When I spoke with director Maria Schrader (Emmy winner for 2020’s Unorthodox), she’d just recovered from a long night out. Her latest film, She Said, held its home turf premiere in Berlin the previous evening. To celebrate, Schrader and friends celebrated the well-received screening with dancing and drinks in the Berlin nightlife. Then, the party migrated home with Schrader, final guests leaving at 7am.
After a continent-jumping tour for the acclaimed film, Schrader and team deserved the night off. After all, She Said covers some intensely emotional terrain as it conveys the struggle of two journalists, Megan Twohey (Carey Mulligan) and Jodi Kantor (Zoe Kazan), as they work to expose the decades-long pattern of sexual abuse by Harvey Weinstein, the then hugely influential Hollywood producer. Schrader deftly guides her cast through the tricky terrain, building an emotionally resonant and fiercely intelligent film that honors not only the intrepid journalists but, most importantly, the dozens of women who suffered at Weinstein’s hands.
So you’ll forgive Schrader if she has a fun night once in a while. She’s more than earned it.
“I spent so much time outside of Berlin making this movie. I also spent the last three months of the summer in New York again to finish it,” Schrader remarked. “Of course, it was very highly anticipated here too, and it was a great opportunity to see all these people I haven’t seen for so long and to reconnect. It was really beautiful.”
Schrader’s interest in the material sparked after the Twohey and Kantor broke the original story back in 2017. The aftermath started several conversations and the #MeToo movement which had reverberations across the world. Eventually, Schrader would be approached by producer Dede Gardner and would read Twohey and Kantor’s book. The opportunity to tell a story, to make a film, with two female protagonists also proved irresistible to the director.
She hadn’t seen a true representation like this within film of two women building trust in one another and of women sharing their stories, their lived experiences, to such great effect. To build as accurate a representation of the events as possible, Schrader worked with Twohey and Kantor to ensure authenticity.
“I don’t know how many questions I asked Jodi and Megan about conference rooms, about bigger things, about different energies in the newsroom and in the investigation bullpen. Over the growth of the team, I believe Jodi and Megan gained trust more and more. They would invite us to their homes and tell us about the details of their private lives during the time of the investigation,” Schrader shared. “The fact that we wanted to make a movie and have them as our protagonists and also integrate other parts which they consciously left out of their report made sense and was meaningful to them. It was a great collaboration.”
One of the more unique aspects of She Said is that it incorporates Kantor and Twohey’s personal lives into the narrative. While She Said still follows in the footsteps of All the President’s Men or Spotlight, it stands on its own as a documentation of all aspects of a female journalist’s life. Schrader considered a full picture of the two women to combine both their fierce professionalism with their relatability. They could not emerge as larger-than-life heroes, but they were constantly reminded of the importance of their work, the impact that their words would have on not only Weinstein’s victims but also likely passing down to their own daughters’ futures.
In addition to the characters of Twohey and Kantor, the film includes a painful look into the lives and on-going torment of Weinstein’s victims. Those dozens of women are mostly represented in the film by three actresses: Jennifer Ehle, Samantha Morton, and true-life Weinstein survivor Ashley Judd. Ehle and Morton represented real-life victims as well. While Morton met directly with her character (Zelda Perkins), Ehle opted out of speaking with Laura Madden. Two different approaches. Two incredibly powerful performances.
Yet, one of the most impactful performances within She Said came from Ashley Judd, who unexpectedly plays herself within the film (Gwyneth Paltrow voices herself on a phone call). Schrader said that Judd often speaks about how validating and freeing it was to play herself in the film.
Working with actors playing themselves can be tricky, but Schrader gave Judd the freedom to explore and modulate her performance on her own.
“She decided how to perform actually, how to tell her own story. It’s kind of a stage which I gave to her. I said, ‘This is the way I’d like to film it, and here I’d like to set up the camera. Why don’t I just watch and let you decide how to do it?’ But she’s a wonderful actor, and she was at peace with doing this. So it turned out to be a wonderful, easy shooting day. She started to dialogue, and we tried different approaches. It was just wonderful.”
She Said is now available on video on demand.
just…NO! there need to be URGENT PRISM and lens with which to view the ‘me too ‘ movement..i VEHEMENTLY AGAINST as awards season should be if it knew what it was good for them embracing and elevating a film to favouritism borne out of movement that been blown out of proportion, a movement that been exploited and yes while no denying initially it positioned women victim of sexual harassment to speak out that so improtant for welfare and wellbeing and rights of women to be safe through all walks of life,,,the ‘me too’ movement lost control of itself very quickly and is responsible for conjecture and derailing of sanctity and need to preserve balance in justice ie innocent till proven guilty..initially me too was good thing but ANY film that keys into and is driven from a socio-idealist form of activism need be just as to extent OVERALL community accept and embrace it ..it is a frought DANGEROUS PATH for awards season to skate on….cos extent after initial founding of movement it been exploited to dangerously blur the lines between those women who use it hoinorably to speak out against sexual harassment vs those who distort the opriginal intent of the original noble intentions of the movement. we had highest profile sexual / rape allegation court case in our country recently a political staffer sexually allegedly assaulted female administrator in her office..while she was drunk…the ensuring court case been completely jeopardised in rightfuly notion of ‘innocent till proven guilty’ heck the statewide federal police very concerned bout extent of external media interference and self proclaimed commentary esp by the victim strongly implying automatice assumption defendant is guilty BEFORE asll evidence is weighted in court of law between both parties– now case been shelved cos toll all media’s reckless stalking type coverage behaviour of both victim and alleged perpetrator…THE PRESUMPTION OF INNOCENCE UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY ABSOLUTELYT MUST USURP ANY ACTIVIST MOVEMENT FURTHERMORE. THE DANGERS OF ONLINE ACTIVISM TAKEN TOO FAR AS THIS PROVEN HERE PUTS LEGAL PROCEEDINGS INTO DISREPUTE CAUSING CONFLICT OF INTEREST AND EXTREME ANGUISH AS BEEN CASE FOR BOTH PARTIES..DO OSCAR REALLY WANT TO EMBRACE A FILM THAT HAS LEAD TO SUCH DASTARDLY OUTCOMES? AND LET FACE IT NOT JUST IN AUSTRALIA BUT HAPPENING ROUND WORLD…LINE BETWEEN THOSE ACTUALLY GUILTY OF DOING CRIME THOSE THAT ARE ASSUMED TO ARE DANGEROUSLY BLURRED COS ME TOO HAD NO LIMITS THIS BE HIGHLY CONTROVERSIAL FOR AWARDS SEASON TO EMBRACE BEST PIC WINNER ‘SHE SAID’;
incidentally much more substantial less divisive but more powerful alternative deserves have best pic nomination is ‘women talking’ cos NOT sparked by activist movement it reflected and drawn out of historic FACT that sadly women were muzzled by the church trhreatened in their safety through intimidation in reality with church’s see no evil speak no evil mantra..as cover get away with heinous intimidation and control of women rights in some more fanatical religious church sects that is..it known to happen in this respect this FAR BETTER TARGETED AND ESSENTIAL IMPORTANT and more justified oscar contender than ‘ she said’ LAST THING ACADEMY NEEDS IS TO REALLY TAKE BAIT OF THE CLICK BAIT CROWD and abandon films that more keenly be hopef for for a win that d NOT pander to online ‘#’ activism..
An informative, welcome interview, Clarence. While watching the movie I thought scenes had a collaborative feel about them. I sensed the actors and Schrader had worked closely to get across a sense of pain about the past as well as a fear of being vulnerable again in the present. It’s good you sought her out.