When Game of Thrones airs its final episode on May 19, it wont just be the worlds final glimpse of Daenerys and Jon and company—it may be the last time seemingly everyone sits down to watch a show at the same time. The biggest TV series in the world is ending this spring, and even though seemingly every network with a major budget is trying to make the next Game of Thrones, so far theres nothing to take its place. Is the end of Game of Thrones the end of the monoculture? Or can unifying forces like Avengers movies, or even the Oscars, step in to take its place?
On this weeks episode of Little Gold Men, Mike Hogan, Richard Lawson, Katey Rich, and Joanna Robinson look at the hubbub surrounding the final season of Game of Thrones, and the extent to which its lavish season premiere at Radio City Music Hall felt like a scene from the fall of Rome. They pick the characters they least want to see meet a bad end, speculate about how the show will tie the story up, and look at the would-be inheritors of the Game of Thrones crown. Right now it doesnt look like anything could possibly take Game of Thrones place at the center of pop culture . . . but then again, did anyone think Game of Thrones would be such a hit?
The episode concludes with a conversation between Richard and Alex Ross Perry, the writer and director whose new film, Her Smell, opens in limited release this week. Its the second film Perry has written to come out in the last year, and the two projects could not be more different: he was also the writer of last years Disney movie Christopher Robin. As he tells Richard in the interview, even though Christopher Robin was his seventh screenplay, the process of making a large-scale family film “changed everything I knew about writing. It was just really rewarding.”
Take a listen to the episode above, and find a transcript of the Alex Ross Perry interview below. You can subscribe to Little Gold Men on Apple Podcasts or find it at Radio.com or anywhere else you get your podcasts.
Vanity Fair: So we have you here to talk mostly about this film called Her Smell, which is out this week in New York and L.A., and I think is having a wider release in the coming weeks. Is that right?
Alex Ross Perry: I think yeah. I think L.A. is the following week.
Oh, O.K.
I dont know if this is coming immediately.
Right. But the film has been seen before because it was at the Toronto Film Festival where it got a lot of great reviews and the film star Elisabeth Moss. People were kind of chattering about her. I finally got to see it a couple weeks ago or a couple months ago, I guess. I was really . . . I had sort of skimmed the reviews but I didnt really know what to expect. I was totally blown away. Its an extraordinary film, and its maybe a dumb question, but I just wanted to ask you, where the heck did this movie come from because having seen previous work or yours, I see DNA shared in Her Smell, but it feels like a different sort of Alex Ross Perry movie.
Well, theres always some part of each one is kind of a pivot away from the other one. The previous movie, Golden Exits, it was a very calm, quiet movie. Even in the completion of that, I was already thinking, the next one ought to be a very loud, crazy movie. Each one of the movies up until this has a sequence in it thats kind of choreographed, blocked, party sequence thats always kind of chaos. We just end up rehearsing it, shooting it five or six times, and then cutting it together and making it feel exciting. Those always were my favorite sequences in each movie. So then I thought, maybe we do a whole movie like that, because thats always my favorite part.
Then kind of in tandem with that, there was this idea kind of predating the notion of the next movie should be big and crazy of a character that came to me just looking for another Lizzie collaboration before Queen of Earth even came out where I was working on a failed TV pilot that was set in the 90s, and I had kind of gotten re-introduced to a lot of the music that I loved and even learning about how much music I never heard.
Then at that same time, I was trying to make a different music movie, 60s music movie that failed for various reasons. Somehow, the combination of those things, like a little bit of a failed movie, this character for Lizzie, the desire to do a big loud movie, it all just landed in this kind of shape.
What was some of that music in particular that you revisited or discovered that helped inspire the movie?
Well, its a lot of the stuff that I think is kind of in the bones of the movie. I mean, I grew up listening to what was the alternative-rock station. So I was really just listening to everything from stuff I missed entirely like Social Distortion, which I had never heard any of except for what was on the radio, and I couldnt believe how much great music I had missed. It was just really kind of exciting because I had kind of come to New York for college and like a lot of people move away from what you love and cared about. I was listening to new music and important music, so to speak, and things that I was supposed to like.
Then all of a sudden, its like 2015 and I havent listened to what was my favorite music for 10 years in 15 years. It kind of all got to come back to me as a weird inspiration, like a lot of movies, people always think this ought to be inspired by movies. Movies should be inspired by movies. But movies inspired by a CD, movies inspired by a play, a book. These are are valid things in my opinion.
