THE KONG WHISPERER

REBECCA HALL is Dr Ilene Andrews

Why do you think Kong and Godzilla endure as movie icons?

Godzilla is the embodiment of the existential nuclear threat, and the capacity for annihilation. These are very real concerns, very real fears, certainly now there’s the issue of climate. These are all real things that can be aired and vented. These fears that all of those themes throw up can be exorcised in some way through the bodies of these gigantic monsters, who are not real, and who don’t actually pose a threat to mankind, but we can go and spend a couple of hours thinking about the worst possible version of our fears. I think there’s an enduring interest in them because they are these blank canvases that we can map all this stuff onto.

You filmed in a real rainforest for this. How was that experience?

The rainforest was crazy. It looked so much like where we’d been in the studio – we were in the studio first and we had to match the studio to the actual location. We’d gotten so used to the jungle environment inside the studio we’d forgotten that actually when we went to the real jungle, there would be things like large bugs and unpleasant humid conditions. And there would have to be a guy there who would check the brush before we walked through in case there were any murderous snakes!

I saw cassowaries, which I couldn’t look in the eye because they were in the season when they had just had babies, so if you happen to come across the mother and you look her in the eye she will attack you, and it’s pretty scary. They attack with claws, like velociraptors, the most dinosaur-looking things I’ve seen in my life.

What’s it like working with Adam Wingard again?

We know what worked about the first one, we know how to make it that much better. We have a laugh. We take what we have to take seriously but we also know what the material is, and we have fun when we make these films. I think that shows, and I think that is important. I don’t say that trivially. It’s a good thing that we have fun!

What’s the trick to acting against nothing?

My trick is absolutely no shame! No embarrassment, no self-consciousness, just fully go for it. Be prepared to look like a fool.