Angelina Jolie sings away those January blues with glamour and class as #Maria.
— StudiocanalUK (@StudiocanalUK) December 27, 2024
In cinemas next month. pic.twitter.com/6D5Ih3MedG
Behind the scenes of Pablo Larraín's MARIA starring Angelina Jolie. Now playing on Netflix in the US. pic.twitter.com/QbmOg6Pd8L
— Netflix (@netflix) December 26, 2024
Meet the Man Behind the On-Screen Singing of Ariana Grande, Timothée Chalamet and Angelina Jolie: Vocal Coach Eric Vetro https://t.co/CsPKKhea15
— Variety (@Variety) December 20, 2024
With Angelina Jolie’s dramatic take on legendary opera diva Maria Callas, the actress portrayed the grand soprano from her aesthetic heights of the 1940s to the early 1950s, as well as the vulnerability of her vocal decline in the mid-50s.
For “Maria,” Vetro assembled, for the first time, a team of three opera singers behind him who, together, worked with Jolie for seven months. “I can sing, but I can’t sing like Maria Callas,” he says, laughing. “Plus, my Italian pronunciation isn’t up to snuff.”
Vetro is in awe of how compelling Jolie is throughout “Maria,” how the actor embodies every nuance and every note of the opera legend.
“Jolie is indeed singing operatically as Callas, the caveat being you’re hearing a mix of Maria Callas’ voice with Jolie’s blended together,” he says of a mash-up vocal process that also took place on “Elvis” between Austin Butler and Elvis Presley.
“Sometimes there’s less Angelina, maybe 10%, other times there’s more Angelina. It changes depending on the aria and on the period as much of the movie focuses on the time when Callas couldn’t sing any longer, or sing in the same way. No matter what or when, Angelina captured every single note and every single emotion. She was astonishing.”
One thing most impressive about having Jolie blend her voice with that of Maria Callas is that the actress had to emulate what the diva did on stage, originally, for the sake of splicing together their performances. In opera, however – unlike, say, pop – there is no steady beat or click track. “Opera has its own ebb and flow, its rubato,” says Vetro. “How in the world would Angelina be able to do that? But watching her sing… Jolie nailed it.”
Ariana Grande, Angelina Jolie, and Timothée Chalamet all have him on speed dial. Meet Hollywood’s not-so-secret weapon, voice teacher Eric Vetro: https://t.co/Ksu3y8K8Va
— VANITY FAIR (@VanityFair) December 21, 2024
When Angelina Jolie sought out Vetro, she was on the opposite end of the spectrum. Jolie needed his help to transform into arguably the preeminent opera diva of all time, Maria Callas. “Not only was she not a singer, she never sang,” Vetro says. “She didn’t even sing ‘Happy Birthday.’ She had a real block about singing.”
Taking someone from “Happy Birthday” to “Piangete Voi?” from Anna Bolena may sound impossible, but Vetro was up for the challenge. In his early days of teaching, he “treated everybody,” Vetro says. “If someone had never sung before, they would send them to me.”
Though Jolie was in the right hands, it took some time to get her opera-ready. “The first lesson, she barely uttered a sound,” Vetro says. “I couldn’t get her to sing. She was very, very, very shy about it.” Vetro enlisted outside help—female opera singers to demonstrate high notes he couldn’t reach, and a fluent Italian speaker to help Jolie with the diction. Little by little, they helped Jolie discover her voice—a poetic parallel to Callas rediscovering her own voice in the twilight of her life in Maria.
“We made the big discovery that she was actually a soprano, which was really surprising to both of us,” he says. “There was one day into it, probably in the middle of the process, when she started singing one of the arias from the movie. And I knew that day it was going to work.”
Of course, in Pablo Larraín’s finished film, Jolie’s voice is heavily mixed with Callas’s own. Still, Vetro says Jolie’s work ethic and deep admiration for Callas were pivotal to her performance. “She loved Maria Callas,” he says. “She felt a lot of empathy for what Maria Callas had been through, how she had been treated in the press—when they would ask her really inappropriate questions about her ex, Aristotle Onassis.” And it all paid off. “By the end of it, she was singing every note, singing every lyric,” he says. “It was a really difficult task. And she rose to the occasion.”