Yeah. Yeah. I think its interesting thinking about you going to college and sort of forgetting about the music you liked but then realizing later, “Well, those people were still recording. They were still putting stuff out.” I think that there is that in Her Smell because this character played by Elisabeth Moss who . . . I dont want to say that shes at the sort of denouement of her career or anything, but shes at a point where shes sort of past, I guess, what you could call her prime, partly because of substance abuse. Was the substance aspect or the drug aspect of it always a part of the narrative in your head? Is that how it started?
Yeah, the initial presentation to her of a character via text message was mother, rock star, addict. So that was always there. It seemed like the right vessel to sort of create the character inside, but not because I have the experience with it, but because it's appropriate and because of the characters and the way that they always end up being written in the movies and then some of the response to them. You know, if someone says in your movies and your writing, the characters can be very abrasive, very confrontational, very unlikeable, I always want to put that as far as possible, not in that direction, but in saying like, “Well, what if all those traits are because of this in one degree or another? What if those traits are because this person is seriously depressed? What if those traits are because this person is going through an extreme crisis?” In this movie, its, “What if all those traits are because this person is out of control with a disease that has completely taken over their life and if all of that behavior, all of that attitude is because of her substance abuse?” Are people still going to say, “Boy, this character is hard to take.” Or are they going to say, “Boy, this character is really sick.”
Right, yeah. You know, a comparison that has been drawn, not by you, but by people whove seen the film is to Courtney Love because theres a young daughter at the center of things. Obviously Her Smell is not the same story as that. Was she on your mind at all when you were writing the movie or is that not a comparison that you like?
Well, I mean, there were hundreds of bands and records and women and men on my mind. You know, none of them are 51 percent of the character. People . . . of course Courtney Love is one of hundreds of women up on the walls for hair and makeup inspiration and attitude and everything, but theres 99 others. I think its just because people only know her. No one knows the names of any other. This is like Chuck Klostermans theory that reggae has been reduced only to Bob Marley. Women in alternative rock has already in 25 years been reduced to one person, which is great for the historical value of that person, but theres so much else. Like if theres a continuum . . . I dont know how well you know Velvet Goldmine.
Not too well, but Ill follow you.
Like, that movie half is just David Bowie and Iggy Pop.
Right.
Like literally. I can tell this just as a fan, not as like an encyclopedic fan of them or of glam rock. Then you read about it, and its like, this character is David Bowies first manager who he abandoned. And this character is his first wife, and this and that. I dont know any of that when Im watching the movie, but then the movie says, well, what if at the height of his fame he disappeared and then this movie is about a journalist with the structure of Citizen Kane trying to find what happened to this guy.
So it takes something that is so close to something that we all know and then just does whatever it wants with it, which is kind of one thing Im trying to do with the script. So there is no . . . but in this case, there is no this is Bowie and this is Iggy Pop. On the other end is like Boogie Nights or The Master or Phantom Thread or that style of writing where its like its just a little of everything. Its kind of this to Phantom Thread. Its kind of this designer, but it doesnt have any of that persons details. Then theres this other character who that person didnt have. Then theres this whole story line that that character never experienced, but its always just like, “Oh, but the writer of this movie just viewed this character and these types of people as the avenue for this particular story.” So this is closer to that I would say.
Right. Did you consult with any musicians when you were either writing the film or making it, or did you kind of just do you research and go on your own?
I mean, I didnt want to because for the same reason that Im talking about is that the closer I looked at any one, the more of that one threatened to get in there. If I sat down with two people and just took tons of notes and listened to everything they said and then I went back and thought about the next draft of the script, it would only be informed by those two womens experiences rather than my preference, which would be 50 or zero.
Yeah.
Because then, again, in terms of Courtney Love or any of the other women who were making this music, like theres nothing that was ever going to work if I want this thing that happened in the movie.
Right, right.
Like if you do that, then in Boogie Nights, he doesnt do the Wonderland killings. He does this thing thats kind of a heist but it has a young Asian boy and theres fireworks. It takes the idea that this guy ends up in this kind of a situation and just does something that is not the thing that we all kind of know happened, but at the same time, its like this could have happened, but it didnt. So talking to anyone I think would have colored it.
So even in my research, I tried not to read too many personal memoirs or personal autobiographies of women in this era just because I was too nervous to just be like, “Oh, this is exactly what I want. This story of this person in this one band is what the movie needs to be.”
