The world premiere to Don’t Worry Darling is fast approaching the Venice Film Festival. In the lead up to the event and the impending release, director Olivia Wilde and Maggie Gyllenhaal sat down in a discussion published by Interview Magazine. Wilde was asked why she chose to direct and star in the upcoming thriller, and apparently she had little choice on the matter.
“It was out of necessity,” she explained to Gyllenhaal, revealing that production “basically ran out of money and I needed someone who would take a really low salary.” After struggling to find a budding actor to fulfill the role, the casting director suggested Wilde should star as the character named Bunny.
According to the filmmaker and actress she approached friends and colleagues — mostly men — within the industry who had done both roles. One of those people was Bradley Cooper who starred in and directed the award-winning film, A Star Is Born. “Cooper was a great supporter,” she said. “He said, ‘It’s going to be really wonderful to be able to direct from within the scenes.'”
It turns out that it was a lot more tricky than Wilde had expected. “All of these men had done this in comfortable shoes, and I swear part of it is that I was in a f****** bustier and heels and a wig,” she said. “They were coming at me doing these necessary but frustrating touch-ups at every second, and I was like, ‘I need to be at the monitor, I need to be in charge.’ I found that to be really hard.”
Despite rumors Florence Pugh and Wilde are feuding, the director took another opportunity to praise the “ferociously talented” actress.
“She was so dogged in her pursuit of the most authentic version of every moment,” Wilde said. “She also knew that my real goal was to create a love story that felt so sincere between her and Harry that people would be incapable of not falling for them as a couple.”
Don’t Worry Darling releases on Sept. 23.