— Maria Film Official (@MariaFilm_) December 19, 2024
Pablo Larraín and Kristen Stewart Reunite to Talk ‘Maria’: ‘As She Was Singing, She Was Dying Every Time’ https://t.co/JvlNTAxMdf
— IndieWire (@IndieWire) December 19, 2024
Death is not something Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larraín is afraid of. From “Jackie” to “El Conde” and now with his latest feature, “Maria,” Larraín has often explored the effect mortality has on individuals, especially on those with the ability to make an impact on others, never shying away from the mysteries the subject offers, but instead creating heart-rending, often celebratory studies of how certain figures, against all odds, find meaning in their lives. In reference to his loose “Important Women” trilogy, consisting of “Jackie,” “Spencer,” and “Maria,” Larraín sets his lens on three iconoclasts who became icons in their own right, each forced to face death as a result of the structures they inhabited.
“I think Maria Caras was someone that as she was singing she was dying every time. Life was taken from her while she sang and I wondered if that was filmable. Can we shoot that? Can we film that and put it in a movie?” said Larraín. “Can we not only feel her perception through music, but really try to understand that Maria Callas sang eight operas more than 50 times in her life and seven of them were tragedies, so she, the main character, was death. Death was dead in the last scene. So I think she became the sum of the tragedies that she played on stage. So it was someone that circulated tragedy and and we didn’t want to avoid that. We wanted to get into that tragedy and that tragic figure and make a celebration out of it and deal with that and not hide from it.”
“There is ambiguity in the sound of music and in the performance of opera that can cut sharper and quicker than dialogue and plot, I mean it just like permeates,” Stewart said. “There’s something about voiceless articulation that can drop you and you could speak any language, you could speak Spanish, Italian. This movie feels like it endeavors to be an opera and I don’t speak Italian and I’m not an opera aficionado by any means and so like I think that that doesn’t mean that you’re alienated by the form of it and it’s really cool to make a movie for like a normal audience that still endeavors to touch you in that particular way.”
Comparing this effect to “Spencer,” Larraín explained that it had everything to do with how he approaches narrative as something that should be perceived and not necessarily spoon-fed to audiences.
“I think there’s a big limitation in the more rational approach to movies,” he said, “where there’s like a shot and there’s like a shot and there’s like a two shot and there’s like a shot from here, so we know that you’re here, and like a logical narrative of the situation, but I feel that reality is way more complicated.”
In a way, Stewart felt the strongest impact “Maria” makes and how it stands apart from “Jackie” and “Spencer” is in how it captures artistry and particularly Larrain’s sensibilities as an artist.
“‘Maria’ is your first film about an artist in a literal sense, even though I find artistry in Jackie and Diana, the way they inhabited the world,” said Stewart. “Maria literally dies when the art goes and you literally told me yourself no creativity is death and I fully cried watching this movie when she takes her last breaths, not because I know Maria Callas, but because I know you.”
Skip Intro with Krista Smith is an award-winning weekly show bringing you dynamic conversations with the exceptional people behind your favorite shows, films, specials, and documentaries on Netflix.
Angelina Jolie joins the show to talk about playing the title role in Pablo Larraín's latest film, Maria. The film tells the tumultuous and beautiful story of the world’s greatest female opera singer, Maria Callas, re-lived and reimagined during her final days in 1970s Paris. Jolie explains how she got involved with the film, dives into the intense preparation process (which required her to learn how to sing opera so her voice could be properly blended with Callas), and walks us through how the costume design process helped her find the private version of Maria that existed behind closed doors.
She also shares her unique connection with the extras who played the audience during her La Scala opera scene, describes her relationship with co-stars Pierfrancesco Favino and Alba Rohrwacher (who play Maria's butler, Ferruccio and her housemaid, Bruna), and breaks down a few of the film's most challenging scenes.
Transcript
You're listening to Skip Intro with me, Krista Smith. Angelina Jolie's career began to simmer throughout the early and mid 90s, before igniting in 1998 with the HBO biopic, Gia, earning her a Golden Globe for her portrayal of the late model, Gia Carrangi. The following year, she won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress as the sociopathic young woman named Lisa in Girl Interrupted.
From there, Angelina rose to worldwide fame as Laura Croft in the Tomb Raider franchise, and over the years has starred in films like Changeling, Maleficent, Salt, and Marvel's Eternals. She has also directed five feature films, the latest of which, Without Blood, premiered this fall at the Toronto Film Festival. Both inside and outside of Hollywood, Angelina has consistently used her voice to illuminate important issues and is regarded internationally as a dedicated humanitarian.”
Throughout the past two decades, her philanthropy and activism has been recognized by the United Nations, Queen Elizabeth II, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. She is also the founder of Atelier Jolie, located at the famous 57 Great Jones Street in New York City, which is a hub for artists empowering people to participate in creating their own fashion with a focus on sustainability. Today we're talking about her role in Pablo Larraín's latest film, Maria, which tells the tumultuous, beautiful story of the famous opera singer Maria Callas.
