Nia DaCosta have had a version of Hedda Gabler lives, or maybe laze aroundin her head for a long time. The writer and director first started thinking about one film adaptation of the Henrik Ibsen play in 2012, while she was doing a masters in the UK, and started writing it in 2018, after the release of her debut film “Little Woods”. But even as DaCosta dives into worlds fantastical and strange in “Candyman” and “The Marvels,” every six months or so, she would take “Hedda” out of the box to fiddle with it.
In a new episode of the Filmmaker Toolkit Podcast, DaCosta told IndieWire that continuing to play with the script wasn’t just about calibrating the levels of performance, oppression and passion simmering just beneath the characters’ exteriors. Her approach to film adaptation requires looking closely not only at the text and how it might be relevant to the times we live in, but why it is important to the person making the adaptation.
“That’s what keeps classic works alive. You have to adapt it not just for the time but for the person you are and for whatever impact — emotional, psychological, existential — it had on you, because it means something,” DaCosta said. “I think if you can transfer not only the play and what it means but also your reaction to the play and how you feel about the play into your version of it, I think that’s super important.”
DaCosta’s “Hedda” then uproots from Norway to a post-war English manner, indulging in all the glitz and oppression of the era, trapping the characters in emotional hedge mazes of their own making — as well as, of course, a literal hedge maze that’s not as much of a makeout site as it might first appear. Off-stage events can be seen and experienced vividly through cinematographer Sean Bobbitt’s buzzing but still keenly observant camera. Tessa Thompson’s Hedda is impressive the moment she enters a room, taking up a queen’s share of the frame in costume designer Lindsay Pugh’s gowns and expertly navigating the hidden corners of production designer Cara Bower’s sets.
DaCosta always adjusts the dials, whether through the visual language and amount of light we see in line with Hedda’s whims or through the blocking and pacing of the film’s shifts between humor, lust and darker character impulses. “You really have to be clear with the cast and crew about what the tone is for each scene in each moment and how we shift into the next gear. It’s all calibration, modulation, in rehearsals, on the day, in the edit,” DaCosta said.
But every tone shift in the film arises out of DaCosta’s feeling for the protagonist. “I think she’s funny. I think she’s scary. I think she’s evil. I think she’s vulnerable,” DaCosta said. “So we can go from farcical, like the chandelier falling and Eileen (Nina Hoss) getting into a fight in the conservatory, but it’s all driven by real emotion. I think it’s so important to be able to do that.”
That’s important to DaCosta because the director wanted to balance it with the real, eternally relatable experience of wild shit going down at a party, no matter how elevated and glamorous the setting the film builds.
“The shifts in tone made me try to mirror, like when you’re at a party and the lesbian drama happens somewhere, it seeps into the rest of the party and you go, ‘Oh no.’ It goes from being super fun to being, ‘Oh Godwho just came out of the bedroom with — oh, that’s not good. My God. Oh, What happened? It’s funny.’ Do you know? “It’s just who we are, and I knew that for ‘Hedda’ it had to feel as dynamic as real life,” DaCosta said.
However, real life on film requires a lot of rehearsal. “I studied writing in drama school because I wanted to work with actors — to learn more about how they work, what their business is, what’s wrong with them,” DaCosta joked. “I realize that what’s so beautiful about theater and what I actually love about telling stories is the collaboration… you know, I’m the helmsman at the head of the boat, making sure we’re going in the right direction, telling everybody, ‘OK, go fast, go slow,’ etc. And rehearsals, for me, are about making sure the script is out and I’m blocking everything with the DP.”
DaCosta has found that by slowly bringing the cast and crew together, starting with Bobbitt but sometimes camera operator Simon Wood or others, a collaborative process can emerge to help the company adjust to the space and come up with exciting character work that just feels real.
“We got to rehearse in the house with all the set in the house for two weeks before we started filming, so it was perfect. For example, the scene with Eileen walking in with her dress wet and exposed, talking to the men, I want her to really play the room and use the whole space. So we thought, ‘OK, maybe she’s making martinis here, is she going to light here, then is she going to light a cigarette?’
But the process of working out all of this helped DaCosta and her actors know exactly when and where Eileen should light a cigarette for maximum effect. “We (decided) we should have this moment with her and George (Tom Bateman), and George being so smitten with her. Let’s have her next to George. Oh, he can’t light a cigarette. Let’s have that moment. Let’s have her light it. And then, (the scene) builds slowly and it’s just so funny and gratifying.”
To hear Nia DaCostas full interview, subscribe to The Filmmaker’s Toolkit podcast on Apple, Spotifyor your favorite podcast platform.
“Hedda” is now in theaters and streaming on Prime Video.
