Amanda Seyfried: This movie has changed me

Amanda Seyfried is unwrapping amagic set she just purchased from Hamleys as Iwalk into ahotel room in London to interview her. She wants to share its delights with me. We are speaking acouple of days after her appearance at the 16^th Governors Awards in Hollywood – she’s warm, welcoming and full of animated spirit and humour as she tells me how excited she was to finally meet Steven Spielberg. Seyfried is an actor who has balanced commercial hits with more hard-edged indie works. There was her early appearance in Mean Girls, followed by Mamma Mia!, which cemented her as one to watch. Her roles in Jennifer’s Body and Lovelace revealed ariskier side, and she dazzled as Marion Davies in David Fincher’s Mank. And yet her devoted and daring performance in The Testament of Ann Lee is unlike anything she’s ever done before.

LWLies: Can you pinpoint the exact moment you tapped into the role of AnnLee?

Seyfried: Really tapping into the character actually came before we even started shooting. Iwas lying on the floor of the studio with Mona [Fastvold] and my dog, trying to find the right feeling to record ​‘Beautiful Treasures’. It’s amontage of three different times in Ann’s life. The first is happy and in love, the second is pregnant and waiting and longing, and the third is grief. There are three different versions of the dance and everything is mixed together so Ihad to record ​‘Beautiful Treasures’ many, many times and then sing it live. When Iwas in the studio, Mona was saying, ​‘Let’s do it again but now just cry through it, just whisper through it…’ it was relentless. By the time Igot on set I’d got it and that was liberating. Before you get to that point it is exhausting, but that’s okay, that’s why it’s so special.

There is an orgasmic and primal feeling to the dance sequences. What were the conversations you had with choreographer Celia Rowlson-Hall?

I was clueless as to what this movie would look like when Iwas reading the script and what the hymns would actually sound like. The script is very unconventional, in the best, most beautiful way. Not being able to wrap your head around something early on is normal but it’s scary because you think, ​‘Am Ithe right person for this if even Ican’t see this?’ Istarted working with Celia in the winter. We were shooting in the Hancock Shaker Village in Massachusetts in the middle of asnowstorm. Iam not adancer. It takes along time for my brain and body to connect to create muscle memory. What Iunderstood was that it was probably going to become intuitive but Ineeded to keep dancing. Iwould see videos of Celia and Iunderstood it to be really abstract and very feral. It’s almost just an extension of emotion. For this film Ihad to show my soul in away Ihaven’t really been familiar with before.

You were last in London in October, when you performed in London’s Café Oto with Daniel Blumberg…

I’ve never had an opportunity like that before. Imet him on Zoom acouple of weeks before Imet Celia. Even though his rhythm is not the same as mine… it’s not the same as anyone’s, so that’s what makes him so unique. He doesn’t know music theory, he doesn’t know how to read music. Icome from amore technical background. Istarted music when Iwas seven. Istarted playing piano, singing opera and playing guitar. It comes from somewhere else for him. It’s more abstract and from the pit of his soul, it’s almost…

…guttural?

Yes! And alot of music is, but he’s unafraid when it comes to music. These songs are not easy to sing. They don’t sound good all the time. They’re hard to sing when you’re moving. Idon’t have enough breath for certain phrases. Icouldn’t listen to myself when Isang and that was tricky. The whole thing was definitely anew understanding of what was needed. The same way Ihave to take my ego out of the equation when I’m acting, Ihad to take my ego out when Iwas listening to what I’m sounding like. Idon’t trust my instrument the way Itrust Mona and Daniel. Ihave to trust that they hear what they want tohear.

It sounds like working with Daniel and on this film changed you and your relationship withmusic.

It hasn’t really changed my love for folk music. It opened me up more to instrumental music. Playing at Café Oto was so heart-opening and so surreal because, for the first time, Ijust sang. Iwasn’t afraid. Usually Ihave acrippling fear of singing live and Iwas just present there. Ihad aglass of wine, Iwas playing the bell and Iwas singing into the microphone. Iwasn’t afraid of it for the first time in my life. Actually, Ithink you’re right, this movie has changed me.

