JESSIE BUCKLEY

Catapulting to fame over the last five years , instinctive Irish actor Jessie Buckley has wowed in films (Wild Rose, I’m Thinking of Ending Things, Men) and TV (Chernobyl, Fargo S 4). She was Oscar-nominated for The Lost Daughter, won a Laurence Olivier award for Cabaret and now she’s spewing wild profanities at Olivia Colman in hilarious period comedy Wicked Little Let ters…

‘I FEEL LIKE I’VE MADE ANICHE OUT OF FALLEN WOMEN. THE ANTI-LADY IS WHAT I’VE BEEN DRAWN TO…’

J essie Buckley is telling Total Film to fuck off. ‘You’re a fucking eejit,’ she spits. Thankfully, the outburst is prompted. In the 34-year-old actor’s latest film, Wicked Little Letters, Buckley plays Rose Gooding, a rowdy Irish migrant living in the quaint English seaside town of 1920s Littlehampton. Rose, a single mum, makes eyebrows soar and curtains twitch with her foul mouth and boisterous behaviour, so is naturally the prime suspect when her pious neighbour, Edith Swan (Olivia Colman), receives anonymous letters addressing her as a ‘fucking old bag of shit’ and worse. The constant stream of inventive invective is hilarious, and attains a certain musicality when delivered in Buckley’s native brogue.

‘It’s so delicious,’ she agrees when TF apologises for embracing stereotypes but suggests that the Irish make an artform of cursing. So what’s her own favourite swear? ‘I mean, “fuck off” is pretty good,’ she grins, and it indeed sounds great when delivered with the oomph she musters. ‘“Eejit” is such a great word. It isn’t that bad but it makes me laugh. “You’re a fucking eejit.” What is that? It’s like something a leprechaun would say!’

As amusing as the super-sweary Wicked Little Letters is, it sure as fuck has something serious to say. Class and fear of the outsider come under the microscope. But most of all, words like ‘decorum’ and ‘moral rectitude’ are bandied about by male characters who make it clear that only ‘ladylike’ behaviour will suffice. Rose, of course, is having none of it, and not even an impending court case and the threat of prison can quash her spirit.

It’s a theme that has run through much of Buckley’s stellar work since she turned heads in the 2017 feature, Beast. Before then, she’d done Shakespeare on stage and Tom Harper’s War &Peace miniseries, but was primarily known for coming runner-up in I’d Do Anything, the BBC talent series geared towards finding a Nancy for the 2009 West End revival of Oliver!. With Beast, however, Buckley announced herself as a startling film talent, her Moll busting loose of the strictures of an oppressive family when she falls for Johnny Flynn’s murder suspect, Pascal. In Wild Rose, she was a Glaswegian mother determined to hold on to her dream of becoming a country star in Nashville. Charlie Kaufman’s mind-melting I’m Thinking of Ending Things saw her play Young Woman, who begins to question her relationship, herself and the world. In The Lost Daughter, meanwhile, for which Buckley received an Oscar nomination, she essayed a younger version of Olivia Colman’s divorced professor Leda, at a time when domestic responsibilities threaten to stymie her thrusting intellect.

Again and again Buckley has delivered riveting portrayals of complicated women who refuse to be boxed. She has a knack for picking quality projects – see also Alex Garland’s folk-horror Men, Sarah Polley’s award-winner Women Talking and sci-fi romance Fingernails, plus TV shows Chernobyl and Fargo S4, and her Laurence Olivier Award-winning turn as Sally Bowles in the 2021 rendition of Cabaret. She also released an album with former Suede guitarist Bernard Butler in 2022, entitled For All Our Days That Tear the Heart. It was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize.

‘I love all of it,’ she laughs, stressing her plans to keep switching it up between film, TV, theatre and, occasionally, music. ‘I’m a piggy!’

You must get so many offers now. Why did Wicked Little Letters leap out?

