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Mere minutes into Simon Kinberg’s high-octane espionage thriller, The 355, Oscar-nominated actress Jessica Chastain is chasing down Diane Kruger at breakneck speed through the streets of the Marais district in Paris; overturning tables inside the Passages des Grands Cerfs, crashing a motorcycle down the steps of a Métro station, duking it out in the arch-shaped inlets which run along the walls of the train tunnels. It’s intense.
“We spent a long time on choreography,” Kruger tells GRAZIA, sweeping her long fringe to the side of her face, before resting her hand on her lavender tweed CHANEL suit.
“It was fun because it felt like I was learning a dance. [Jessica and I] trained individually at first with our personal stunt people, and once they felt like, ‘Ok they aren’t going to kill each other,’ they put us together to work it out. That was an exciting day, even though, we almost killed each other!”
“Diane is a dancer and it’s clear in these scenes,” quips a smiley Chastain, a grin so wide it immediately triggers memory of that viral video with Scenes From A Marriage co-star Oscar Isaac. The 44-year-old actress also serves as a producer on the film.
“All of us were just flawed the day [Diane] came on set because it was shocking how she just fit. She was such a badass! We spent weeks rehearsing and I realised quite early on that I had to up my game because it was going to be tough. We really took care of each other though, we didn’t hurt each other. It’s my favourite scene in the movie.”
Watch the moment below.
In cinemas now, The 355 centres around an impetuous and wickedly intelligent CIA agent named Mace (Chastain) who joins forces with German agent Marie (Kruger), former MI6 ally and computer specialist Khadijah (Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o), and a Columbian psychologist named Graciela (Oscar-winning actress Penelope Cruz) who happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Together, the quartet travel around the world – from the monied markets of Morocco to the opulent auction houses of Shanghai – to ensure a top-secret weapon, which can hijack any computer-controlled device on the planet, doesn’t fall into mercenary hands.
PIAGET WERE THE EXCLUSIVE WATCH & JEWELLERY PARTNER FOR THE 355, SEE PIECES (BELOW) FROM ONE THE FILM’S ICONIC SCENES (ABOVE).
It’s in their travels they meet Lin Mi Sheng (played by GRAZIA cover woman Fan Bingbing), who I can only describe as a glamorous, sauntering enigma. You’ll also spot Sebastian Stan (who GRAZIA readers will know best as Gossip Girl’s Carter Baizen. He will soon play Jack-guzzling musician Tommy Lee in the highly anticipated eight-episode series Pam & Tommy, out next month.)
The edge-of-your-seat, visceral action scenes pretty much don’t stop during The 355’s 124-minute run time, a refreshing reprieve which focuses on the punches and not the sex appeal. Off-screen, Chastain says the all-star female cast had a wonderful time on set together.
“On the first day of shooting, I was looking around like, ‘Are we really getting away with this?” she says, sitting cross-legged on a dining chair and in a red suit. “It was shocking to me that we could have so much control and so much input into what we were making…it was amazing. We were all really supportive of each other, and that was also nice to be around.”
There is a scene in the movie where the women are speaking about the first life they took. We get to know the backstories of these women and what brought them to this particular moment, an interesting segue to a question about Chastain and Kruger’s experiences on set as younger actresses.
“When I first started in the industry and I had an idea for a scene, I always felt like it would be met with an immediate no,” recalls Chastain. “It’s crazy to think about it now, but what I would have to do is talk to the male actor in the scene about the idea, and he would go to the director and present it, and it would be more acceptable.”
Kruger agrees that things are “moving in the right decision” but notes gender equality still has a long way to go.
“I feel like a space has been created for women to be able to say what’s on their mind,” the 45-year-old says. “I know when I was younger how much sweet-talking I did to get what I wanted, or what I felt was right. I’m able to say things more straight-forward now and am able to be heard. Some of it has to do with age and getting older and maybe being more respected than when you’re a young person starting out.
“But when I see my daughter and what’s been taught to her in school and the books that she gets to read – and of course how I try to raise her – I am hopeful that there is a generation coming where [gender equality] is not even a discussion anymore. It should be just a given. I definitely will try really hard to make that happen in my lifetime.”
The 355 is out now.
