Daily Mail

Divorce drama that’s pretty Dern good!

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LAurA DerN was two years old when her parents, the Hollywood actors Bruce Dern and Diane Ladd, ended their decade-long marriage.

‘They had a very difficult and painful divorce,’ Dern recalled. ‘Now they’re best friends, spend Christmase­s together and are both remarried.

‘I saw my dad a lot but lived with her,’ said Dern, who herself finalised the end of her own union to musician husband Ben Harper in 2013.

Dern, 52, told me that she brought all of that knowledge to her role as Nora Fanshaw, a formidable celebrity divorce lawyer in writer/director Noah Baumbach’s film Marriage Story, starring Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver as a couple, Nicole and Charlie, who have split up.

Scene by brilliant scene, it’s one of the year’s best pictures. A handful of scorching moments belong to Dern’s Nora, who’s hired as Nicole’s high-priced, attack-dog attorney. The role is one of the highlights of Dern’s career.

She made her debut in 1974, aged seven, as an extra opposite her mother in Martin Scorsese’s Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore. But the films that marked her out were Peter Bogdanovic­h’s Mask and the series of pictures she made with David Lynch that included Blue Velvet and Wild At Heart.

‘I went from the innocent girl-nextdoor in Mask to playing raw sexuality, all fever, in Wild At Heart,’ she said. DerN

has not stopped working since. She won plaudits for her role as renata Klein in two seasons of Big Little Lies on Sky Atlantic; she’s playing Marmee in Greta Gerwig’s highly anticipate­d Little Women; and during our interview Dern mused about scheduling a call with Steven Spielberg to discuss making another Jurassic Park film.

But at the Telluride, Toronto and current BFI London Film Festivals, much attention has been paid to Netflix’s sensation, Marriage Story: ‘a love story about divorce’, as Dern puts it.

eighteen months before there was even a script, Dern and Baumbach had a series of fried chicken suppers, washed down with red wine, to talk about the film and her role. They also went to meetings with a handful of Los Angeles female divorce lawyers.

‘It’s a world of men, predominan­tly,’ said Dern when we met at London’s Ham Yard Hotel.

Dern’s Nora has a marvellous clientgett­ing ‘seduction’ scene with Johansson’s Nicole, the latter an actress who has moved out of the Manhattan apartment she shared with director husband Charlie (Driver) and moved, with the couple’s eight-year-old son, to her hometown of LA.

Dern talked me through how, in one swift carefully choreograp­hed moment, she went from standing to falling on a couch beside Johansson.

‘Noah was specific, down to not only what the heels were [ruby-red Christian Louboutins], but how I kick them off. I’ll never forget how he rehearsed me from standing in front of Scarlett and how I needed to get from there to being her best friend next to her on the couch.

‘It’s so manipulati­ve. It’s like: “Oh, we’re girlfriend­s now. Here’s lemon tea. Oh, and have a cookie. If you like them I’ll courier some over.” ’

LA is like the cradle of divorce, Dern told me. When she was in her teens, she always wondered what it would be like to have a normal childhood and be raised by two parents who were married and lived together. Then she found out that a ‘normal’ childhood in California involved divorce. Her experience­s flavour her performanc­e in a film packed with acting of a breathtaki­ng quality that’s bound to feature highly this awards season. There’s an indelible moment in which Dern’s Nora articulate­s to Johansson’s Nicole the double standards society imposes on mothers. ‘A dad can be a f***-up, but not a mother,’ Nora warns her. Audiences I’ve watched the picture with ( I’ve seen it four times) are hooked by Baumbach’s poetic screenplay. Dern said she felt inspired by Nora. ‘She scares me and makes me laugh. She’s such a cautionary tale. I hope people in love see the movie and think: “Oh, my God!” I beg people to really stay communicat­ing and always avoid getting to someone like a Nora.’ SHe

added that she understood the longing to be a good mother and not wanting the child to be badly affected by a break-up. ‘Among the cast and crew, I don’t think there was anyone who hadn’t been impacted by divorce in some way. We led with our hearts and people were weeping as scenes were shot; and we were laughing hysterical­ly, too.’

As someone who is raising two children (‘ they’re teenagers, but they’re my babies’), Dern said she was moved when Jaya, her 14-year- old daughter, shared her perspectiv­e of Marriage Story.

Jaya recounted a scene where the couple and their lawyers are at a mediation session, and the husband Charlie can’t decide what to order for lunch.

‘She said she was so moved by how Scarlett’s character was the only one who knows to order that salad for him.

‘My daughter said: “Mom, that is heartbreak. That’s the only person on the planet who knows just what you like and knows how to save you when you’re at a loss.”

‘And I recount that as a daughter whose parents had a very difficult and painful divorce.’

 ?? Picture: GETTY IMAGES ??
Picture: GETTY IMAGES
 ??  ?? Seat of power: Dern and Johansson
Seat of power: Dern and Johansson

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