Laura Dern says she cried hard after reading Marriage Story script

Actor Laura Dern says filmmaker Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story has the perfect script and she cried really hard after reading it.

The film, featuring Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson in the lead, is about a married couple who goes through a gruelling divorce.

Dern, 52, is essaying the role of Nora, the lawyer of Johansson’s character Nicole. The actor is receiving critical acclaim for her performance in the film, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival.

When asked about the reviews for her performance, Dern told Entertainment Weekly, “I mean, as an actor you can’t dream up speeches that delicious! It’s just crazy amazing. But let me just say, I’ve never cried so hard as when I first read the script. It wasn’t just the emotion of reading the story, it was the perfection of the screenplay. (And) being a parent, I understood this unbelievably sad, broken moment,” added the Jurassic Park (1993) and Wild at Heart (1990) star.

The actor said she has noticed a sea change in how the industry treats its female actors as well as their characters.

“There’s been this paradigm shift in every industry now where everyone’s voices matter, and women can be in charge, women can be paid the same, all of those fights. But in terms of (acting), also that women can have ownership of complicated, raw, ugly, beautiful, sexualised or asexual, damaged, vulnerable characters. And actresses don’t have to be typecast because of one role, or because of age,” Dern said.

PHOTO: NEILSON BARNARD/AFP Laura Dern is best known for her role in Jurassic Park (1993)