OC: Most of the film is improvised, only the stage directions are written in the script. Since it was such a personal project for you, it was impossible for reality not to merge with what you showed us on screen. Was this process exciting or did it scare you at first?
EP: What scared me about it was the improvisation of this dramatic film. How was that going to work? Of course it’s personal, certain themes relate to identity, but a lot of the actual storyline itself wasn’t like my own. It’s quite different, but I think working this way, it inherently becomes so personal.
Every actor in this film was amazing and gave their best. When you’re working in that process and you have to be so present in the moment to do a 20-minute take, a 40-minute take, and even a 53-minute take, you really disappear. You can see it in all the actors, those moments of such extreme emotion that for some of them they often came out of nowhere. They didn’t know what was going on. You could see how that way of working became almost inherently personal to everyone, even when the situation itself was very different from their own.
OC: Dominic, what impressed you most about Elliot?
DS: A lot. Just how much Elliot was 100 percent into it. He believed in me and the process, even when sometimes I didn’t. Whatever the challenge, Elliot always rose to it. That doesn’t always happen with actors. I’ve worked with others who found ways to not deal with something uncomfortable or not want to deal with that particular feeling they needed.
We went on an emotional journey for this film and Elliot was very involved from the beginning. You can have conversations that are absolutely great and interesting, but they don’t mean much. We knew that conversation meant something. You could really feel that Elliot and the other actors were there all the time, in a way that went beyond the idea of a performance.
