Saltburn Director: 'I Hope They Let Me Get Away With This'

ODE

The director of 'Saltburn' starring Emerald Fennell talks to Jonny Nelson about how the film's star-studded cast made it 'more excruciating' and 'more hilarious' than she had imagined.     The film features Richard E. Grant, Rosamund Pike, Barry Keoghan, Carey Mulligan, Ewan Mitchell, Archie Madekwe, Sadie Soverall and Alison Oliver among others.    It's due to be released on 17 November 2023. Report by Gracex. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn

Transcript

00:00 Emerald, Vanell, Saltburn.

00:03 Where do we start with this one?

00:04 I interviewed you on the carpet of London Film Festival

00:08 before I'd seen it, and then I watched it,

00:10 I think like the day after, and I was like,

00:12 "God, I wish I'd seen this beforehand."

00:14 It is the first film I've seen in a good long while

00:17 that made me audibly gasp in my seat.

00:20 I'd like to watch it again,

00:21 just to watch other people's reactions to it

00:24 and see if they're as shocked as I was at moments.

00:27 Was there any time in writing this

00:29 where you were like,

00:31 "God, I hope they let me get away with this.

00:34 "I hope I can get away with this soon."

00:36 I mean, honestly, I think almost all of filmmaking

00:40 is the exercise of, "I hope they let me get away with this."

00:44 But absolutely, I mean, what's been so thrilling

00:47 about watching it is that it's just different

00:50 in every room, in every place,

00:51 'cause we've been in America going all around all the states

00:55 and then here in England,

00:56 there is not one room

00:59 that doesn't have a completely different dynamic.

01:01 And it's exactly that.

01:02 Some people are gasping,

01:03 some people are laughing with kind of horror

01:05 or embarrassment,

01:06 some people are like shushing

01:08 because they want to hear every single moment.

01:10 And it's kind of just so, that's the thing.

01:12 That's why you make movies, for the theatre,

01:16 for the cinematic experience,

01:17 for everyone in that room to just like, yeah, feel it.

01:22 - Are those the most satisfying kind of things to write,

01:25 but the most nerve-wracking things to kind of like,

01:27 put into action when making a film?

01:30 Like getting signed off

01:31 and talking the actors through what you want.

01:33 Those kind of scenes that challenge an audience

01:36 to keep watching,

01:37 but really like push them in that way

01:41 when they want to like gasp and cover their eyes at times.

01:46 - Well, I think it's sort of about

01:47 finding your collaborators.

01:49 Like that's what's so great about,

01:50 the way that I work is nobody knows what I'm working on

01:53 and then until the script is ready

01:55 and very much sort of finished, I would say.

02:00 It means that when you're talking to,

02:03 Linus, the cinematographer,

02:04 or the actors or the production designer,

02:07 they have a pretty good idea of the sort of film

02:09 that we're going to make.

02:11 And so it just means that you're all kind of,

02:13 all of you working in one direction

02:15 and that direction is to do, as you say, kind of push.

02:18 Is to keep kind of pushing and finding where those like,

02:22 you know, I kind of, you want to like slip your hand

02:24 in the underbelly and kind of see where the tenderness is.

02:29 That's what's so interesting, isn't it?

02:30 - I definitely felt the hand in my underbelly.

02:32 (laughing)

02:33 I don't know what to do with myself.

02:35 I felt like a prudish old lady.

02:37 (laughing)

02:38 It was great, I loved it.

02:40 Speaking about collaborators,

02:41 there's obviously a lot of heat over like Barry,

02:43 over Jacob, I think Rosamund Pike was like the,

02:46 a scene stealer like throughout this movie.

02:49 As actors, I guess a lot of it is on the page

02:52 already, but how much of a buzz is it behind the camera

02:55 to see how those characters come to life

02:58 through their interpretation of what was on the page

03:01 and how different was it on camera and on screen

03:04 to what it was in your mind when you put it to page?

03:07 - I think it's sort of a combination of both.

03:09 It's that when you get actors as good as the actors are

03:13 in this film, is that you kind of have that uncanny feeling

03:16 of this is exactly what I wanted.

03:19 And then also more than that, better.

