Working WITH MY HUSBAND WAS INTENSE
Mixing business with pleasure? It can work, as the Devil Wears Prada actress explains…
AQuiet Place, currently showing at a cinema near you, is one of the movie hits of the year so far, having made ten times its $17million budget already. Much of the credit for that goes to its inventive premise – a family must live in silence, while hiding from terrifying mysterious creatures, which hunt using their ultra-heightened powers of hearing. But another huge reason for its massive critical and commercial success is the central on-screen partnership between real-life married couple John Krasinski (who also wrote and directed the film) and Emily Blunt, who has to endure all kinds of horrendous traumas.
The film is the latest in a long line of great performances from the British star, 35, who started out with a flurry of period TV dramas such as Boudica and Henry VIII, before her star-making role as one of Meryl Streep’s highly-strung assistants in The Devil Wears
Prada. She went on to dazzle in heavyweight hit thrillers Sicario and The Girl On The
Train, and later this year, we’ll see her take on the huge challenge of stepping into Julie Andrews’ shoes in Mary Poppins Returns.
But first, the even scarier task of grappling with those monsters and that silence in A Quiet Place…
So, the film is pretty terrifying…
I think the reason why you are so frightened is partly because you are invested in their plight as a family. That’s ultimately why I have watched the movie Jaws 30 times – because it’s not about the shark chomping off people’s legs, it’s about these three men trying to overcome something. And that is why I keep watching it.
What did you find challenging about this role?
My feet. I was in such desperate need of a pedicure at the end of this film – my feet were hideous by the time I was done [she was barefoot for the entire film, because noisy shoes would’ve attracted the creatures’ attention]. I never wore fake feet, I was completely weirded out by them, and I would rather get blisters and some horrible foot infection than wear those.
Would you let your children see this movie?
Neither of my kids [Hazel, four, and Violet, one] should see it until they are at least 40!
Has becoming a mum made you choose different kinds of roles?
I would say that I don’t necessarily warm to certain roles in the way that I used to – ones that are defiantly violent or defiantly cold. I have become much more selective about when I work and who it’s with, because it costs you so much emotionally to be away from your kids.
Was it easier or harder to work with your husband?
Well, in some ways, we realised that we have the ultimate trust and this is a relationship in life, and in work, that needs the ultimate trust in each other. That was exhilarating, because we were able to also discover a new side to each other. It just felt very intimate and exciting to work together. I found it so effortless working with him and I wanted him to do much more with me.
Like what?
I want him to re-write every script I get sent, basically. I remember, we’d just had our second daughter and we were sitting on the couch, and he walked through the door and he pitched me the idea, and I responded, “You need to direct that movie.” I said, “I can see it in you. You’ve struck gold – there is something here and you have connected to it.”
Did you pitch for the role right away?
Originally, I had suggested a friend of mine play the part, and then I read the script and decided that I needed to call her and tell her that it wasn’t happening. My friend is so great – she told me, “John called and he was like, ‘So, you know how we called you about it…’” Then she went, “Oh my God, you are firing me?” And he was like, “Yes.” And she goes, “Is it for Emily?” And he goes, “Yes.” So she goes, “OK, that’s fine.”
That’s friendship. What input did you have on the film?
I would say things like, “You have no idea what this feels like, so let me just take the reins on this one.” It was definitely incredibly helpful that I had gone through two births with my own kids, so that was a lot to draw on. I mean, the whole childbirth sequence – we shot it over the course of a week, and it was the most draining, the most physically demanding and gut-wrenching sequence to shoot.
That sounds tough…
Luckily, John is a very economical shooter, in the sense that he was like, “You can just do two takes, I got it.” And the scream scene – I probably did one take and he was like, “We have it, you don’t have to do it again.” But it was very intense.
How did you chill out after a draining day of filming?
We drank a lot of whisky on this film. Most nights were rounded off with a stiff drink And it was really nerve-wracking, the prospect of working together, if I’m honest, because I think we didn’t know how our processes were going to align, whether we were going to be creatively in tandem with each other, or whether we were going to crash heads too much, whether we were going to be able to afford each other the same diplomacy that I would any other director. And whether I would be like, “No, I am not doing it like that.”
What do you differ on most as a couple?
I will say I am very good at planning when to leave and when to go to the airport, and John has zero concept of date or time, and is always late – he just has no idea. I’ll say, “So, tonight, we are going to go out with Jen and Johnny at 7.30pm.” And he will be like, “Great, we should see a movie tonight?” And I’m like, “I just said, at 7.30pm, we are going to dinner, did you hear?” So that’s probably the thing. He calls it my “time mode”. I get in a time mode with things like going to the airport and I cease to be any fun and I don’t
speak to him. He’s usually packing his bag at 5am when I’ve planned it for two days, and that’s probably the thing we differ on the most.
Silence plays a huge part in the film. Do you enjoy it?
I do actually quite enjoy my own silent company. I feel like my life is pretty loud and dialogueheavy, because I am constantly negotiating with my two young children. My quiet place is usually in my car when I’m by myself, which is very rare. I think the power of silence not only reveals itself to be a very arresting thing to watch cinematically, but I think you need to be in a happy place, a comfortable place, where you can just sit with people and not feel the need to talk.
Did you always want to be an actress?
I didn’t have a burning desire for it my entire childhood. I was never planning on being an actress, and I was going to go to university. My mother is a great linguist, so I wanted to be just like her and I wanted to do modern languages and be a translator.
So, how did you start out in acting?
I sort of fell into it – an agent saw a school play I did and said, “Oh, you are good, you should do this.” I was like, “OK.” I was 17. I sort of shrugged my shoulders, and not to sound cavalier about it, but it just wasn’t my plan – it was not what I was wanting to do. So, I remember doing my first play and my first job, and I was working with Judi Dench, and it was so thrilling and I remember saying to my agent, “I’m getting $400 a week, oh my God!” I had never seen that much money in my life. I just couldn’t believe how lucky I was.
And at the end of the year, we’ll be seeing you in the iconic role of Mary Poppins.
What was that like?
It was the most magical experience, because Rob Marshall [the director] is so loving and nurturing. He made it feel like an intimate experience and less of what I worried it would be, which would be to try and re-imagine this character that is so beloved, and played by an iconic actress like Julie Andrews.
How did you prepare for it? Did you watch the original film over and over?
Ultimately, I didn’t end up watching it. I had seen it as a child, so that image was sort of emblazoned in my memory, but I never watched the film during the process – I just read the books. So, however people view it, it’s my version of her. I hope people like it. I took her from the books and she is batty, eccentric and incredibly vain. It was just a joy to play somebody who knows that she is better than everybody else, but ultimately, has this incredibly warm core, and that there is this plan that she takes people on. She is magical.
A Quiet Place is in cinemas nationwide now
‘We drank a lot of whisky while we were filming A Quiet Place’