Actress/Producer/Writer Charlotte Kirk talks to The Inside Reel about focus, inspiration and evolution of character with her new movie, the action thriller “Duchess” from Saban Films.
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00♪♪
00:10♪♪
00:14Nicely done, Duchess.
00:16Duchess?
00:19She handled that with grace.
00:20♪♪
00:23Real power...
00:25can never be given.
00:27It has to be taken.
00:28♪♪
00:31You've got some balls on you, Princess.
00:33It's Duchess.
00:34♪♪
00:39You know, creating a character,
00:41but creating a character from the birth of it throughout
00:45is so important, I think,
00:46both for a creator and an actor.
00:48And I talked to, obviously, Neil about it before,
00:51but can you talk about seeing Scarlet?
00:53Obviously, your company is named for it.
00:56Could you speak to that and the key with her as a character?
01:01Yeah, so Duchess is an interesting one
01:05because obviously me and Neil had done two films previously,
01:08very, very different kind of films.
01:10One was an action horror and one was a drama horror.
01:14And we just wanted to make a very different kind of movie
01:19that we'd made before.
01:20And what was nice about this film was
01:23we focused on Scarlet as opposed to the genre.
01:29It was very character-driven.
01:31And it was kind of the first film that I'd done
01:34that the idea was based on a character,
01:38which was very, very exciting.
01:40And I think it shows through a lot.
01:42And I think with a lot of gangster films,
01:44great gangster films, the selling point,
01:47the driving force is the main character, right?
01:50Like Tony in Sopranos, Tony in Scarface.
01:53It's all that driving force of the character.
01:55So as Neil said, it was the funnest script he had ever written.
02:02He had the most fun writing the script.
02:04And it was just a blast because Scarlet is such an interesting,
02:09fun, tough, no-nonsense character.
02:13So it was definitely the most fun I had playing a role
02:17and writing it and developing it.
02:19It was very, very cool developing her.
02:23Come here.
02:24Whatever happens, I got you.
02:28I never meant to put you in any danger.
02:30Someone stabbed me in the back.
02:34It's going to be okay.
02:39To really understand where this all started,
02:41we have to go back a bit.
02:46So this is me, named Scarlet.
02:48Got some nice moves.
02:50That's Rob McNaughton, the future lover of my life.
02:54Well, with films like, obviously,
02:56it also speaks not just to Scarface and those,
02:58but like obviously Lock, Stock, Snatch,
03:00those things like Guy Ritchie did.
03:02But the great thing about those,
03:03they always had humour and perspective.
03:06And that's the great thing that Scarlet has,
03:08is that you see her perspective, but her humour shines through,
03:11even in the darkest situations.
03:12Like, well, I should do it.
03:14Doesn't matter.
03:15Could you sort of talk about that and finding the voice,
03:17both dialogue-wise,
03:19but then just the whole package of her, per se?
03:22Yeah, I think, like, every film,
03:25it's nice to have some comic relief or some humour to it,
03:28some dark humour.
03:29I think that's very important.
03:30Like, there's some real tragic moments in Duchess.
03:33Real tragic.
03:35But then it's, I think, with this film in particular,
03:38it's almost like a rollercoaster of emotions.
03:40So, and you need that relief of a funny line,
03:45a funny moment, a funny scene,
03:47because it is otherwise very heavy.
03:50Her story overall, her, you know,
03:53almost her rise to power.
03:55This film is her rise to power.
03:56So, and it's, I think, actually,
04:01a lot of gangster films have that in a way, right?
04:03Just to add that flavour to it.
04:05And it has definitely got that Guy Ritchie feel to it
04:08with the whole, you know, freeze frames and the voiceovers.
04:11I love a good voiceover.
04:13One of my favourite gangster films is Goodfellas.
04:15I just think, for me, the audience,
04:17it just automatically drags me in.
04:19It pulls me into it when there's a voiceover.
04:22It just automatically connects me with it.
04:26So, and it was, I had a lot of fun doing that.
04:29A lot of fun with the voiceover.
04:34Welcome to your new home.
04:37You must be Scarlett.
04:38Scarlett.
04:39Welcome.
04:40Tell me who you really are.
04:42I deal in diamonds.
04:44Diamond trade is dirty and corrupt.
04:48That's when I saw the real one.
04:56The man who killed for me.
04:59Because you were talking about,
05:00even when we're looking at Goodfellas,
05:01Neil and I talked about that too,
05:02is that it's sort of funny because it's the ironic element
05:05of raising the stakes of how dark this place they can be is in,
05:09and then just sort of flopping it.
05:11You know, can you talk about stakes in here?
05:13Because it's in, unlike the other two films,
05:15this is, and Neil said this too,
05:17is in the real world.
05:18So you have to take certain, even though it's heightened,
05:21it's more set in our world, per se.
05:24Yeah, exactly.
05:25That's so true.
05:26It's heightened, but we wanted to make it as real
05:29and as nitty gritty as possible.
05:31It's almost like a My Fair Lady story, right?
05:33Taking her from the streets, from a little fishbowl world
05:37to this incredible other dark underground criminal world.
05:43So, yeah, it was just, it was-
05:46Because you play with the tropes too.
05:48You play with the tropes, even with, you know,
05:50the way you dress at certain times.
05:53It's sort of playing against that, you know?
05:55Well, we wanted to make it as real as possible.
05:57I think that what I like about Neil's characters,
06:01when he writes them, is he makes,
06:03she's not a superhero, she's not a spy,
06:05she's an ordinary girl in extreme circumstances.
06:09Extraordinary circumstances.
06:10But we wanted to make her as real and relatable as possible.
06:13Remember, she's an anti-hero.
06:15So for the audience to really like and connect to this character,
06:18she has to be relatable, I think.
06:21And I think she is.
06:22You know, and then, obviously, for our-
06:25And another really important thing was,
06:27the revenge comes quite late in the film,
06:30which I think is very important,
06:32because a lot of these revenge films now,
06:34they happen within the first five, 10 minutes.
06:36So you don't really get to connect or love
06:39or care about the characters.
06:40No, you see the romance here,
06:42and you see why she's drawn in, you know?
06:44Exactly.
06:45And a big inspiration for this one was Man on Fire,
06:48Denzel Washington.
06:49That doesn't happen until halfway through the film.
06:51So you start to love and care about these characters,
06:54and then it happens.
06:55Then you care.
06:56So that's why a part of it, again,
06:58we wanted to make it as real as possible.
07:00You wanted to, the audience wanted to be on her journey,
07:03falling in love with Robert.
07:05So when stuff happens,
07:06then the audience really feels it as well.
07:08And then you're on her path with her,
07:10on the revenge path.
07:13I'm going to kill all the men that betrayed me.
07:16They will eat you alive.
07:20Do your worst.
07:23It's not enough to be as good as a man.
07:27You have to be twice as ruthless.
07:31And ten times a bitch.
07:32Oi.