Reimagining the origin story of an iconic villain such as Cruella de Vil was likely a no-brainer for Walt Disney Studios executives. Casting Emma Stone probably gave it the greenlight. Setting the tale in an increasingly punk-ish era of ’70s London was probably a twist the family-friendly studio might have been slightly apprehensive about. How do you play with that sort of tone and still land a PG-13 rating? For director Craig Gillespie, the solution was obvious.
READ MORE: Glenn Close wants to return as Cruella de Vil
“Funnily enough, there were things I had to shoot two ways because they were nervous. But all the stuff that I was pushing, to their credit, they ended up leaving in the film,” Gillespie says of Disney execs. “Yeah, there are certain things that we had backup plans for, but I was like, ‘I think this would be great,’ and they lt me shoot it, and it all staying in, which was amazing.”
The result is “Cruella,” a film that sometimes feels safer than its PG-13 rating (no swear words, no sexual innuendo, only insinuated gay/queer supporting characters) but finds Stone and Emma Thompson, as Cruella’s rival The Baroness, clearly having a scenery-chewing blast. During a conversation earlier this week, Gillespie took some time to revisit his London excursion, the masterful work of costume designer Jenny Beaven and that one classic song he couldn’t land for the soundtrack.
The filmmaker also explains the appeal of his new Hulu mini-series “Pam & Tommy,” currently in production, which finds Lily James and Sebastian Stan portraying the iconic ’90s couple Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee.
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The Playlist: You came onto this project in December 2019. Emma had already been attached for years, and I know there were numerous versions of the script. How much of the previous gestations of the idea of that movie ended up in yours?
Craig Gillespie: You know what? It’s like we had all the milestones identified, and the writers that came before did an amazing job of sort of cracking the backbone of it. It’s like the twists and turns that happen, the deceit, who the baroness is, and so I don’t know how much we can give away in this.
We won’t be revealing any major spoilers for anyone reading.
Those milestones were kind of in place, and then we got to sort of figure out, secondly, the tone of the film, and the energy of it. Then the screen time with both the two Emma’s together, it’s like I bought… I was lucky enough that Tony McNamara could come in on this, and he’d worked on “The Favorite” with Emma [Stone]. I’d been working with him on a project when this came along, so I really wanted him to do it, and tonally, I really respond to his work. So, one of the big things that he’d kind of cracked, that wasn’t in the original draft, is in the middle of the movie she has this sort of break and becomes Cruella. At that point, she stopped working for the Baroness, and they never crossed paths again. It seems so obvious in hindsight, [but he] came up with the idea that she keeps working for her undercover. So, they have all the screen time together, and then you get all of this sort of deceit, and how much each of them knows about the plan, and what’s going on. That was amazing because I think, honestly, it’s the funniest part of the film when those two are in the room together.
Also, one of the best parts of the film is Jenny Beavan’s costumes. I hope I’m not jinxing it, but Just give her the Oscar now. They’re that good.
I know.
How hard was it to land her, or did you have a bunch of costume designers audition? I know that happens with other projects. Can you talk about that process?
It’s like I came on and this film accelerated rapidly, Tony came on quickly, he started to rewrite, and then the prep schedule’s set. It came up very quickly in the sense of I met with Jenny, and what she had to accomplish, and I think it was about three months out from shooting, was formidable. Just the scale of the amount of costumes, and she was up for it, and her resume is spectacular. I was particularly excited about [her work on] “Mad Max: Fury Road,” which you wouldn’t think of for Disney, but I did. And she was up for it, and we had a great meeting, and we just hired her the next day. She dived right in. It’s not draining, but it’s just, in terms of energy and resources, just going on that journey and trying to really figure it out, because we’re dealing with two fashion icons in a lot of events. Every time they make an appearance, it’s got to be a statement, but then on top of that, she had to design their fashion line. So, on top of just that job, which was enormous, she had to come up with a fashion line. That was the most nerve-racking for me because I felt like as an audience, we’re setting them up as these great fashion icons. If we don’t deliver with your fashion line, it’s like we’ll lose the audience, and the audience can be very tough on that. So, trying to figure out what those fashion lines look like, how they still fit in the seventies but the current, was an enormous amount of research on her behalf.
I know you love all your babies, but is there one design she did that just is your favorite?
It’s probably the garbage truck [dress], close second by the red dress, on top of the moles. They’re very iconic moments, but the iconic thing to me for Cruella was that first time she walks out for breakfast in the morning, knocks the cereal off in all of that black leather. It’s just an amazing outfit that she put her in, with the skirt and a black jacket. Funnily enough, I got to say, it’s like the one that grew on me was her dalmatian coat at the fashion show.
You didn’t like it at first?
Yeah, it felt like it was a little too put together for the show, but I think Jenny was absolutely right, and it really stood out on that runway amongst everybody else and was so iconically dalmatians, which was great for Emma Thompson’s line of like, “She took my dogs and turned them into a coat.”
I don’t know if it was one of the screenwriters, or yourself, or someone else, but who came up with the flammable cloak that sort of disintegrates away to reveal the gown underneath?
I think that was actually in the original script that Dana wrote. Because a lot of the other fashion pop-up things that I sort of created afterward, just drawing inspiration from Alexander McQueen, and how sort of confrontational and aggressive some of these fashion shows was. Sort of saying, “How do we really make statements there?” But that one, I think it was originally in the script from Dana.
