONNE: I love her, too. She’s so good at crossword puzzles and reading books, and those are the two key components to being an excellent human being. This movie is already been labeled a “gay rom-com” in the press. Do you feel like, “Hey, it’s 2024, why are we still doing this?” Or do you feel like it’s important?
DUVALL: I understand why people do it, but it is a way of othering. This is not something that has been made on the studio level, so it’s complicated. I, as a gay person, need this movie because I want to see a genre of movie that I love reflect my life. I am a gay person, Natasha.
LYONNE: Clea, let’s not do any sort of surprises because I’m just trying to have my day, and now I just feel like you’re dropping bombs. It’s interesting because this movie has never existed before, so it’s worth mentioning so that people feel seen. Representation matters.
DUVALL: I’m very proud that this is a rom-com that centers on the gay couple, and there aren’t that many, so that’s why people do talk about it. I do think in time, telling stories that are not told from the perspective that they have historically been told from just becomes the norm.
LYONNE: But then again, that’s what’s so subversive about your world domination. Typically, when these movies exist, they are sort of othered and they are meant to be seen on a small scale. What you’ve done with the concept of the movie and the execution is so brilliant. You’re like, “No, this is a big movie,” meaning that everybody can enjoy this movie in the same way that we can all enjoy It’s a Wonderful Life. It just so happens that it’s not Tom and Tina, it’s Tina and Tina. You’re inviting everybody in to say, “I think we’re ready for this now, right guys? Can we handle it?” The act of rebellion becomes just subtle enough to have everyone participate in it. It’s just awesome.
DUVALL: I wanted to create a film that anyone would be able to connect with, in the same way that I’ve spent my entire life watching Christmas movies that don’t represent my experience in any way, and yet I watch them every year.
LYONNE: So much of what we talk about is that little girl who’s the outsider. Little us needing to be able to know that we’re not alone and that there’s hope on the other side of those weird, outsider feelings. What do you hope that they get from this movie?
DUVALL: I hope that people feel seen. I think about when you and I had the privilege of making But I’m a Cheerleader. We’ve spent the last 20 years seeing how it’s impacted people’s lives in a positive way. That’s very meaningful to me. It definitely informed the kinds of stories that I want to tell.
LYONNE: What did you feel like when this movie wrapped?
DUVALL: I felt a tremendous amount of relief and accomplishment because we made this movie for less than we thought we were going to, and we had not as many days as we thought we were going to. Every single day of the shoot I would just look at the schedule and go, “I don’t know how we’re going to do it, but we’re going to do it.” I would begin every single day with a pit in my stomach thinking, “Are we going to get what we need to tell the story?” And somehow, miraculously, every day we would, without having to work insane hours. It was a testament to the cast and the crew.
LYONNE: It’s also a testament to you. People may or may not know this about you, but you are just so fucking on top of shit. Clea DuVall does not fuck around in terms of hitting deadlines and budgets. I’m always so in awe of how clean a thinker you are and how efficient and decisive and sure of your vision you are. That extends to us on a road trip. If we’re on a road trip and we’re driving to Vegas, and then I say, “Take a nap, I’ll take the wheel,” we may end up in Arizona. That’s only half the fun. And then all you need to do is wake up and I’ll be like, “Hey, Clea, I don’t think this is Vegas.” And then you’re like, “Hold on, let me drive.” And the next thing you know, we’re in Vegas.
DUVALL: [Laughs] We got there.
LYONNE: How did you get all of these incredible actors? It’s chockablock with movie stars.
DUVALL: Some of the people I knew already, so I reached out to them to see if they wanted to be involved, and luckily they did. Then there were other people I didn’t know who were passionate about the script and what the movie was doing, and it being the first of its kind. I was very moved by the reaction we got when we started sending out the script.
LYONNE: I love Aubrey Plaza in this movie so much. Obviously, she’s such a ridiculously funny person and she’s proven 20 times over in the past few years just how great she is as a solid, multi-leveled actor. It’s really satisfying seeing the truth emanate from somebody and bringing a character to life with such ease.
DUVALL: My very favorite shot in the movie is of her.
LYONNE: Can you describe it?
DUVALL: I kind of don’t want to. I’ve never told anyone that.
LYONNE: Okay. They say secrets are the sauce of pasta.
DUVALL: I just love her. I want to work with her over and over again.
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