So when you were having conversations with Elisabeth Moss about the role, how does that conversation happen? I mean, did you just kind of let her go with the script and she came back to you with this version of this character? Or was it really like beat-by-beat collaborative effort to build to what we see on-screen?
Well, the last couple movies are always written with somebody in mind, but this was the first one thats just like, its just written for her. Its written for her voice, its written for her face, its written for her physical presence. Its written for her eye color. Its written for her height. All of these things are just baked in.
So in the writing of it, knowing that this was the deal, I really just felt like I was just watching an existing performance and then just writing down what was happening in it. So then the material in her hands becomes like . . . its all just tailored to you doing this. Its all a challenge, but theres nothing in here that I wrote not thinking how will you do this.
Then the chaos of it was kind of up to her on the day. The controllable nature of how to replicate a performance often enough to film a movie for a month was not something that we could have predicted or planned on. Its very different from the way most actors work to do one 30-page scene for three days in a row and then move on to another one. So the conversations were always just kind of me saying, “You cant fail. This is just yours. Its in your wheelhouse and everything you do is just exactly whats supposed to happen. There is no degrees of, Oh, shes kind of not doing it, because its just yours.”
So theres really no way to analyze it.
That sounds so freeing for an actor. I bet that was . . . I bet she was excited for that kind of opportunity. I wanted to talk about the . . . I mean, we have to talk about the chaos of it all. You know, you mentioned that you have does these sort of party scenes in your other films and you said, “O.K., well make a whole movie out of that sort of . . .” its chaos but its also beautifully choreographed. Its obviously specifically made. What was that like to make almost a whole movie in that sort of mode? Was it exhausting or what did you get out of it day to day?
It was actually . . . I mean, unfortunately for story-telling sake, it was really easy. Not that filming it was easy because everything was a challenge, but we spent a year kind of creating the parameters of the production to make it so controllable and streamlined, which is something I think most people neglect. Most people when they're putting together a movie, be it $20,000 or $20 million, have no creative impulses on how to structure things, on how to spend money here instead of there, how to balance the schedule in a way thats not just logistically correct, but also creatively inspiring for the crew and for the actors. We had the opportunity to do that.
So starting eight or nine months out, we were saying each act will have a full day of rehearsal. So there will be a day every four days where we dont film anything and we just plan and rehearse and everyone on the crew watches and thinks. Then we come in the next day and we do 12 pages. Thats kind of the chaos of it. I wanted to not have lunch breaks. I hate having the break in the middle of the day. Everyone kind of gets out of the head space. Some people get tired. Some people get on the phone. They get bad news. I said, “We cant have breaks. We have to just spend a whole day basically not working, but thinking.” Then three days where I dont want to see anybody taking a break because the actors wont and that will be the performance that they give because now theyre actually really worked up. Theyre sweaty, theyre exhausted, theyve been doing this for six hours straight without an hour or two hours in the middle of things. Everything about it was just can we do it like this so that everyday everything is easy except for whats happening in between action and cut. But if weve done our work, that will not be easy but it will at least be predictable and controlled and consistent.
Yeah. I mean, I think its . . . people can watch a movie like this and say, “Oh, they just like all were in a room and the camera was wandering aimlessly around,” but I dont really think that. It cant really work exactly like that, right? I mean, there has to be a sort of . . . I mean, I guess a day of rehearsal and sort of parameter that youre following. I mean, its kind of the irony that in order to capture chaos on film, it has to be the opposite behind the camera. Is that true?
Yeah. No one who has been on set would think that. This is just a mistake that people in public audiences get tripped up on because its like the movie is so chaotic and theres so much happening and theres scenes in rooms that are small that have 8, 9, 10, 11 characters in them. Every single one of them is talking and moving. Its one of those things where like shooting and editing it, I just know well never get credit for how hard this actually was. Ill never get credit for the fact that every single utterance of this dialogue is scripted, because it just seems like madness. This room is such a decrepit mess that the production team will never get credit for how much work they put into this because it just looks like some backstage hellhole. Theyll never get credit for the fact that this was constructed from nothing.
Yeah, I mean, its just the steadicam alone has to be measured for every shot, every take. So we have to know where every actor is going to land or move so that the steadicam operator and the focus puller are tracking them. So theres so much rehearsal to then saying were going to shoot this six-minute take five times in a row until the sweat on peoples faces is real. Theres no way to do it. Then yeah, this has kind of been the thing, since even Listen Up Philip, which was similarly kind of blocked and rehearsed in terms of letting the actors creating the scene and then following them consistently. But the style of that movie, which is a very shaky, handheld camera suggest people we just are kind of winging it, but its as precise as can be.
