Ana de Armas has opened up about her upcoming film Blonde, which details the life of Marilyn Monroe. The biopic is directed by Andrew Dominik and based on a book of the same name by Joyce Carol Oates. According to de Amas, per Entertainment Weekly, it’s also the "most intense work" she’s ever done as an actress.
“It took me a year to prepare for that — research and accent and everything you can imagine. Reading material, and talking to Andrew Dominik for months, and getting ready to start. It was three months of shooting nonstop — like, a crazy schedule.”
During the time that de Armas was preparing for Blonde, the film got pushed, and she got called for the James Bond film No Time to Die. So she went to London to play Paloma, a memorable supporting character who assisted 007 in completing his mission. According to de Armas, she only had “like 10 days to two weeks of training,” which, according to her, wasn’t much for everything she had to do, which made her nervous.
“And then, on top of that, Daniel [Craig] got injured, and I had to postpone my shoot and go back to do Marilyn Monroe, which is completely different from everything else — emotionally, mentally, and physically — and then three months later go back to London and go back to being a Bond girl. All that training I did was kind of gone and forgotten! But it all worked out, and I was working with the best team possible, and they made it happen, so I’m happy with it.”
Blonde is Unapologetically Rated NC-17
In the past, Oates has listed Blonde, and Them, as the books that she’ll want first-time readers of her work to turn to and what she thinks are the books people will remember her for in the future. (Of course, she also said she could have easily chosen any number of titles. Asking an author to pick among their work is like asking a mother to pick among her children) Oates has also been privy to an early cut of the film. So what does she think of it?
Oates has spoken very highly of the film and Dominick. In a tweet, the author wrote that the film was “startling, brilliant, very disturbing & [perhaps most surprisingly] an utterly ‘feminist’ interpretation.” The author doesn’t think that any male director has achieved anything like this.
In the director’s words, Dominik has described the upcoming biopic as “a movie for all the unloved children of the world,” adding, “It’s like Citizen Kane and Raging Bull had a baby daughter.” And in the words of its star, de Armas, has said that it’s a very special film. That Dominik was not only a genius but one of the best filmmakers that she’s ever worked with.
Blonde is currently eyeing a festival run later this year. Other cast members of the film include Oscar-winning actor Adrien Brody as Monroe’s third husband and playwright Arthur Miller, with Bobby Cannavale playing Monroe’s second husband, baseball player Joe DiMaggio. The information in the article comes courtesy of Entertainment Weekly and The Washington Post.