Relived and reimagined during her final week in 1970s Paris. It's a tremendous performance from Angelina, who learned to sing opera in addition to balancing the emotional and physical transformation that the role required. Angelina joined me in the Skip Intro studio to discuss the film and her experience playing La Divina.”
Angelina Jolie, great to see you. I want to just start by saying I was in Telluride when Maria premiered. It was just amazing to sit in that theater and to just feel the excitement of the audience and knowing that you were there.
Everyone was just like, ah! And so much enthusiasm for this film. And obviously Pablo Larraín is beloved filmmaker.
It's just a great combination. And to see it in Telluride, I thought, was the perfect place. I wasn't in Venice, obviously.
But tell me for you, how was that going from Venice to Telluride? They're two distinctly different film festivals.
“Yes, they're very different. They're very different. But in a way, it was very interesting because there's so many different aspects to this.
She's an artist. It's a piece of work, but it's a piece of work about an artist and her work. And so it's interesting because the relationship she has to Europe and Venice in particular, but to Europe and that opera has feels different, of course.
And I'm sure she felt that way when she performed for different audiences. Because you have a different relationship. So it was wonderful to be in Venice”
“It felt a certain part of her was very present there, and a certain part of the work was very understood there. And then it was beautiful to be in Telluride, because to bring it to a festival that is so focused on the craft and so warm. And I felt this other part of her was very present there, and her life and her work and her humanity.
“So it was a very nice balance, actually.
So I had heard that Pablo had reached out to you even before any script was written about playing Maria. What do you remember about that first conversation with him and then with yourself that you had about taking this part on?”
“Well, Pablo and I had met many years ago, and I loved his work, and we just talked about one day finding something. So I was very happy to know that he was calling and that there was something to discuss. I think anytime you're asked to play a real person, you take pause no matter how big or known or not unknown the life is, because it's a person and you have to feel that you're ready to do your best to bring justice to this person's life and take that on.
“I was definitely taken aback because I don't sing or didn't sing. I knew of her and I knew her music, but I didn't fully know her, and so as I thought about it and read up on her and heard how Pablo saw her, I understood more who this woman was and then I started to find our connection.
It's got to be so great for an artist to want to work with a filmmaker and then the phone rings and then it's Maria.
“Oh my goodness. It's a dream.
It's a dream, right? Then there's that thing of a conversation where we can do everything. Oh yes.
Yeah. And then the script comes and then, like you said, you actually see it laid out. You weren't a singer.
You're not known as a singer. We've never, to my recollection, heard you sing in any other films. And here you are portraying the greatest one, arguably.
What was it like to see it on the page and then know what you had to do?
“I think it took me a minute. I knew Pablo's process. I think I would have been even more scared in the beginning if I really understood all that I would later come to understand about what was expected.
“But in the beginning, I think I thought, well, you're acting as a singer. You're going to have to make sure you can sing along with her, match your mouth. You're going to have to sing some part.”
“But I didn't really understand that they needed me to actually sing and learn to sing opera. And I think even Pablo didn't fully in the beginning understand what it was going to be, because as it would go on, we would understand, okay, I have to learn the arias, then I have to get an Italian coach, so I'm definitely making sure my Italian is right. Then I have to do a singing class.
“Then I did singing class for a long time until we all realized I need an opera singer, because singing and singing opera, not the same class, right? So that was another discovery that we would add all these parts. Then we would both learn from John about how we were going to have to record it.”
“So we were then both informed that in order to really get the mix and to do the mix right, it meant I would have to actually perform it with no music accompanying it, with none of her voice being heard, just only my voice in the room or on the stage, in front of audience and in front of crew, and that was going to be the only way to actually blend us. That was when I got really- that's when the reality hit home that we were actually going to be doing this.
“Then the added layer of it's not singing and it's not just singing in Italian, it's also playing a character because she's an actress and it's performing a piece on stage that is Annabellena or it's- It was so beyond anything I was comfortable with that I think it shook me out of my fear.
Just for our listeners, what is the difference of learning to sing a pop song that way versus an opera singer? What does it require of your body and your voice?”
“I would say to anybody listening, have you ever with your full body, saying your full voice, tested the boundaries of your full sound from your belly through your mouth, have you ever tried? And have you ever tried connected to your full emotion, right, the depth of your anguish, the extent of your hope connected to sound from your body and let out everything you've got. As a human being, most of us have never done that.
“It's something we don't do because it's how we hold a lot of our pain inside. It's what we don't release. And so I think that the biggest difference is that there is, like we said, like there's not a drop of anything left on the floor once you've expressed fully through opera, your full feelings and your full sound with all the physicality you have in your body.