Well, firstly it was Olivia [Colman]. We did The Lost Daughter together, but we’d never actually worked together. We just get on. I love her to bits. She’s become such a good friend. She sent me a text and was like, ‘Do you want to do a job together? Can I send you something?’ So I was like, ‘Yeah, send me Baa Baa Black Sheep’ [laughs]. And then I read it. It was just so funny. I’d done quite a lot of dark material for a while, and I just wanted to go have fun, and be really naughty. And the best person to be naughty with is Olivia Colman!

Had you met before The Lost Daughter?

We first met at Latitude Festival. We ended up doing karaoke until way too early in the morning. I think she kindly suggested me for The Lost Daughter, which is a mad, amazing thing. I did all my stuff first, in the first two weeks. And then she came and did her stuff. But we had a five-day overlap.

Doing karaoke with you is a terrifying proposition. She must be fearless!

No, I’m shit at karaoke! I’m always, in the middle, like, ‘This is too slow. I’ve lost the crowd. I should have had that other glass of red wine…’ And you’re singing Adele or Amy Winehouse if it’s at 5am. It’s always sad [laughs].

In Wicked Little Letters, Rose refuses to conform to society’s norms…

Oh, yeah! I mean, I feel like I’ve made a niche out of fallen women – the anti-lady is what I’ve been drawn to. The women that I love in my life, they’re not that. They’ve got brilliant minds, and they have so much to say, and so much space to stake. It isn’t just being put into a parlour room and being told, ‘Be a good girl.’

The good girls that I’ve known in my life are the ones that have ended up behaving the worst [laughs]. So, yeah, Rose was so free and so fun. As a single mother to a daughter, she has utter commitment to teach her daughter to live. I think she says that to her daughter: ‘Don’t let them fuck you up.’

Growing up, did you ever have those stultifying expectations thrust upon you?

Definitely, yeah. It’s impossible not to. You get it in all shapes and sizes. In my experience, it’s always made me very sad, and I don’t think it’s very honest. Even with The Lost Daughter, sometimes that character, that mother, Leda… it’s difficult for people. I’ve had other women say, ‘Was that really hard, to play someone so unlikeable?’ And I was like, ‘Wow, that’s so interesting.’ There are so many things that we kind of nip each other about what we expect a perfect mother to be, or what the trajectory of that is. If you’re a single mother, or have an affair, or want something more in your life, God forbid.

‘BEING A BLE TO CU RSE IN MY OW N ACCEN T WAS EXTR A DELIGHTFU L’

Was it liberating to use your own accent for Rose?

It was so nice! I did it with Romeo &Juliet and Alex Garland’s Men as well. But I love accents. Sometimes it’s quite scary doing it in your own [voice], because you’ve got nothing to hide behind [laughs]. Actors, we quite like putting things on, often, and finding nuances in somebody else that you can live in or whatever. But I think that being able to curse in my own accent was extra delightful. I’ve been doing it my whole life. I’ve definitely heard, ‘Just be more of a lady, Jessie!’

Did you have a favourite curse in the film? Everyone in the cinema howled at ‘fucking Jesus shat on the cross’...

Oh, did they? That’s good. Rose doesn’t even notice that she’s putting them out there. It’s just like drinking a cup of tea. I remember when we did that one, one of the producers came in, and he was like, ‘Do you think that’s a bit too much?’ Thea [Sharrock, director] was like, ‘No, it’s great.’ When Olivia curses at the end, it’s so glorious. The first time she did it, all the extras and everybody couldn’t keep it in.

It’s always more funny when it’s unexpected…

[Scrabbles for phone] I don’t know if I still have it… My mum was over in my house at the end of the shoot, and we all got cups. And on the cup was one of the swears. My mum, she was just having a cup of tea at nine o’clock in the morning, and then she started wetting herself. I was like, ‘What’s so funny?’ She went, ‘Fuck off you old, shrivelled, pasty, fucking piss-bastard’ or something like that. [Shows photo of mum with cup]. My mum’s as good as gold. I’d love if all the most pious women in Britain started reading out curse words – all the grannies. Wouldn’t it be so great?

As you touched on earlier, your characters refuse to be fettered. Do you consciously gravitate towards these roles, or are they simply the most interesting?