Obviously, we know Emma Thompson as a fantastic actress, she’s also an Oscar writing screenwriter. What did she bring to the role of the Baroness that probably wasn’t even there on the page originally?
Honestly, it’s her performance. I’ve seen Emma in a lot of work over the years. She does amazing stuff, and she has such a chameleon, but I don’t think I’d ever seen it to this character before. Usually, you can sort of see a piece of somebody in their work, and she’s such a warm, gregarious person, and this character is so tightly wound. When she put on the hair, the makeup, and the outfit, and the shoes, just the nuance, and just the timing for her for that humor with just an eyebrow, or a look, or the way she bites a cucumber. All those little moments, they’re so perfectly timed, and that was amazing to watch.
For a Disney branded movie, you’re probably pushing the tone in a way that probably hasn’t been seen since maybe the first “Pirates” movies. Were you nervous at all about any of the content? Was there anything you had to cut to make it work for the studio?
Funnily enough, there were things I had to shoot two ways because they were nervous. But all the stuff that I was pushing, to their credit, they ended up leaving in the film.
That’s great.
Yeah, there are certain things that we had backup plans for, but I was like, “I think this would be great,” and they let me shoot it, and it all staying in, which was amazing.
Is there some blooper reel of either Emma just swearing, like their characters would in real life?
I’d have to look for that one. Yeah, I’m sure there is. I did see some outtakes, I don’t know who it was for.
The soundtrack is also fantastic, and these are some classic songs you got to use. People always think it’s easier to secure the rights to classic songs because they’re older and that they’ll cost less, but that’s not how it works. What was the hardest track to secure? The one you wanted the most?
Yeah, it was the one we didn’t get. [Laughs.]
Oh, damn.
There was one track that was surprisingly extensive. I mean, twice as much as anything else, I was like, “Seriously?”
They wouldn’t budge?
No, [not] that one, unfortunately. But literally, we have 50 songs and every other song… Susan Jacobs, who was our music supervisor, it’s part of her enormous talent is that she can get yeses to literally everything. It was Disney being so supportive that they said yes to it. Because I presented them this movie with The Stones and all of these songs in there. I was waiting for somebody to be like, “What are you doing?” But we’d been fiscally responsible throughout the production and everything, and always told them there was going to be a big price tag on these songs, and the whole movement was designed around them. So, they knew it was coming.
Glenn Close has credit as an executive producer. I’m sure you’ve been asked this question before, but I’m going to ask it too. Was there any thought of giving her a cameo, or a wink of some kind, or maybe I totally missed it and she’s in the movie?
I mean, I love Glenn Close’s work, and everything she’s done, but I really deliberately stayed away from watching her version of Cruella. Because I just didn’t want to have that in my headspace as I was directing Emma, and what she was creating. Because we were in such a different setting, such a different tone with this film, I sort of really wanted to keep it as a clean slate. I didn’t, honestly, want to be influenced by that, and sort of going out on the discovery of creating it.
You have now done “Cruella,” which takes place in the seventies, you did the pilot for the new Showtime comedy “Physical,” which takes place in the eighties, you’re doing “Pam and Tommy” right now, which is in the nineties. Why are all these period pieces speaking to you?
I’ve got to say, honestly, with Cruella [having] the backdrop of the seventies was incredibly alluring, because just that whole punk sensibility, and some of the aggressiveness of that with the attitude of the film, the character, works beautifully. With the other work, honestly, it’s just script. It’s like the scripts are just so good, that’s always first and foremost. Then it happens to be the nineties, or the eighties, or what it is. Then it’s sort of, “All right, so how do we address that?” But it all comes down to the script.
When the first look photos for “Pam & Tommy” came out, people went nuts, they look incredible. I don’t know anyone that would have said, “Who’s going to play Pamela Anderson? Lily James.”
We did. [Laughs.]
No doubt, she looks amazing, but I don’t think it would be the first 10 actresses that most people even in Hollywood think of to play her. Who pitched her to you?
Honestly, when I came onto the project, Lily was attached.
I clearly did not know that.
But I thought that was incredibly intriguing, and I love that she could get lost in that character. Because I find that Lily’s work, the one thing that she has, she’s incredibly accessible as an actor. You really empathize with her performances, and you can feel her emotion. That was more important to me than the veneer, I knew we could get the facade of Pamela, but later you really want somebody that’s going to ground the performance. She’s just blown me away, the homework that she’s done. Because it is, it’s incredibly nerve-racking to be playing such an iconic character, and not make it just be an impersonation. To get to a deeper level, and actually inhabit the character, and hopefully give it humanity and empathy, and she’s absolutely killing it.
I know it’s 10 episodes, but were you surprised that this story was that expansive? That there was that much to it?
Yeah, it’s very “I, Tonya” in that regard, it’s like we all think we know the story, well, have a version of it, and it goes so much deeper. It’s so much more complicated with what actually happened, and kind of the birth of the porn industry, in a bizarre way. It’s changed the whole trajectory of these self-made tapes, and the internet, rather. It really kicked off the internet back in 1996, up until that point, it was kind of where you’d go to the yellow pages to look up some plumbing. For better or worse, the porn industry’s often been at the forefront of technology there, and this kind of exploded it.
“Cruella” opens nationwide and on Disney+ Premier Access on Friday