“There's very little left of you when that's over. Like there's nothing you're still holding on to. And usually as an artist, you let out parts, you control parts, you give a taste of something or a feeling of something, but you don't let it all out.”
“And so that's why it was part singing lessons and opera lessons and also part having to let go of a lot as a human being and share a lot in a way that I was not comfortable. And yet now I wish it for everybody in the world. I wish just go to the ocean by yourself and scream into the, you know, I think it's a really important thing for us to do.
I think about that scene in the kitchen, which is the first time the audience sees Maria sing to Bruna, her housemaid, and then to the scenes where she's performing with hundreds of people in there. I assume extras, obviously. How is that as an artist at experience for you?
Were they of equal measure or did you feel like something else happened when you knew that there were people watching?
“The funny thing is in the film, cause it's like the magic of movies, right? To you, one was singing to my friend in the kitchen and the other one was to an audience. But obviously they're both in front of an entire crew.”
That's so true. I didn't even think about that. It is the movie magic.
“Good.
“That means we did our job well.
Yeah.
“I mean, in a funny way, the kitchen's harder cause everybody's just standing quietly on a set and you're not even on a stage. Like you can't hear a pin drop and it's just me. And the thing I would just say that I think when I started this, I thought, yeah, I'll sing.
“But in order for it to be convincing and to do it, you have to be very loud when you sing opera. So whether you feel confident or not, you have to still be very loud. And every single person on the street could probably hear you.
“In the final scene when the doors were open and we were in a real apartment, I knew that whoever was on the street or walking by, right?
Yeah.
“To your point about when she's in her full kind of glory and it's her on stage, an absolute majority Maria's voice, even though I still had to sing them alone by myself, I had this beautiful relationship with the audience because Pablo did a wonderful thing in that he cast a group to be the audience that stayed the audience. And so they were with me through a few performances. I became a performer to an audience and these wonderful people who were playing the extras on the day would become so essential to the piece.
“And I think the first day I kind of met them and said, I apologize for what's about to happen in case I hit the wrong notes loudly, but I'm going to do my best to perform for you. So it helped me because I was performing to a real audience. And they were so kind, really kind people who knew that I was trying my best and I wasn't an opera singer, but I was learning and also flew them out when we did La Scala.”
“So it was kind of this interesting thing that we'd been on this journey. They'd seen me the first time I did it in front of an audience, the second time, the harder, different operas, different costume changes, different performances, and then we all went together for these few intense hours that we had to pull off La Scala. And so it really was a lovely thing.
“I felt like we were connected in the attempt and in the storytelling.
That's lovely. I love that he did that. It's true you are connected at that point.
And to all share that experience in that historic opera house together. It feels like it's kind of complete.
“Yeah, and they knew like, okay, here I go, guys. I got to do the mad scene from Anna Belina on the stage at La Scala and hit these notes and do this thing. And they knew I was trying and they knew I was nervous and they knew I was doing my best for them.
“So somehow their understanding and support was everything. And sometimes they'd applaud and we'd smile at each other. And it was everything.”
“So I was, yeah.
Oh, that's so sweet.
“It was wonderful.
All right. The costume designer, Massimo Cattini Parini. The costumes in this are magnificent.
Obviously, you expect nothing less. It's a Pablo Larraín film, it's Maria Callas. Let's see what that world is through the wardrobe and what she's wearing and how she moves in it.
So I'd love for you to talk a little bit about that relationship between the two of you and creating Maria for you.
“He was so wonderful and there were these different things happening. So there was actual costumes for opera because we were going to perform all the opera. So it was like we were doing pieces within pieces within pieces.
“So we were actually going to have to perform and match the costumes to opera as they were. And so that was one. And then some of those would be, I can't move in this or this is too tighter.”
“This is on my throat and I have to sing, which is something I never thought I'd be saying. I need to adjust this for my voice, which felt funny at first, but became very real. And then there was the Maria as we remember her.
“And the trick was which things we would be mimicking history and then making sure it wasn't just doing that. So how do we make them real and personal and adjust them? And when?
“Which ones to try to match a part of history and which ones to shake it out a bit and adjust? But the truth is, the first Maria I wanted to test, because we did a test day, was older Maria. Because I felt the costumes for the performances are what they are, and that's Anna Bolena, that's not Maria.
“And the 50s, 60s, 70s woman in public is another Maria that we know. But the Maria that we don't know, the Greek American woman who's in her 50s and has had health issues and has a charm necklace around her neck that has different things from her faith to her family. We did that woman first.”