It’s not conscious, but I definitely love it when I read it. I mean, you go through different things where you’re like, ‘I want to explore that.’ Men and Women Talking were quite an interesting conversation for me, because I thought, ‘I want to put myself in two quite heightened places, having a similar but different conversation. I’m curious about what

that might feel like.’ I guess I need some sort of emancipation in my work. I’m a bit scared of telling a story of a woman who’s just a victim in her world, because I don’t know what that offers.

Last time we spoke, you said you want to put out good examples to your younger sisters.

I don’t know if I set an example any more [laughs]. I think I’ve sailed that ship! I think about all women. And I also think about men, and the relationships I want us to all be in with each other, which is not being smaller or scared of certain aspects of ourselves. What if we both took the space that we’re most scared to stake? I don’t even know what that is, but let’s think about it, you know? What we have – the parlour rooms, or the uberman [mimes being macho] – it doesn’t work. I love men, and I love women, and I love our relationships together. I just feel like… I don’t know if I can set an example; I can only really do it for myself. If something gets shifted, great. And if it doesn’t, then I’ll try again.

You’ve worked with a fair few female filmmakers. Is that something you seek out?

I haven’t made a point of it, no. But I love it. You’ve got to feel something from the script, and if something gets your juices going, whether it’s aman or a woman directing that, then brilliant. You really want to feel like you’re going to be able to have a curious and creative relationship with either of them. I think what’s so exciting is that it definitely feels that with people like Maggie [Gyllenhaal, director of The Lost Daughter] and Greta Gerwig and Chloé Zhao [director of Buckley’s rumoured next project, Hamnet]… People like Lynne Ramsay and Andrea Arnold, before, were kind of anomalies. And now someone like Greta Gerwig is changing the whole course of what is expected of women. I mean, we’ve always been able to do it. But whatever people think quantifies, or gives people a gold tick to say, ‘Yeah, go’ – that’s changed. The biggest films in the last few years have been led by incredible women. As a performer in all of that, it gives you strength. Alittle girl can go, ‘Maybe I can do that,’ instead of thinking, ‘That belongs to a certain kind of person.’

Studios can’t hide behind the old narrative that used to say that only guys can handle the big blockbusters.

[Nods] But there’s still loads to change. There’s still an incredible pay discrepancy between men and women. And that’s not just within our industry; that’s within every industry. And that means so much. It means that a woman can’t buy her own home. It means that she can’t go and get a third-level education. These things have a trickle-down effect, which affects a whole option of possibilities for women. There’s still lots to do, but I feel like it’s moving.

Talking of changing your life, how much has yours changed in the last five years? When I get a job, I’m still like [mimes shock and delight]. The week before [filming begins], I’m like, ‘This was an awful idea. Who said that I should do this?’ I feel lucky to keep doing work that I’m still excited by, and impassioned by, and that I feel challenged by. I feel very aware that that might not always be the way. You’re only as good as your last job. And my life is still my life. I’m very lucky that I have a very private life outside my work.

Do you still cycle around London? When we met four years ago, you turned up on your bike…

I still cycle! It’s the only way to get around London. Except now I’m into Lime bikes.

My life hasn’t changed.

It hasn’t. How I work has maybe changed, and the level of what’s expected of you, and the pressure of that. But my life is the same, which is brilliant.

Has the way you find characters changed? Have you learned things along the way?

I hope I have [laughs]. Yeah, it changes all the time. Every job asks you to work differently, and I love that. For example, I did Cabaret six months before I did Wicked Little Letters. That was like a marathon. The hardest, most physical, incredible, just ‘blew me apart’ kind of job. And I’d done, before Cabaret, Men and Women Talking back to back, and had, like, a week off, and then went into Cabaret. So by the end of Cabaret, I was like, ‘I want to have fun. I want to go in and take my hands off the wheel, and just see what happens.’ This character was so full of this effervescent freedom that it lends itself brilliantly to just really move through that script with utter pleasure, and to not try to pinch anything in. Every job’s different. Some jobs take a year to prep, and you think, ‘I still need more.’