It sounds like aliberating experience. You also had to learn the Manchester accent…

I stayed away from the contemporary Manchester accent. Things evolve over time so in order to make it feel less contemporary, our dialect coach, Tanera [Marshall], wanted to dilute it alittle bit. Peterloo was the movie specifically that we all watched and we used it as abible. There are certain scenes that really helped me find my voice as an empowered woman. Maxine Peake of course is from Manchester, and she is of this age, but Ineeded areference and Ifelt like Maxine was the safest way togo.

Peterloo is great. Iinterviewed [its director] Mike Leigh recently, Iwas terrified…

It’s abeautiful movie. When it comes to directors I’m always abit intimidated. Directors for me are always like ​‘Mummy and Daddy’. Mona’s my mummy – on set we actually called her [Amanda adopts aManchester accent] ​‘Mother Mona!’

We should talk about your relationship with Mona because you previously worked with her on [the 2023TV series] The Crowded Room…

That was the first time Iworked with her, but Ialready knew her. Imet her in my early twenties. We have many mutual friends in Brooklyn. She chose me because she knew Iwould give it everything. She knew that Iwould show up. She knew that it was achallenge and she knows that I’m not apussy! I’m not precious at all and she knows I’m not going to give her ahard time. She has such aclear vision and she knows what she wants and she directs beautifully. She holds the room. She supports and nurtures the room but she also controls the room. There’s something very maternal about ​‘Mother Mona’ but she asks for what she needs in avery simple and direct way.

There’s one point where Ann is on the ship and she has annoyed everybody and she defiantly continues to dance and chant. It’s so funny. Do you and Mona share asense of humour?

Yes. She’s Scandinavian so she’s got alot of manners and she’s very proper, but she can be quite dark and that’s part of the reason we get along so well. When Iintroduce audiences to the movie Ilike to say that you shouldn’t be afraid to laugh. It’s absurd at times, because the Shaker religion is absurd. We have ashared appreciation for the absurd, and the way she navigates that and the way she writes, you can understand that’s what she’s going for. She’s so funny. We had alot of fun with it. There is alot of darkness and grief with this film too. You gotta hold both sides of that and it’s very hard todo.

I think it very much does that… So, on aspiritual level did you have any curiosity when it came to religion?

I was with somebody in my teens when Iwas living in Hollywood and we started going to this Presbyterian church. We would go together and sing and Istarted thinking Ihad this faith. Ieven started going to aBible-study class because Iwas new to town and wanted to belong to something. Then it dawned on me ayear after we started going that Ireally just like to go tosing!

That’s what John Paul Jones, the bassist in Led Zeppelin, said about his early roots in music. He wasn’t religious, he just went to church to playmusic.

You have community and music at church and it’s free. Did Iagree with everything? Most of it. Alot of religions are very confusing to me. The basis of religion, Ialways thought, was to lift each other up and bekind.

That’s what Ann Lee tried. So that sense of euphoria, it seems you get that alot from music, but when you connect with adirector, isthat…

It’s everything! Ijust did amovie with Tim Blake Nelson [The Life and Deaths of Wilson Shedd] and ​‘euphoric’ is avery good word to describe it. It’s too much to describe every day on set but Ihad moments of that. He made me understand things through this poetry in his direction. It was delicious to take his note and thread it through all my thoughts and feelings. I’m truly an actor. Iget such akick out of it. It’s abeautiful chaos. Iremember Iwas with Thomasin [McKenzie] and Mona watching the film at Venice and we were all holding hands. It felt like asisterhood. Icried hysterically at the funeral scene, because of the culmination of the whole experience, in afilm about awoman whose whole existence was under the threat of erasure –this was abeautiful person, as nuts as she was. Her intention was incredibly powerful and pure for so many people.