“We put together the woman with the gray hair and the fragile body. We did that first and that fed everything else, because everything else, it was more important that it didn't distract or become a caricature.
Was there one thing in particular that you're like, oh, this is it, I'm in her skin now when you put on the clothes?
“This robe that was handmade in Italy, that and the glasses from the props team and the wig and my hair and makeup team, which were extraordinary.
Oh, that robe, I gasped when I first saw that on screen.
The white one that's all knitted.
“The white one that was like crochet or hand-knit and the way you looser it, it felt very intimate in that. And she was so comfortable in that space and in her apartment. And then the vanity, obviously, to be able to wear those glasses, because I didn't realize that she was almost blind, basically, and needed those thick, thick, thick glasses.”
But yeah, I know that robe, I'm like, where is that robe? Did you get to take that robe?
“No, but I do, you know what I do have? I have this funny thing. I saw it the other day.
“It's like in a Ziploc baggie, and it's a bottle of Mandrakes and a pair of glasses. And it's just such a funny thing to look at, because that's somehow what I ended up with, I guess, from props and a few album covers. So it was bringing in those touches to find the real woman.
And then I felt like, finding her style, little things of just like, this is her at home, and then how does she adjust herself when she has to go out in public? How does she protect herself? Is she hiding?
You know, what does she feel like when she has to go face the public when she's older? And so some of the outfits were, you know, her still holding her style, which was beautifully eccentric, too. I love that.”
“I love that, and I kind of felt more like beautiful eccentrics, right, that are not just dressed in the latest thing in the shops, but have, like, earned a wardrobe over a lifetime and are beautifully eccentric and artistic.
I love that, earning it over a lifetime, just a collection of pieces, and everything is deliberate and meaningful to her.
That's right.
It's not just, like, thrown on.
Like some stylist found it and threw it in.
Yeah, no. It's her life.
This is a really emotional and a physical performance. How was the creative connection for you and Pablo through that? How'd you guys work together?
“He's a wonderful director. He has such a vision. So creative, so strong, but also very curious and open about how actors are feeling and what's personal to them and human behavior.
“I think sometimes people are very good visually, but not necessarily good with humanity. Sometimes we don't always get that mix in one, where it can be or something that's very intimate, but somehow lose his scope. So he's a rare person that understands both, and so it was wonderful to work with him.”
“And he, I just always felt a part of the process. I felt like he was wanting me to connect to her more than tell me what he wanted from her. He wanted to guide me and give me space and make situations where I would be within them and we would learn together from the situation and from the space.
“The music was key to everything. He grew up listening to opera. His mom would take him to the opera all the time.
“So he probably of a lot of the pieces he's done, and certainly pieces about women that we know, this is the one he probably feels that he knows the most, her world he knows the most. So I learned a lot from him about the music and he gave me space to understand the woman.”
Yeah, there's a couple lines in there through the film, just understanding opera of like, you have to give absolutely everything and you described it a little bit earlier and just the physicalness of it, but the emotion of it. And I remember the first time I saw an opera was at the Met and I was so young in my career. My mentor had taken me big opera fanatic and I was so excited to see the curtain at the Met and you know, it was just so glamorous and I was so naive.
I'm thinking it's like Broadway, like seven shows and I was like, wow, it's Renee Fleming and she's only doing one, you know, I was like, why don't they do more performances and then after you realize it takes everything, they need days if not weeks to recover. Someone is on a run of show for like a Broadway, three weeks, you know, it's like two performances a week is basically what it was and how special that moment is. I love the way you and Pablo captured that.
Like it is a moment in time and she has that great line about, I don't want records. Records are perfection and a performance has to be a lie.
I never listen to my own records. Please turn it off.
This is my caffemina and this is what I listen to when I am alone.
You are not alone. Please turn it off. I cannot listen to my own records.
Why not?
Because it is perfect and a song should never be perfect. It should be performed in that moment differently to every other time.
I love that line in the film. I was just saying it gave me chills because it is like there is something about when you're in the room when it's happening versus this perfect recording.
And it could fail and there's something alive and dangerous to it when anybody's trying something so big. And also you can just feel you're in the presence of somebody expressing that much on stage and for you. It's a real connection to the audience.”
“I think that was something that helped me a lot as well, which I love performing. I don't perform for myself. I perform for an audience.
“And it was nice to come back to that, just that work and trying to do something, trying to do it as good as I could for the audience. And funny, you mentioned that the time in between he did, he really tried to separate because I did have a director that understood this is a day she's going to sing all day, and then we're going to have to give her a few days in between to prepare for the next one and rest her voice. A lot of directors may not understand how much he understood the warm ups and everything was being a singer for that time.”