Do you ever worry about burning out? You’ve gone from project to project…

I definitely feel like at the end of a job, I want to hide in a hole, and drink wine, and smoke a fag, and disappear. I live out of London now, so I do disappear. I love being able to do that. But I haven’t worked all year, which is the longest time I haven’t worked. For different reasons. The strike. Also, look, I’ve got to pay bills and pay tax. I’ve got family to look after. I’ve got responsibilities. I’m a jobbing actress. I’ve always been a jobbing actress.

‘I DON ’T K NOW IF I ’D DO M A RVEL, BUT I ’M UP FOR TA K ING A BIGGER SPACE ’

Have you consciously stayed in the indie space? You haven’t migrated to Marvel-type movies.

Honestly, I’m not that interested in Marvel. I’ve never actually seen a Marvel. I’m worried about people having to see me in a body legging suit [laughs], all covered in blue paint. But I’m ready. I’m up for it. I don’t know if I’d do Marvel, but I’m up for taking a bigger space, if it was right. So, yeah. Who knows?

In some ways, the biggest movie you’ve done is Dolittle, and it was your worstreceived film. Is there a lesson there? Look, I was young. I got to earn enough money to pay rent for a few weeks, and be with all these people that you can learn from. I don’t regret it at all. That’s what I needed to do at that time in my life. I wouldn’t put it first on my CV, but I don’t regret it [laughs].

Last time we spoke, you said you don’t like horror movies and you’d never do one. Then you did I’m Thinking of Ending Things, which is arguably horror, and Men, which certainly is…

Well, I guess I’m a big, fat liar [laughs].

Do you think of them as horror movies? I’m Thinking Of Ending Things I didn’t think of as a horror movie. If it’s a horror to you, then great. I guess it was more of a psychological mind-fuck. But I loved making that. That was so wild and fun.

It deals with things that horror movies often do, like loneliness and entrapment and anxiety. And going off to a remote farmhouse…

Yeah. I mean, maybe [laughs]. I’m actually really scared of horror films. Maybe I pretended that they weren’t. Men I knew was some sort of horror. But, honestly, I don’t know. I’m really crap with genre stuff.

You don’t need to worry about it, do you? You think about a character’s journey, and you create a world, and you try to make it grounded in something.

‘I LOV E DOI NG THINGS TH AT ARE A BIT OBSCU R E ’

Whatever thing it captures after your performance is kind of nothing to do with you. But no, they were both great. I love doing things that are a bit obscure, and make people feel… I don’t need everybody to like it, or love it. If people have different experiences of things, then great.

How was Charlie Kaufman to work with? His films are so anxiety-ridden. Is he like that in real life?

I adore Charlie. He’s one of the greatest minds of our time, you know? You talk to any filmmaker, and I guarantee you there’s one of [Kaufman’s] films or one of his scripts that have been one of the most influential things in their lives. What’s sad is that it’s so hard for somebody like him to get a film made now, because everything’s being driven off an algorithm, or it’s sensationalism, or some kind of corporate system. And actually to have an original thought is difficult in our industry right now. I found working with him… He’s got a really funny, dark, wild, naughty sense of humour. He’s such an interesting director who will give you really abstract notes but that are so specific. For Jesse Plemons and me, for the first two weeks, we were just in a car in a studio. There wasn’t anything else but us. Charlie would come in, and he would sit at the back, and he’d just say one thing, and then he’d go out. But that one thing would change the whole course.

Is it daunting to be in a work of such imagination?

His writing is so huge. The language of it, and the possibility of it. As a young actress, do you want to jump into a pool, and learn to swim? Yeah! Do you want something to blow your mind, and you don’t know where you are, and you find a way to come through it, and feel like you’ve got extra muscles? Hell yes, I want to do that. I don’t want to put on a blue suit. I don’t want to go into something that is, for me, narrow and narrowminded. His language and his worlds – they have broken boundaries, and created the cinema of our time. I adore him.

I hope we can make another film together. I would work with him at the drop of a hat.

How was it being in a room with that head-fuck of a beast at the end of Men?

