Warning: This article contains spoilers forMay December.
Gracie Atherton-Yoo is a slippery creature.
Is Gracie or George the one who’s lying?
Julianne Moore and Charles Melton in ‘May December’.Everett Collection
“I don’t know if Gracie even knows,” reflects Moore.
“That’s the insidious thing about our pasts and trauma.
This is a personal opinion, but I don’t behavior is created out of a vacuum.
Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore in ‘May December’.courtesy netflix
There’s cause and effect with everything.
But with anybody’s history, people are also not aware or even conscious of what happened.”
“As a human being, I can say that her actions are reprehensible.
I would be crazy if I didn’t think that.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: You’ve made more films with Todd Haynes than any other director you’ve worked with.
What keeps you coming back?
JULIANNE MOORE:He’s truly one of the greatest directors of our time.
Everything that he talks about in his films are things that I’m endlessly fascinated by.
As an actor, he gives you so much scaffolding.
He’s always giving you a frame to work in.
He has such a strong point of view, and he’s really able to communicate that to me.
I feel like he does all of the work, and I can just slot into it.
Gracie has this very infantilized way of being.
What was the impetus for that?
She felt she was rescued by a love affair, but the love affair was with a 13-year-old boy.
She says, “I am naive.
I always have been.”
It’s a willful denial.
In this vastness, there’s this huge amount of emotional volatility.
This story wasloosely inspired by Mary Kay Letourneau.Did you do much research on her or borrow anything from her?
But I did read about the case, and I saw some of the documentaries and stuff too.
It was interesting to read those and to think about how we gobble up these sensationalized stories.
Then you wonder, “Well, what is the story?”
We may never really know, because sometimes when you sensationalize these things, you take away the humanity.
Speaking of the tabloids, we see you as Gracie in a bunch of shots.
Were those photoshopped images or old pictures of you?
Oh, we shot all of those.
We had one afternoon to quickly do all these things.
courtesy netflix
Natalie had to study and copy a lot of your mannerisms.
No, that’s not how the game is played.
The lisp was something that I was messing around with early on.
It was something that was emblematic of her feeling of being childlike.
What do you think it is?
I don’t know.
Gracie thinks that it’s good.
You’d have to ask Michael Corey Smith what he thinks.
Gracie says, “Of course, I see all of my kids.”
They all continue to live in the same town and go to the same schools.
She turns the tables on Elizabeth at the end, but do you think that’s purposeful or subconscious?
I don’t know.
People’s behavior, often, they want to be some way and they end up being another.
Are we in control of our actions?
Or is some subconscious thing taking over?
Her whole life hangs on the telling of this story.
But I do think that she’s quite aware.
There’s a deliberateness to a lot of things.
She tells Elizabeth that Joe will take her home.
So, you really do wonder.
You’re like, “Wow, is this somebody who’s conscious of everything?”
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