Yeah, yeah. Then I dont want to spoil anything for the audience, but later in the film, one of the acts of the film is quieter and its more still and it involves fewer people. Shifting to that, was that kind of a jarring . . . was it a relief in a way, or how do you plant this very different sort of paced and energy scene in the middle of all of that frenzy?
Yeah. I mean, thats the only act that we didnt rehearse. That was the only act there was no time to rehearse. We knew that . . . the irony is that as youre kind of suggesting, this is the kind of filmmaking that people actually think takes time. Perfectly composed locked-off shots where the camera doesnt move for four minutes and people sit perfectly still. This is something that people actually think you have to deliberately plan, whereas that one had the least planning because to us . . . also, we filmed it last. Those are the last three days of the shoot.
To us, after everything we had already been through, you know, one house location with just three actors. This was kind of a lovely little postscript to the actual challenges of the movie. It was something I had never done before. So the whole challenge was like, I dont know if we can just set a shot like this and hold it for two minutes because Ive never tried that. It requires a lot of patience and a lot of trust, but again, we just thought about it and talked about it. And at that point, we had done everything else. So we had nothing left to try other than minimalism.
So is Elisabeths performance in the film what you . . . I guess you were saying its just whatever happened on the day, but when you first were conceptualize this movie or this character, did she do anything that surprised you that we see on film? Or is it kind of everything that you expected it to be?
Well, its all surprising because I dont expect or thing about anything. The only thing Im expecting is that she is going to memorize all the words. Beyond that, I really dont know, which is sort of why the collaboration works for us at this point because that kind of . . . all she is going to do is memorize the line and then come in and figure the rest out. It's very similar to how I work or like all I know is that this whole sequence is gonna be like this and theyre out here and in there and its chaos and then so and so happens. But I dont really know the details until were doing it because Id rather find that details than create them by myself and then force everyone else to understand them.
So everything is a surprise. Its a surprise what shes doing, but then it becomes a surprise in how we want to cover it. Then she moves slower than we thought. So now were adjusting or she moves faster than we thought. So now this whole scene is different. Yeah, I mean, everything is just kind of up to spontaneity, but then theres little things. Like theres a moment thats easy to talk about where in the second act of the movie, theres a very poppy song played by the younger band and in the script, it was written that Becky dances around and likes the song a lot. She had been watching some drug movies. She was talking about Goodfellas and Boogie Nights.
She was like, “What we havent really seen yet is that kind of like dazed druggie feel. So far its all very high energy. What if instead of dancing, I just sit here and we play it out like you dont know whats going to happen? Then when we go back to the script, to the words, everything is the same but the meaning is different because whats happened during the performance is not whats written.” This was exactly my challenge to all the actors was like, “Were not going to change any of the lines. Everything is going to be delivered as written and well figure that out, but any physical things you want to do, any body language, any props, these are the ways were going to create the characters.” This was the perfect thing where I was like, “Yeah, thats much better.” Sitting down and looking in that kind of like “Jesses Girl” Mark Wahlberg–Boogie Nights facial expression. This is actually a thing we havent done yet and this is what the movie wants right now. This is much better than whats written, but then when we go back to the dialogue, then the whole thing is the same or better.
So working in that way, I would imagine that you have to assemble a particular kind of cast, a cast thats willing to do that. I mean, past Elisabeth who you have a working relationship with. Can you talk to me a little bit because there are great performances in the film from Agyness Deyn in particular, Dan Stevens, Virginia Madsen is great, Ashley Benson. How did the casting process work past Elisabeth?
Well, its the kind of thing that has happened in one form or another with all of the movies in the last few years. Like everyone sees the script and they know that shes in and then people can picture themselves in it and they really want to be a part of it. So Im always very, very lucky to have a script that goes out with, in the case of something like Listen Up Philip, like Jason Schwartzmans playing this role and now everybody can see the movie and they want to be in it. Or in Queen of Earth, Lizzie is playing this role or in this movie, Lizzie is playing this role. People are like, “O.K., well thats going to be exciting. I want to get in the room with that.” So I think you just kind of end up with your pick of so many exciting options.
Then the conversation for them was like, “Look, this is going to be like theater. Were gonna be doing these long scenes over and over.Read More – Source
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