Rory Kinnear – I mean, I love that man with all my heart. It was basically just the two of us for the whole shoot, because he was every man. And he’s one of the funniest fuckers I’ve ever worked with. Honest to God, the amount of times, if you look again, I’ve had to turn away because I’ve just laughed. But I remember, we were heading into the week of that last scene, a night shoot. Getting any kind of prosthetic on ever, it’s a big old feat of eight hours sitting in a chair. He was covered, and there’d be different layers of gunk that had to be put on him.

He’d be in his little tighty-whitey shorts having smashed banana and blood poured on him. You’d just look at him and go, ‘Bad life choices.’ We both knew, ‘This is so far out. We’re just going to have to commit.’

The performance as much as the prosthetics make it scary…

Rory came in, and fell to his knees, and let the first bellow out – or moo, or whatever. It was about one o’clock at night, and he let the first labour pain out, and in the adjoining field, a sheep bellowed back to him [laughs]. The sheep was like, ‘Mehrrrrrrrrr!’

Did you watch horror movies growing up?

We had a Halloween party, and we put on [The] Texas Chain Saw Massacre. We lived up by the woods. My dad came into the room, and he was like, ‘Everybody get into the car.’ He drove us up to the middle of the wood, and was like, ‘Everybody get out!’ And then he disappeared. There were about five 10-year-olds in the middle of wild Ireland where every tree and every rustle of wind was something coming for you [laughs]. The next thing – we had, for some reason, a hooded cape at home. He came up through the woods, this dark figure arriving in a hooded cape…

No wonder you’re scared of horror films!

I actually had [a scary experience] the other night. We live in Norfolk. I was in bed with my husband. We were watching Under the Skin, and the next thing I heard was [groans]. We were like, ‘Is that in the film?’ We stopped it, and it kept going. The house is 1500s, so it’s a tiny bit scary anyway. Every time I come in, I have to go, ‘Hello, if anybody’s here, it’s time to

leave. Thank you.’ I looked out the window, and it was one of those little baby deer that will bark outside the window. We had the fright of our lives.

You mentioned Chloé Zhao earlier. It’s rumoured you’re the lead in her next film…

I don’t know what I can tell you. There’s nothing set in stone yet. But I have two things that I’m doing this year that I’m so excited about. Both of the directors and the scripts are beyond incredible. After a year of not working, I’ve never been more excited about going into a year of work. I can’t wait.

Will you be doing more TV? How was making Chernobyl and Fargo compared to making movies, or performing in Cabaret?

I don’t see any difference with any of it. You create something, and hope that it works in whatever world you’re stepping into. There’s so much great TV going on, and amazing writers. It definitely gives writers a place to write more, and go into depth with a character. But, also, I started watching old films recently, with Barbara

Stanwyck and Marlene Dietrich. Some of them are 60 minutes. They manage to capture a whole world in those 60 minutes. Actually, even writing music, it’s like a mini-film. Each song is like a mini-film. If you can do that in three stanzas of a song, and create a whole world, it’s the same with film. I think there’s room for all of it. There are so many platforms now.

That’s a good thing.

My only worry is… I don’t like this algorithm thing. I think for all creatives, your instinct gets dulled down. Companies want things to have a reverberation into every single pocket. That’s what’s so amazing about someone like Jonathan Glazer. He’s so in his thing, and his worlds are so bold and uncompromising. The Zone of Interest was my favourite film last year. And something like Under the Skin, or [Charlie Kaufman’s] Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, lasts beyond the time they were created because they’re so pure. I think if somebody’s got something to say, let them say it.

WICKED LITTLE LETTERS OPENS IN CINEMAS ON 23 FEBRUARY.

JESSIE BUCKLEY LINE READING

‘You get the world you deserve and if you don’t fight you deserve the world you fucking get.’

JO ROBINSON MISBEHAVIOUR

‘[COUNTRY MUSIC IS] THREE CHORDS AND THE TRUTH.’

ROSE-LYNN HARLAN WILD ROSE

‘IT’S GOOD TO REMIND YOURSELF THE WORLD IS LARGER THAN THE INSIDE OF YOUR OWN HEAD.’

YOUNG WOMAN I’M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS