Vogue recently interviewed Lanthimos and Stone about their journey to making Poor Things The Long Journey (Stone is also a filmmaker), tells a new story about female sexuality and liberation, dresses Bella through her many self-evolutions, and more.
Vogue: How was the idea to adapt this project inspired?
Yorgos Lanthimos: I read many years ago After reading this book, I went to Scotland to meet the author, Alistair Gray, and persuade him to give me the right to choose it. He did it. He is a very lovely person. Unfortunately, he passed away a few years before we actually made the movie, but he was very special and full of energy; he was 80-something [when we met] , as soon as I got there, he saw Dogtooth and said, “I asked my friend to put the DVD on, because I can’t operate these things, but I think you are very Talented, young man.” I was young then. [laughs] He started showing me around Glasgow, showing me the various places he mentioned in the book and the universities he taught at, and it took me a while to get it He is so energetic and excited to be with him. Unfortunately it took me a while to put this movie together because I hadn’t done English-language movies at the time. Then I did The Lobster
to prove to myself that I could make English films and do them well, and it was a long process. After the relative success of The Favorite, I actually made a movie that cost slightly more and made it, and people were more inclined to allow me to do whatever I wanted thing, so I just went back to Gray’s book and said, “This is what I want to do.” It’s been a long process, but I’ve been thinking about this book.
What is it like for you two to work together again, five years later
Favorite is out?
Emma Stone: We know each other It’s been eight years since we started talking about this movie when we were making
The Favorite, at
. During this time we shot a short film called Bleat in Greece at the beginning of 80 and then we worked together again in New Orleans this fall, so it feels like this ongoing process.
2020
