The stars of Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale” including Brendan Fraser (Charlie), Sadie Sink (Ellie), Hong Chau (Liz) and writer Samuel D. Hunter discuss A24 film in this interview with CinemaBlend’s Sean O’Connell. They discuss what happens next for Ellie, how Fraser’s acting was affected by his character’s prosthetics and more.
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00:00 During his time, if he gets through to her,
00:03 she'll remember him with such poignancy
00:05 that likely she will become amazing.
00:08 - I would love to start with you, Mr. Fraser.
00:17 Your movements in this movie tell a complete story.
00:22 They are laborious and they are painful
00:23 and we literally feel them through the screen.
00:25 And so I'm wondering what some of the notes were
00:28 that Darren gave you early in the process
00:30 as you guys were trying to figure out the prosthetics
00:32 and capture or achieve what he wanted to capture.
00:35 - Interesting, because when we did the first makeup test,
00:37 it took six hours to get into it.
00:39 Eventually, I got it down to four
00:43 when we worked on the day, about an hour to get out of it.
00:45 But that it was built one-to-one
00:48 to be cumbersome for the actor to wear,
00:50 that it was made, fabricated with such an exacting attention
00:56 that the size and placement of the very pores itself
00:59 on his body and the applications that went on to me,
01:02 all in service of authenticity,
01:06 always with the mandate that the look of this character
01:10 obey the laws of physics and gravity,
01:12 whereas we don't really see that done previously in films,
01:16 which are often in service of a one-note joke
01:18 and a little bit mean-spirited in my view.
01:20 - Sure, sure.
01:20 - This is clearly not that.
01:23 A simple thing that we learned was that
01:26 unless Charlie's fingers were active a little bit,
01:31 where there's some tension in there, or they were crossed,
01:34 I could never just let them rest, as you would do,
01:37 without your eye going to it and going,
01:39 "Hmm, that may look a bit like a fabrication."
01:44 - Interesting.
01:44 - You needed to be vital inside of it all.
01:46 And we had Darren Aronofsky, who said to me in this ear
01:50 that if he was not a film director,
01:52 he would have been a baseball umpire,
01:54 'cause he sees everything.
01:56 That I can tell you, a 360 fish eye,
01:59 he can take it all in, sharp relief.
02:01 He knows the answer and he knows the call from home plate,
02:03 but he's also a great coach, a great collaborator.
02:07 Once we had the body of Charlie and his corporal being down,
02:14 then we can go work more internally.
02:16 And that's the domain of what Sam Hunter has written
02:20 and worked on for many years for the productions
02:22 of the whale that were on stage that have been adapted
02:25 for the screen for the first time by him.
02:28 - Right, right.
02:28 And Sam, to that end, it's rare to get to the end
02:32 of a story and then just so desperately need
02:34 to know what happens next.
02:36 And I'm curious if you have thought at all
02:38 about where Ellie goes and maybe even had some conversations
02:42 with either Sadie or Darren about that.
02:44 - Not really, not that I can recall.
02:46 I mean, I think there's just,
02:47 I think with all of my plays,
02:50 I never really make decisions
02:51 about what happens afterward.
02:54 You know what I mean?
02:55 I think storytelling is,
02:57 kind of the amazing thing of it is like,
02:59 you just get this section of this person's humanity
03:03 and it's not my job to deliver anything
03:05 other than that section.
03:06 And in fact, if I were to say anything or impose upon that,
03:10 I think that's kind of taking away something
03:12 for the audience.
03:13 You know what I mean?
03:14 - Sure.
03:15 - I'm only giving them a specific limited portrait.
03:20 And I think that's what I love about drama,
03:23 is that like, there's so many different perspectives,
03:27 there's so many different voices.
03:28 Like I'm not, there's no authorial voice,
03:31 or at least there shouldn't be in dramas.
03:33 There shouldn't be an authorial voice
03:34 telling the audience what to think
03:36 or what to believe or what to feel.
03:38 I think that's up to the very complicated matrix
03:41 of these five people.
03:43 - Oh my God, we didn't discuss it,
03:44 but it keeps me up at night.
03:45 I have no clue.
03:47 I think there's so much potential in Ellie to,
03:51 you know, be a really honest, good person.
03:55 Brendan's theory is that she becomes
03:58 this incredible, strong writer, goes on to be an author.
04:01 There's another theory that she just continues on her,
04:05 you know, her bad path.
04:08 I think I do, I do have hope in her
04:13 after this week that she has with Charlie.