I want to talk about the other part of the film that was so moving to me is Maria's relationships with her housemaid Bruna that I mentioned earlier, and her butler Ferruccio. Pierfrancesco Favino plays Ferruccio and Alba Rohrwacher, who's incredible as Bruna. And to me, it's just this poignant, beautiful chemistry that the three of you have, that the audience can project so much onto that relationship in that apartment, and the piano is this other character, right, in the apartment.
But you say at one point, Bruna is my mother, my daughter, my sister, my housekeeper. It's very crowded in our apartment.
I have my car. I can drive you back to your prison cell and have a new George Mandela, if that's what you want.
Bruna is my mother, my sister, my daughter, my housemaid. Ferruccio is my father, my son, my brother, my butler. It is a terribly crowded apartment.
I love that sentiment. It was so well written and so accurate.
“Which is also Stephen Knight. Beautiful script.”
Right. Talk to me about getting to work with them and kind of getting that, because it's very intimate. You have to have immediate intimacy between the three of you to have those scenes carry the way they do.
“Well, first of all, they're extraordinary actors. I mean, just extraordinary actors. And they did a beautiful thing where they were so within their character that how we were started to match in some way, they were in support of Maria, and then the actors and I had a similar where I would do things that were, I'd sing in the kitchen to Bruna, and this was me and Alba.
“It wasn't two actors. It was actually me singing to her, her telling me what she thought and being kind to me and being supportive, looking at me as I was doing it, knowing I was nervous to do it. Right?
We were together. We were a team. We became a real team through the piece.”
“We became a family, and I think we all collectively care for these real people, and we thought often about how extraordinary these relationships were because Ferruccio is still alive. He's not on talk shows saying bad things about Maria. He protected her with the world of gossip and people hurting people or using people.
“They were her real friends, and they had real love for her, and she loved them. We all felt that, and we all felt connected to that, and I think we kind of became, in a funny way, three people that loved each other and worked together well.
Yeah, and that was great, the card scene, you felt that love, and that's what happens because everyone's at their most vulnerable.
“I remember they came in the day that I was doing the last scene, and they weren't working, but they were there. It was a big, complicated end, and then turning the corner when I would step out to try to get my breath, and they were there. And they'd been watching and gave me a hug, and they are so brilliant as artists, and they are really kind, and they're really generous as artists as well.
Yeah, I would say the casting is fantastic in the film as well. Haluk and Alba's character, and Kodi was great.
“And not an easy role. I think it's one that somebody could have made a caricature of or turned it into something or made it disingenuine, right? And he found beauty in it.
What is your favorite part of the day when you're going to work?
“I like the, nobody's ever asked me that. I think I like the moment when you're deeply in the trenches, trying to fix something or fight for something or push yourself to a limit. I like when work is hard.
“And I like being a part of a crew. I like being a part of a team of artists. The special thing about making film that maybe Maria didn't have as much, even though she'd do pieces, but so much of her life was her and her alone standing on that stage.”
“And when you're an actor, director, or even anybody that's in a film crew, you're a part of a team. That's a wonderful feeling to be a part of a collective making something together. It's a really special feeling.
“So I love that.
“And my sons worked on this one. So it was also nice. Yeah.
“They were doing the AD work and some of the photography.
Future filmmakers.
“I don't know. I mean, the AD work is not easy work, so it's good that they do that work and learn to cut their teeth with that. Pax does some stills and some video, but I think it's also just being in a part of a crew, right?”
“Feeling a useful part of the crew and just being of service is what's important, that they feel and they learn that it's not about what you can grow into or what you have, but just really appreciate being a part of that crew. But it was also probably one of the things I also had to overcome, because I didn't think about it when we were, we've worked together on quite a few projects, mostly ones I've directed. But I realized after the first big scene and they came in a bit worried that I never cry in front of my children, not like that.
“They can see you weep a little, but anyone who's a parent knows that you do not show your children that level of pain. You don't want them to know you feel that or carry that. And so when I saw their faces after one of the first big ones, we talked, I think the important thing is they knew they were the reason I don't feel like that, right, that they could come and give me a hug and we could get a cup of tea and we could just get through and talk about the...
“But that was unusual, that was hard. Or even scenes where she's being attacked a certain way. And seeing that there were certain aspects of it that were unusual.
“But then also good for them to see their mom try for something she's not necessarily good at. Good for them to experience their mom try and fail at some things and work really hard and be really nervous and struggle and be a part of carrying it out. That we all get through it together.