03:22 More kind of excruciating, more hilarious.

03:26 They're so, so brilliant, all of them.

03:29 And also all of them like really exceptional comic actors

03:32 'cause this really is like in its heart

03:34 a very, very, very dark comedy.

03:36 So it was important that everyone felt real,

03:38 but there was also this kind of sick humor

03:42 that everyone really, really understood.

03:43 And I think Jacob gives such an exceptional

03:46 like comic performance.

03:48 And then Richard, who's just so good,

03:52 every line is just devastating.

03:54 And then you find people like, not find,

03:58 but you're introduced to people like Archie and Alison

04:02 who play Venetia and Farley,

04:04 who you've never worked with before,

04:05 who were just like transcendently good.

04:08 It's, yeah, it's one of the most exciting

04:10 and the most important parts of making a film

04:12 is that casting process.

04:13 - I think when the, I don't wanna give too much away,

04:15 but when like Richard's character sort of turns

04:18 towards the end and becomes a lot more sort of formidable,

04:21 I think that's quite exciting to watch.

04:23 Let's talk about when it was set.

04:27 I love the soundtrack to this

04:28 'cause I started uni in '07.

04:29 This is set in '06, so it was all like great music,

04:32 crack plumbers. - Period dramas.

04:33 - And I love that, but I wondered what inspired you.

04:36 Was it your own like sense of nostalgia

04:38 or something else that made you wanna root

04:40 this story in that time?

04:41 - Totally, well, it's, yeah, so it's set kind of

04:43 for the most part in the sort of summer of 2007

04:46 and absolutely that was when I was at university.

04:49 But more than anything, because the way that this film is,

04:52 this film is a kind of take on the Gothic tradition,

04:54 this sort of British country house Gothic,

04:57 you know, that you have at Brideshead

04:59 or The Go-Between, for example,

05:00 and it's always a narrator telling you about

05:03 something that happened in their past

05:04 that they never got over.

05:06 And so it kind of, it always had to have

05:08 that framing narrative, which meant it needed to be set

05:11 to some degree in the past.

05:12 And 15 years ago feels perfect

05:14 'cause it's wherever you are in time 15 years ago

05:17 is not cool.

05:18 It's like, it's just, it's always bad clothes, bad hair.

05:23 It's not become trendy yet.

05:25 So that was really part of it,

05:27 was kind of humanizing this family

05:29 and also making the world feel,

05:31 if you're dealing with a very timeless, beautiful world,

05:34 making it actually feel sort of timely.

05:37 It would have been, if we'd set it now,

05:39 it would have been too cool.

05:40 You know, it just would have been beautiful people

05:42 in beautiful clothes.

05:43 There's something really funny about all of them

05:44 having Carpe Diem tattoos,

05:46 Livestrong bracelets, bad tans,

05:48 you know, bad jeans.

05:51 That's kind of part of the whole world, really.

05:53 - Well, I'm not sure everyone would have cool clothes now,

05:55 considering I'm wearing a novelty T-shirt in 2019.

05:58 - And good for you.

05:58 - Thank you.

05:59 I've got to live my truth.

06:00 - Absolutely.

06:01 - And I'm not sure whether it was the purpose of the film,

06:03 but it just made me very nostalgic.

06:05 In a way, I was like, send me back.

06:07 - Really?

06:08 - In a way.

06:08 Obviously, the whole hedonistic kind of like,

06:11 the whole world I had no idea of, of course,

06:14 but to listen to Block Party again every day would be sick.

06:17 - No, to listen to Block Party would be amazing.

06:18 What was quite devastating was the costume department

06:21 would be like, oh my God, Emerald,

06:22 we found the most disgusting T-shirt,

06:24 you're going to love it.

06:25 And it was literally something I still wear.

06:26 It's still in my wardrobe.

06:28 And I was like, ha ha ha, how awful.

06:30 - At least the sweat bands have mostly disappeared.

06:33 - Mostly.

06:34 - Congratulations on the movie.

06:35 - Thank you.

06:36 - Bang it, if you ask me.

06:37 Really enjoyed it.

06:37 I'm sure lots of people will as well.

06:39 - Thank you.

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