TOTAL FILM INTERVIEW
Rose Byrne: great at comedy, drama and sporting analogies.
The Australian shapeshifter who can master all accents and vacillates between bawdy comedy, high-wire drama and heartfelt family feels returns to TV with jet-black humour as she explores the interior monologue of women in ’80s-set Physical. She tells Total Film about self-doubt, success and ensuring she has ‘a seat at the table’.
YOU NEVER KNOW IF THIS IS YOUR LAST JOB… BUT YOU’VE GOT TO KEEP SHOOTING AT THE BASKET
Rose Byrne is running errands in Sydney. While she Zooms with Total Film she’s flitting in and out of stores, making purchases, juggling shopping bags. “I’m so sorry,” she apologises down the line, “I’m multi-tasking!” It’s entirely appropriate that she should be spinning plates when we’re talking about her latest role in Apple TV+’s new show, Physical. Byrne plays a harried ’80s housewife, Sheila, whose school-run/grocery shop/husband appeasing days are interrupted by her own self-loathing internal dialogue and bouts of miserable binge-eating and bulimia. As a former free-spirited activist of the ’70s, Sheila has found herself trapped in a Sisyphean existence, playing enabler to her man-child husband (Rory Scovel) – literally once ‘a big guy on campus’. Until one day she follows a lycra-clad woman to an aerobic class which changes her life and outlook…
Tapping into ’80s nostalgia and the truth bomb of women’s real/brutal interior lives that recalls the dark humour of Promising Young Woman, Physical leans into the gadgetry, fashions and fads of the era, exploring the revolution and emancipation that VHS and fitness videos could offer. And the leotards. Byrne laughs thinking about the dizzying array of high-leg one-pieces she wears in the show while showing off her jump-step-kick moves. And at 41, the actor is just the right age to recall the end of the ’80s. “I remember doing Cindy Crawford’s workout on tape. With her, in those jeans, doing a workout – in my living room, aged 12, and the craze of that reaching Australia!” she giggles. “But you forget how revolutionary it was to be able to exercise in your own home, and how that was, at the time, a new and a sort of bizarre concept. The idea of the lifestyle guru really is now a dime a dozen – everybody on Instagram is a healer of self-help, or self-worth, or promoting some tonic or prayer or whatever. To kind of reverse-engineer where that first started, that sort of new culture of cultivating your own self-esteem was really interesting to examine.”
Talking to no-nonsense Byrne it’s clear that she’s worlds apart from the selfabasement of Sheila. Though she confesses to worrying about where her next gig is coming from, Byrne has worked steadily and successfully since making a splash with Heath Ledger in Two Hands in 1999. She moved to the States from home in Sydney to make a blink-and-miss-it bow in Star Wars: Attack Of The Clones before impressing as ferocious Briseis in sword-and-sandal behemoth Troy – and holding her own against Brad Pitt. That led to other projects, including Danny Boyle’s nihilist sci-fi Sunshine, Brit zombie horror 28 Weeks Later and a role as Ellen Parsons in TV appointment-viewing, Damages, right at the apex of the TV renaissance.
After owning five seasons of the legal drama (against Glenn Close no less), Byrne pivoted unexpectedly to comedy with a perfectly-pitched British-rock-star-wife turn in Get Him To The Greek and the brilliantly brittle Helen in Bridesmaids (it’s all about the Fritz Bernaise, ladies). Since then she’s effortlessly pinballed between ambitious drama (X-Men: First Class, Insidious, The Place Beyond The Pines), comedy (Bad Neighbours, Spy, Irresistible) and family sweetness (Instant Family, Peter Rabbit). Married to fellow actor Bobby Cannavale, with two little boys, Byrne alludes to acting being like basketball more than once during our chat, and exhibits a healthy cynicism for the promise of ‘stardom’. Here are the moves she pulled on the court while we shopped and discussed her slam-dunk career highlights...
Physical
What was it about that spoke to you when you read it – and why you did want to exec-produce as well as be in it?
I read it, and couldn’t stop thinking about it. I knew that the commitment for a show was so monumental, having done Damages all those years ago. But the material just spoke to me so clearly, and I thought it was such a remarkable kind of dissection of the destruction that women do to themselves – internally, you know? Often, you see women represented on-screen as crazy, or they’re self-destructive outwardly. And I often just don’t think that’s the case. I think there’s so much internal struggle that women go through, and create for themselves like that. I love starting that conversation about it. I found it confronting.
But it’s also wickedly funny...
I found it very funny [laughs]. I was laughing, you know, inappropriately, in very dark moments. I was surprised to be laughing with a show that was dealing with incredibly dark issues. But that’s Annie Weisman, the creator – she has this incredible wit about her, and genuine observational skills about human behaviour, which I haven’t seen for a while.
Had you forgotten how demanding a TV show can be compared to a movie?
Yeah, it’s a lot to be in a show – you forget. It’s such a challenging character to play, and I wasn’t sure how I was going to do it, with all of the aerobics stuff. I’m not naturally very coordinated at all [laughs], so I had to make sure that I looked somewhat convincing. I’d just finished Mrs. America, so it also strangely felt like a companion piece for that. Mrs. America finished in 1980, and
then this picks up in 1981, I think. But Sheila was a former activist and a hippie. She was coming out of that stage. Her husband is this sort of revolutionary thinker with these radical ideas. She’s really part of that generation that moved into the ’80s and became disillusioned. So it was interesting, having done this time-travel through feminist history, and then living it again in this role.
Was that a strange transition, to go from playing Gloria Steinem, a strong feminist with selfworth, to Sheila, a woman who constantly berates, questions and devalues herself?
