TEN QUESTIONS WITH
The Oscar-winning actor seeks out small-budget films — even if it means doing her own hair
One of Hollywood’s elite, Jessica Chastain, 46, has starred in sci-fi blockbusters like Interstellar and The Martian, as well as the critically acclaimed films The Help and Zero Dark Thirty. In 2022 she won an Oscar for The Eyes of Tammy Faye and is now playing a recovering alcoholic and assault victim in Memory, opposite Peter Saarsgard.
You’ve won an Oscar and been in loads of massive movies — is there a downside to success?
I think that you reach a level of success where the very interesting film-makers stop calling. Because they are like, “I’m going to wait for ever for an answer. They’re going to string me along, they’ll sign up, and then they’ll ditch it at the last minute for something else that makes them more money.”
So the weird thing is that now it’s more me seeking them out. I think people are nervous to approach me because they think they don’t have enough money [to afford me].
There must be advantages, too — presumably, you can say “no” to more?
That’s true. I find clichés a bit boring – for female characters or for stories.
In Memory you play a survivor of sexual assault — how did you approach that?
The sad thing is, when you look at statistics, most of us know women who are survivors of sexual attack or rape or assault. I work with a lot of charities, so I was very familiar with some horrific stories. And what I needed to do was make it as real as possible for my character, Sylvia.
As part of that process, is it true that you went shopping for Sylvia’s clothes yourself?
Yes! I was like, “I want to go to a store where she would get all of her clothes.” So I bought a bunch of things that I thought would make sense for Sylvia. Memory was a very small film with no dressing rooms and I was doing my own hair every day, and buying the clothes, costumes… it was so creative and so exciting.
The film is about the subjective nature of memory — how does your own memory work?
Interesting question. I mean, you’re touching on something that actually drew me to the script when I read it. I was worried that people would discount Sylvia, because of her misperception of the things that happened. What I found to be so moving is we understand that the memory of what she experienced walks into the room before she does. And so she’s having to look through it, in some sense, to try to figure out her way forward.
Is there an emotional cost to playing that sor