04:14 I think she learned a lot about herself
04:17 and was able to kind of let her guard down,
04:20 but most importantly, just get closure
04:23 from her relationship with her father.
04:25 But yeah, that's what's next for Ellie.
04:28 Hopefully all good things.
04:30 - No, I know, in a way, I wanna see it,
04:32 but I don't wanna see it.
04:33 - Right, right, I'm a little nervous.
04:35 - Yeah.
04:36 - I let my imagination go a little bit wild, Sam,
04:39 to tell you the truth,
04:40 'cause I believe that Charlie believes in his daughter,
04:43 not just because she's his daughter,
04:45 but I do firmly believe that he realizes that, yes,
04:49 she will care about people.
04:50 Yes, people will love her,
04:53 but yes, he also realizes she's talented
04:57 in ways that she is not even aware of yet.
05:01 And during his time, if he gets through to her,
05:04 she'll remember him with such poignancy
05:07 that likely she will become the amazing author,
05:11 author, great mind in the making
05:15 of how she just even represents herself
05:18 when she scribbles something in a notebook
05:20 that turns out to be,
05:22 whether it's by design or accident,
05:27 a pretty clever haiku.
05:28 She has poetry within her.
05:32 She has unrealized potential.
05:34 And that's how I feel aspirant and positive
05:38 about what became of her
05:40 after clearly a portrait of her fraught youth
05:45 and understanding herself and her father.
05:48 - People are incapable of not caring.
05:52 - In this story, I really do feel like Charlie's apartment
05:54 was something that we felt.
05:56 And so I'm wondering as performers,
05:58 and maybe Sadie, start with you,
05:59 can you be inspired by a location?
06:01 Can you play off of a set
06:03 the way that you would like a human co-star?
06:05 - Absolutely.
06:06 I think for Ellie, the apartment's tricky
06:10 because when she walks into the apartment,
06:12 she's looking at everything that her father left her for.
06:18 So it's a really dark space for her to be in,
06:21 but it's also, I remember the first day
06:24 that we got to see it all with the set dressing,
06:26 the props, everything.
06:27 It was like a playground.
06:28 It was so fun.
06:29 But yeah, I think part of just staying in that one space,
06:36 it gets, you have to be a little creative
06:40 with, for Darren and Maddie, the DP,
06:42 like the angles that they use.
06:45 And for us, where we were walking,
06:47 what space we were utilizing.
06:49 But yeah, I agree with you.
06:52 I think the apartment is definitely a character of itself.
06:55 - Holland, did you feel that way as well too,
06:57 when you had to spend time in the apartment?
06:59 Did you feel as constrained
07:00 as I think we all are supposed to?
07:02 - That was definitely intentional.
07:05 And I think also because Brendan's character
07:08 is pretty stationary for a lot of the story,
07:12 we sort of had to orbit him
07:14 and part of rehearsal was just figuring out
07:18 what the best way to do that was.
07:21 - Liz in this movie is such a complicated character
07:24 and her relationship with Charlie, of course,
07:25 is extremely complicated.
07:26 And I'm wondering at what point in the process,
07:29 did you feel like you fully understood her
07:32 or did you ever get to that point?
07:33 - I think I did.
07:37 I understood the complexity of that relationship
07:41 where Liz at times was an enabler for Charlie.
07:46 In my own life, I've definitely had to tell family members,
07:53 like, "You need to go to the doctor.
07:54 "Why haven't you gone to the doctor?"
07:56 And so that rang so true to me,
08:01 those moments and even the moments
08:05 when she's bringing him food,
08:10 that's not really healthy.
08:12 And I just think they have such a long history
08:17 with each other and a complicated and painful history
08:23 that they share that she really wants to comfort him
08:28 in any way that she can.
08:31 And so I think because she's doing it out of love,
08:34 it can really blind her to
08:40 just the unhealthy aspects of it.
08:45 - I'm burning the kicking out.
08:46 I just need to know, were those your feet
08:48 that stepped into the ocean?
08:49 Did you get to do that?
08:50 And was it rewarding?
08:51 - Indeed they were.
08:52 That was a nice day at the beach.
08:54 And I should say also, that's Sadie's little sister
08:57 playing little Sadie.
08:59 Isn't it?
09:00 - Isn't it?
09:01 That's great.
09:02 Keep it in the family.
09:03 (gentle music)
09:06 (gentle music)
09:09 (gentle music)
09:12 [BLANK_AUDIO]