WHAT WOULD YOU MAKE MAGGIE DO?

of a bottle. What she looks for in a script is “an observation that we haven’t seen, that’s real, that people relate to, that’s complicated — as we all are”.

Of her participation in the project, Gyllenhaal says: “Everybody knows when there’s a good script, it’s so rare. And when there is, it doesn’t matter if you’ve made movies before, everybody wants to be a part of it. I find it so exciting to imagine that someone might be thinking of something for me.”

She recommends “putting a little bit of your actual self into what you’re doing — good art takes vulnerability”.

And she should know, having played everything from a sexcrazed secretary to an English-accented philanthropist. She has also appeared in Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya and Three Sisters, so that idea about a Russian duck-whisperer might not be entirely off the mark. LS

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