Anna Kendrick is opening up more about how her personal experience in an abusive relationship has affected her lead roles in her new filmAlice, Darling, currently in theaters in New York and Los Angeles, with a wider theatrical release in January 12.
Kendrick previously told People by Mary Nighy ‘s feature directorial debut, project written by Alanna Francis premieres in Toronto Film Festival, which “resonated” with her as she was “coming through a personal experience of emotional and psychological abuse”.
“I was in a situation where I loved and trusted this person more than I trusted myself,” Kendrick told People ) Her past relationships while refusing to reveal the ex-boyfriend’s name she said was abusive. “So when that person tells you that you have a distorted sense of reality, that you’re impossible, that everything you thought was happening wasn’t happening, your life can quickly become very messy. I’m in In the end, I had the unique experience of discovering that everything I thought was happening was actually happening. So I had that feeling and springboard to recovery that a lot of people don’t have.”
Now, in an interview with Los Angeles Times , in addition to starring , Kendrick, who also served as an executive producer on the Lionsgate film, went further by opening up about how her past relationships affected her image in the film.
In particular, it’s important to Kendrick that the abuse on screen isn’t physical, and hopefully provides a more nuanced portrayal of abusive relationships, something she hasn’t seen a lot movie, which made her wonder if what happened to her was really abuse.
“That’s a huge part of my problem,” she said. “Well, he never hit me, and I’m really not afraid he will. How can I tell the difference between normal conflict and abuse? Why is my body in such constant fear? Why do I wake up feeling like he’s in bed next to me and I’m wondering, ‘well, I had seconds or…? ‘”
The relationship even made her doubt her own history, she said: “He was so convinced I was a monster that I couldn’t see that I wasn’t. ”
And she doesn’t necessarily think the abuse turns into physical abuse.
“You don’t have to believe it might make you feel like Allowed to leave, you deserve better, you deserve to feel safe,” she told
Los Angeles Times .
Kendrick added that she “relates to Alice’s OCD. “
she told Times she recalled writing in her diary, “I just wanted to try harder . If I can get it right, if I can make it perfect, if I can say it in a perfect way, I’ll be fine. “
“That’s exactly the unreasonable hope that if I’m a little better, I’ll be safe. It’s like putting a pair of pliers on your heart,” she said.
She also had an idea of how to act out key scenes in the film when her friends tried to film There’s a strong feeling Alice is away from her abusive boyfriend Simon (Charlie Carrick). Specifically, she’s with her friend Sophie (Wunmi Mosaku) There was eye contact, but not Simon.
“Sophie’s actions put me on a voluntary tightrope,” Kendrick told Times how her character felt in that moment. “That was the phrase I used that day, and I know it made me sound totally crazy. I was like, ‘If I break eye contact with her, I’m going to fall off the rope. It’s a survival technique. ‘”
As in the film, Alice begins to regain her sense of self and reexamine her abusive boyfriend while on vacation with friends,
Someone Just did the one thing he couldn’t do, which was to tell me, ‘You’re right, I’m sorry, you’re not crazy.’ I’m so grateful to that person and [their] gift to me,” Kendrick said. “I don’t know how to describe it other than it feels like one of those clumsy CGI ghosts from the 90 movie that pops back into your head and body , and you wake up, and you’re like, ‘Oh my God, I’m here. Oh! I’m hungry for the first time ever.’”
In the movie with her own In recovery, she had to believe she was evidence of abuse.
“I was begging Mary, ‘Can Alice be evidence?'” Kendrick said. “Because not only do I wish we don’t make a movie that’s already been made, but personally, I need to believe that I’m the proof. Part of it is, if you can’t trust Alice, then I can’t trust myself. So this It’s really, really important that the movie is so reliant on being with Alice.”
She added of her own experience, “It’s been a lot of hard work sitting in my grief and trusting my own body, But it’s so much more rewarding. I have to believe that we can follow Alice and trust her, because that’s what I do now: believe in myself.”
