Amanda Seyfried On Going Ferral in Shakers Finder Ann Lee Film: Venice

Amanda Seyfried approached a high task entering the shoes and strict religious beliefs of the founder of Shakers Ann Lee for her new film, Ann Lee’s will, which is not a musical or a direct biographical film. The writer and co -director of the film, Mona Fastvold, presented an obvious question during the press conference of the Venice Film Festival today: Why Amanda?

“Amanda has a lot of power. She is really strong. She is a wonderful mother. She is a bit crazy,” Fastvold explained about her Emmy prize -winning star and Oscar nominated. “Then, I knew that I could access those things, kindness, kindness, tenderness. And I could also access this power and this madness.”

The actress exceeds the Venice team led by Fastvold from a script that the filmmaker co -written with her The brutalist Partner Brady Corbet. Seyfried is thrown alongside Thomasin McKenzie, Lewis Pullman, Stacy Martin, Tim Blake Nelson, Christopher Abbott, Matthew Beard, Scott Handy, Jamie Bogyo, Viola Prettejohn and David Cale, with music from Oscar Daniel Blumberg’s winner, also of the monumental work of Corbet of Corbet. The brutalist.

In the film, described as a “speculative count”, Seyfried stars as the founder of the radical religious sect The Shakers. The cult group, which was formed as a branch of Cikerismo in Manchester, England, in 1747, obtained its name from the adoration practices that included tremors, dances and speaking in tongues. Lee defended gender and social equality while he believed it was the female incarnation of Christ, and the members of the group practiced celibacy and community life. The Shakers ended up fleeing to the United States to escape the persecution, finally establishing themselves near Albany, New York, to build their utopia.

In the Fastvold movie, more than a dozen original agitator hymns are transformed into ecstatic “movements” with choreography by Celia Rowlson-Hall, who worked with Corbet in Vox lux. Fastvold said that the Shakers catalog includes about 1,000 hymns and “found those who felt they belonged” in history, adding that it was a beautiful and exciting process to access this “rich history” of music. But don’t think about it as a direct song and a dance photo because nobody is singing dialogue.

“It is not a traditional musical and it is not a traditional biographical film,” Fastvold explained. “It is a film with a ton of music, a ton of movement, and it is a historical figure, but we really do not know much about it, really. I really had to rethink what this could be for me. And it was difficult to look at any other musical as a reference, honestly, honestly, I really couldn’t find anything that spoke with this.”

Without any reference and with a support director, Seyfried said he felt that the game was completely free.

“This was felt as an opportunity in which there were simply not tied at all,” said the actress at the press conference. “Basically, I follow Mona in light and everything is worth because there is so much freedom, and the only threat is not to use that freedom for your advantage as an artist to go as deeply as you can go to make the most crazy sounds. They have never released me in this way.”

Even so, Seyfried admitted that he told Fastvold: “You don’t have to choose me.”

“I kept saying: ‘Go with someone English’, because the accent seemed so difficult. That was not the most difficult part,” Seyfried added, which had approached difficult parts such as Cosette’s The misérables and Elizabeth Holmes in Abandonment. “But it was alone, I saw the love that Mona had. This was her baby, and I didn’t want to do it. But she believed in me, and so she believed in me, and here we are.”

Another journalist asked Seyfried how he managed to achieve what a “intense and physically challenging” role that requires a lot of vocal energy and unique sounds. “There are so many things I can say,” Seyfried said before praising Fastvold and the community he created in the set that was no different from what the Shakers experienced. “The reason I could face these challenges as an artist, that there were many as you say, it was because I felt completely protected, sustained and surrounded by love artists, and in a place where everyone knew the value of doing this, and I understood Mona’s vision. It is very rare. I have to say that this was incredibly weird and would never happen again.”

It sounded like a unique experience for many involved. “One of the best things for me was to be able to work with Mona throughout the process, starting with pre -production in the set even to the sound mixture,” Blumberg explained at a point during the press. “It is one of the most experimental extreme projects I have done. But we could try things and use our instincts.”

The press conference panel presented Fastvold, Corbet, Seyfried, Blumberg, producer Andrew Morrison and choreographer Rowlson-Hall. At one point, Corbet thanks Morrison for being able to make the film be made for “$ 10 million,” which said it was a feat. “As you can imagine, the elevator tone for an agitator musical was not the easiest to take off.” Corbet, who handled the second unit by directing the film, also pointed out that he and his romantic and professional partner insist on the final cut for his projects.

In its director of Festival statementFastvold confirmed that although he was raised in a secular home, Lee’s prophecies, “unlikely,” he moved deeply. “Not because he shares his faith, but because I recognize in it a yearning for justice, transcendence and community grace. His radical search for an autonomous utopia speaks to the creative impulse in the heart of every artistic effort: the urgent need to shape the world.”

She said her film is offered as a tribute to Lee’s dream “and the silence that now surrounds her.” Ann Lee’s Testament He has its world premiere on Monday afternoon inside Sala Grande. The Venice Film Festival takes place from August 27 to September. 6.