I mean, to play Gloria was very intimidating, because how can you bring texture to this legend, this icon? And create somebody who’s a real person with flaws and complications like any human being, and all of that stuff, beyond just the image of her? Because that’s powerful, her as an image, already. But again, I couldn’t say no! [laughs] The piece as a whole – I was like, ‘It’s the perfect story. It’s a specific setting, in a specific time, and a specific character’. I really wanted to be part of the whole story, the whole world.
Did you get to meet Steinem?
I didn’t unfortunately, but Dahvi Waller, the creator of Mrs. America, was incredibly diligent and again formidable with her research packages she would suggest for me, and I got to read some incredible interviews with her from the time. So I was spoiled with a lot of information but yeah, she is truly one of the most incredibly admired women; she’s really a force of nature.
Sheila’s interior monologue is incredibly cruel, but so recognisable. You’re a successful woman in your field but do you know that sort of self-doubting and chastising?
Ask any actress! [laughs]. We’re all constantly, you know, second-guessing ourselves! But the voiceover was also like weaving another texture through the show, and that we didn’t really discover until afterwards, because it’s such a puzzle – right? – putting the show together. The voiceover came after we’d shot it, and Annie really reworked a lot of it, and figured it out. I liked that, though. I like working in the ADR room, tweaking stuff, getting technical.
Is that more important to you now – being in a producing position?
I just want to sit at the table. You know, like Sheila, you just want to be at the table where decisions are being made, whether it’s about casting, or decisions on story points, on plot points, about the look. For me, it’s just about being there when the decisions are made, and being heard.
Are you starting to see change in that respect? That stories like this are getting made? Women in the film industry are being heard?
I think so. Five years ago, I don’t think it would have been made. And definitely not 10. Annie wrote this pilot nearly 10 years ago and it took that long for it to find a home, and for people to get a shot to make it. It’s the same with Mrs. America. And I do think it’s time for stories like this to be finding a home, and finding places to come out. Which is the positive side of streaming. Obviously, there’s other
I DO THINK IT’S TIME FOR STORIES LIKE THIS TO BE FINDING A HOME
sides of streaming which, you know, are a bit more complicated [laughs]. But that is a good side to it.
As an exec-producer and an experienced actor now, what do you think about your early experiences when you were a newcomer in a massive machine, like on Attack Of The Clones or Troy? What does that experience feel like to you now when you look back on it?
Star Wars was really fun. It was very easy. It was 10 days. I was just standing behind Natalie [Portman] looking very serious. My role is very small – it usually comes up in interviews more than anything else. No one else ever mentions it. My kids haven’t seen it – they’re a bit little. They probably wouldn’t recognise me, anyway. I’m in it for about 35 seconds. I guess I could try to milk it somehow [laughs]. ‘I’ve been in Star Wars! Get your shit together. Clean up!’
But you know, looking back... getting older, you have more confidence and you don’t care as much about what people think. You’re just more interested in doing good work, rather than getting caught up in anything else. And for me, I found once I had children it puts everything in such a different perspective. It’s such a journey. And you start to look at how far you’ve come too. You look back, and say, ‘Oh, you know what? It’s hard to do this [job] because there’s such a high turnover.’ [laughs] You know what I mean? You never know if this is your last job. I’ve seen so many careers that you go ‘What’s happened to that actor or this person?’ You’ve got to keep shooting, right? Keep shooting at the basket.
What was making Troy like?
Troy was a surreal experience. We were in very exotic locations like Malta and Mexico. It was much like the film – quite an epic journey with all the adventure and travel, and feeling very overwhelmed, and still figuring things out. The part was really, really fun. I was very lucky to do that at that age. I look back on it fondly, you know? It’s funny when you’re young. You’re less aware, but also more aware. Does that make sense? It’s fun to be able to watch it now – I look like a baby, a little girl.
Did it open doors for you?
After Troy, I actually had kind of a quiet period, but then work really picked up.
I had a great year in 2005. I did Marie Antoinette with Sofia Coppola which was incredible; and then I went straight on to Sunshine with Danny [Boyle] and everyone so that was really great – and then I did 28 Weeks Later. Danny saw me in Troy. He wasn’t familiar with anything I had done before that so it was a really big break. I was very lucky.
The training for Sunshine was quite intense, wasn’t it?
It was wonderful. We had about three weeks of rehearsal, which is always pretty rare for a film to have that much time, and it was just adventurous. Jam-packed with screenings and then a lecture and then, you know, we would go scuba diving and then we did like aeronautical acrobats… I flew a plane, a British Airways, a 747 in the simulator. It was great and extremely helpful with everything that we then embarked on when we did the film.
Tell us about making Damages – was working with Glenn Close part of the attraction of taking it on?
Working with Glenn every day – I was so lucky. And she’s the greatest. She’s incredible. She’s also incredibly giving. She’s a great leader, in terms of running a show. She’s such a hard worker. She just takes it to the hoop, you know? She takes it to the hoop every time. And that show changed my life profoundly, professionally and personally. It opened many doors for me.
It was a trailblazer in terms of prestige television...
We came out the same year as Mad Men, and it was the beginning of the renaissance of television. It was ‘pre’ when everyone was doing a show. I look back and feel quite proud. I moved to New York, and worked with Glenn every day. They gave me a lot to do, probably too much. I don’t know if I was able to keep up half of the time!
And you probably knew that Glenn Close could do ‘Da Butt’ before everyone else learned that a few months ago at the Oscars…
[laughs] She’s such an eccentric! She really is. I really do love her. We’re still very close. She’s so joyous to me. People don’t realise how eccentric and kooky Glenn really is. She plays a fearsome woman but she’s not like that at all.
GETTING OLDER, YOU DON’T CARE AS MUCH ABOUT WHAT PEOPLE THINK