That's a big thing for them to see. But it is true, I get it. I have two boys.
And when you see mom cry, it becomes a different... Yeah. Yeah.
I can appreciate that.
“I knew that I was going to be nervous and they'd protect me when I'm singing. And I knew they'd be supportive even if I was bad. They'd try to help me.
“But yeah, I didn't think about that until it happened. That was a big one.
All right. I have a question about diva because Maria Callas was the diva. I looked it up actually, what is the definition of diva?
And it's an Italian opera “singer, it says, if you just go on dictionary. But I feel like our relationship, certainly women's relationship has changed from the 20th century to the 21st century around the word diva. Now it's used in a way that's derogatory is my feeling.
But I'm just curious for you playing Maria, basically the genesis of the word was Maria Callas diva. How is your relationship with that word? Or did you learn anything more through it?
Or did you not even think about it?
“People had a lot of opinions about her. And when you get close and you discover a lot of why somebody might say she was acting this way or difficult. There was a discovery of a woman who was dealing with health issues, went through a difficult time in her childhood, worked so hard since she was a teen in the conservatory, to take responsibility for her work to do the best job she can do.”
“And in order for her to do that over her life, there would be times where somebody would say, oh, well, she was difficult about that. And when you'd look into it, you'd say, well, no, she needed the air conditioning off for her voice. And no, she couldn't sing into the corner because it wouldn't be the right sound for her voice.
“And she was a technician and she needed this to be this. And she was a lot of the times it was about the conditions and the work that she was trying to protect to do her job. And that was often when she was called a diva.
And so when I think of that, there's a difference. And I think, like you point out, they may be now it's considered somebody demanding unnecessary things for their own comfort or something like that. But then there is the other, which is the understanding of the person who has to be in the ring protecting their work and being clear about what they need in order to do their work.”
“And for a woman at that time, and maybe even today, that's seen as a negative. I think maybe it just always will be that when a man demands something or a woman demands something, it comes across differently. Society receives it differently.
“And so I think women have learned to try to adjust their approach to asking for what they need. Sometimes they don't even ask. Because of being afraid of how it will be received.
“But for her and playing her, I kind of took it upon myself to believe that the job was protect the work. Whatever it may be, protect the work, because that's your job. You know, be gracious, but don't not say what you need.
“Get the work done.
So I am asking everybody, and I'm curious about your answers, so what's that song that you're either driving on PCH or going in the hills? And now would it be opera or what? Because I know you like The Clash.
You said to me about The Clash earlier.
“I love Burundian drummers. There's also a great section, I think it's Joe Strummer from The Clash, but Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros where it's just instrument and drums and I love that. And yes, now I would think I would listen to more opera.
“I love opera now. It's hard to pick one though. It's so full that it has to meet how you're feeling somehow in that moment.
“And I believe that there's something to it where when you feel that maybe it's getting older as well, you feel that depth of anguish. There isn't a song other than that piece of opera that meets that feeling, or also that beauty and that hope and that expression. So I know Pablo always jokes with me because I do love the Mad Scene.
“It's probably one of my favorite pieces to sing and to listen to. I loved Ave Maria because it reminds me of my mother.
Yeah.
“I love. I live for art is one of the most beautiful pieces and where Pablo put it in the film, I think is extraordinary.
All right. I like that image. Little of that, windows down, Angelina screaming into the wind.
Pablo Larraín's #Maria, shot by Ed Lachman and starring Angelina Jolie, is now on Netflix.
— The Film Stage 📽 (@TheFilmStage) December 14, 2024
One of our streaming picks of the week: https://t.co/P7HpMjelsK pic.twitter.com/bRVrWuEVsR
Take a look at photos of the @outsidersmusical cast at a recent screening of @MariaFilm_ with Angelina Jolie!
— BroadwayWorld (@BroadwayWorld) November 12, 2024
https://t.co/3x5KaZZmla
Just a glimpse of Angelina arriving at the screening! pic.twitter.com/vBhsc7JFCS
— 🇪🇸 (@aliciaottt) October 19, 2024
The starrrrr pic.twitter.com/cvkCelbTlP
— 🇪🇸 (@aliciaottt) October 19, 2024
and just like that Netflix gets another Oscar player with Pablo Larrain's Maria. heard the movie is more emotional than Jackie or Spencer. Best Picture nominee possible.
