[Listen to the full conversation above.]
Marion Cotillard joined NYFF Live over the weekend. She mused on her new film Two Days, One Night by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne as well as her illustrious career that spans both sides of the Atlantic. Two Days,One Night, screening as part of NYFF52's Main Slate, is a film that is at once an unforgettable drama and a tough ethical inquiry. The narrative centers on the employees in a small factory who will each receive a bonus if one of their co-workers is laid off. What follows is a relentless journey in which Sandra (Cotillard) tries to change each individual's mind about their bonuses.
Cotillard is a dedicated character actress and goes through an intense amount of preparation to lose herself in a role. “We had a month of rehearsals, which were really amazing,” she said in the Amphitheater at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center. “It was more about the technical aspects… On day two we had 56 takes and on day four, 54. Usually you think the takes mean the director is crazy or sadomasochistic but with the Dardenne Brothers, I knew that doing another take was for a reason. There was a very strong connection between the brothers and [me]. Even sometimes we’d do 70 takes and I would ask for more. I trust them 1,000 percent. That was one of my best experiences as an actress, they offered everything I wanted from a relationship with directors.”
Variety critic Scott Foundas moderated the talk, praising the actress as “an actress with exceptional range and skill.” Among the fascinating questions he probed Cotillard on were is it possible to go too deeply into a role, her view on the celebrity factor and how it affected her post-Taxi, and why she is attracted to femme fatale roles, such as her characters in Christopher Nolan's Inception and The Dark Knight Rises, as well as Lady Macbeth in an upcoming screen version of Macbeth.