— Gregory Ellwood - The Playlist 🎬 (@TheGregoryE) August 28, 2024
producers wanted $$$ for it
Netflix will now have two Best Actress contenders pic.twitter.com/KaQzvcK5Fg
Netflix has acquired Pablo Larraín's biopic “Maria,” starring Angelina Jolie as the legendary opera singer Maria Callas, for U.S. distribution. https://t.co/aaTOSLWmqK
— Variety (@Variety) August 28, 2024
The streamer won a bidding war with at least one major distributor in the run up to the festival. Netflix feels like a natural home for the movie which it will position in the awards season. The buzzy film completes Larraín’s trilogy centered around inspiring female protagonists. “Spencer” starring Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana and “Jackie” with Natalie Portman as Kennedy Onassis, both garnered best actress nominations.
On Wednesday, Larraín said in a statement: “I’m excited to partner again with the Netflix team who care so passionately about movies. This film is my most personal work yet. It is a creative imagining and psychological portrait of Maria Callas who, after dedicating her life to performing for audiences around the world, decides finally to find her own voice, her own identity, and sing for herself. I’m deeply honored to tell this story and share it with audiences worldwide like Maria did with her life.”
Added Netflix’s Chairman of Film Dan Lin on the acquisition: “I’m excited that we are continuing to work with Pablo and Fabula – this is our seventh project with them, most recently with El Conde, and they are producing the upcoming In Her Place. Pablo continues a remarkable streak of exploring iconic women through film, this time with the incredible Angelina Jolie as Maria Callas.”
Andrea Scrosati, Group COO & CEO Continental Europe, Fremantle, commented: “We are delighted that Pablo Larraín’s extraordinary piece of filmmaking, Maria, with its incredible performance by Angelina Jolie, has found its US home at Netflix. I know they will give it the best possible support and we are grateful to Glen and his FilmNation team for spearheading the sale.”
Alongside Jolie, the cast also includes Pierfrancesco Favino (Adagio, The Hummingbird), Alba Rohrwacher (La Chimera, Hungry Hearts), Haluk Bilginer (Winter Sleep), Kodi Smit-McPhee (The Power of the Dog, Elvis) and Valeria Golino (Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Caos Calmo).
The script was written by Steven Knight (Spencer, Peaky Blinders, Eastern Promises). Producers include Juan de Dios Larraín for Fabula, Jonas Dornbach for Komplizen Film and Lorenzo Mieli for The Apartment, a Fremantle Company. Worldwide sales for Maria will be handled by FilmNation Entertainment.
Can ‘Queer’ and ‘Maria’ make a mark?
By Kyle Buchanan
Aug. 28, 2024
Two of Venice’s most anticipated titles are still looking for buyers: Luca Guadagnino’s “Queer,” an adaptation of the William S. Burroughs novel starring Daniel Craig, and Pablo Larraín’s “Maria,” featuring Angelina Jolie as the opera singer Maria Callas.
After the writers’ and actors’ strikes left many studios’ year-end slates looking awfully barren, you might have expected a bidding frenzy for two prestige films with major stars, but potential distributors that have screened the movies are taking a wait-and-see approach. Splashy premieres at Venice and almost-certain Oscar buzz could help make the sale.
and just like that A24 picks up U.S. distribution rights to Luca Guadagnino’s Queer. can they get a Best Actor nomination for Daniel Craig? are two different studios campaigning Luca for Best Director first two different movies?
— Gregory Ellwood - The Playlist 🎬 (@TheGregoryE) August 29, 2024
fun zoom calls await pic.twitter.com/FR9tJsGP8D
Timothee Chalamet, Brad Pitt and Joel Edgerton attend Netflix Presents 'The King' Tastemaker at The London Hotel— Getty Images Entertainment (@GettyVIP) October 23, 2019
More 📸 #TheKing 👉 https://t.co/t81m6SbrxT#TimotheeChalamet #BradPitt #JoelEdgerton #Netflix pic.twitter.com/lMdFp2fU6y
After tonight’s Q&A for THE KING I swung by the reception and was wondering why the entire party suddenly convened in one corner of the room. Then I realized Brad Pitt had arrived.— Jenelle Riley (@jenelleriley) October 23, 2019
Fun evening as Brad Pitt and his Plan B partners Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner screened and celebrated THE KING, writer/director David Michod and stars @RealChalamet and @JoelEdgerton1 at an LA event packed with Academy members. All stayed/graciously mingled late into the nite. pic.twitter.com/wgC4JJS4n5— Scott Feinberg (@ScottFeinberg) October 23, 2019
#BradPitt talked to USA TODAY about fatherhood, the movie that was the "turning point" of his career and crying in #AdAstra 🌔 https://t.co/p1FqwxMW1E— USA TODAY Life (@usatodaylife) September 19, 2019