Claire Foy very talented professional. She has been successful on screen and on stage for many years, she has won two Emmy awards for her work in Crownshe has received four BAFTA nominations, two for Crownone for First man and one more for wolf halland now she’s rightfully back in the conversation about awards season for her performance in Sarah PolleyX women talk. However, even with all these achievements, she hesitates to do justice to her young women talk co-stars good advice. (Despite the fact that these are point things.)
The film is based on Miriam ToewsA best-selling novel about a group of women living in a secluded religious colony who must figure out how to respond to a series of sexual assaults perpetrated by the colony’s men. Do they stay and act like nothing happened? Do they stay and resist? Or are they leaving everything they’ve ever known to build a better life elsewhere?
Now that the film is playing in select theaters and releasing nationwide on January 27, Foy took the time to join us for one of the episodes. Collider Women’s Night return to her journey from drama school to “breakthrough” through Crown be part of an exceptional ensemble in women talk.
Foy has certainly reached the point where she can help pave the best path forward for new actors like her. women talk co-stars Keith Hallett and Liv McNeil who both make their feature film debuts. But, of course, there was a time when Foy herself was new to the craft and had a lot to learn. She remembered:
“I think I went into drama school with very little understanding of what it takes to actually be an actor, or what it takes, or the skills to have, any of those things. Theater school, we prepared a lot for it. You have done a lot of Stanislavsky exercises and have been preparing a lot for the skills you may need to do it. And then when I did my first play in drama school, I thought, “Oh, that was good. I enjoyed doing it.” I love it. It was terrible, and I was worried that I was wrong all the time, but at the same time I thought: “This is very, very, very good.”
Luckily, that’s what theater school is for! Trial and error to find what works best for you. Foy singled out two specific ideas that she picked up while attending drama school that have proved invaluable even to this day:
“I think one of the vocal teachers at school once said, ‘If you’re on stage or playing in some way and you feel like it’s not happening, just stop and take a breath.’ Just take a breath! You are probably not breathing, which is really important. But also for myself, I fundamentally realized that real acting is not about me. It was about the impact on another person, the person with whom you acted. How will you make them change? How will you make them see your point of view? You are always trying to get something from someone in life. Everyone is trying to influence everyone in their life, be it other people or themselves. They are always trying to get an answer or a reaction or change someone and that is the most rewarding thing in the world for me. I think most of the time as an actor you have to feel that everything should be about you or that all the attention is on you, when it’s actually the other way around. If you just focus on the other person, then you just start doing it. You just do it. You basically listen in the room and that’s it.”
But of course, all the training in the world cannot fully prepare a person for what it takes to become a working actor. Here’s what Foy said when asked about what surprised her when she got into her first pro sets:
“I think I was not prepared for the fact that there are technical elements to it, such as the inability to fully focus on the experience and feelings. Sometimes you have to wait for the light and you have to be ready to go when you have to go. Sometimes it’s about saving yourself. You take other people’s shots before your own, but you have to get there. You have to succeed every time for the people with whom you are together, and then for yourself.”
Foy has certainly honed her craft over the years, but there’s always more to learn, both in front of and off the lens. For example, for film and television lovers, this can mean one thing. watch the actor is experiencing a “breakout opportunity” but that could mean something different to the person who is actually going through it. Here’s what Foy said when asked about the misconception about the reality of “breakthrough” in Hollywood:
“By the time I got the Crown, I had been working for about 10 years, so I felt a little long in the teeth when it happened. [Laughs] I thought for a bit, “So what?” There was a point in my career where I thought, “Well, that’s not going to happen to me.” I mean, I don’t know who this is happening to. It was quite an unusual experience. But I was very lucky that it was not at the beginning of my career. I was very lucky that I wasn’t overwhelmed by it and didn’t take it too seriously. Or in person! So it was amazing, but I also had my own life and by then I knew how to do my job, so I was very lucky. This is another thing Matt Smith actually told me. He already had it because he did Doctor Who and he said, “What I find really interesting is that everyone thinks you’ve changed, but you said the same thing.” It’s just that everyone’s opinion of you has changed, you know? Everyone around you suddenly thinks differently about you, and you think the same about yourself.” I understand that it could be something along the lines of “It’s not hard” but there’s something to consider because you still have all the same opinions and insecurities or beliefs about yourself and then all of a sudden everyone else thinks of you differently now that you obviously move through the world differently, even if you still feel the same way. I don’t think it’s a matter of fighting it. You can’t control what other people think of you, so you can just control your own life.”
Even with all these achievements and experience, Foy still had a hard time realizing what a valuable resource she could be to her young children. women talk film co-stars. “I don’t know how helpful I was. I think I kept scaring them.” She went on to explain the specific advice she hoped to give them, a particularly valuable lesson to learn in film and television, or any other profession, for that matter.
“I wanted them to know that they are not at the mercy of the system. They were not at the mercy of this film. I just kept saying, “Look, a lot of us work for quite a long time”… [laughs] I just didn’t help. But I just said, “Please don’t feel like you have to sacrifice yourself for what you’re doing.” Don’t go where you think you can’t return. Don’t think you have to bleed for this. Yes, there is an element of it, but take care. You are so young. Please don’t hurt yourself. Please don’t harm yourself. And I really didn’t have to worry about that, because obviously Sarah was acting very young. I think she always looked at them with one eye. And they’re just tough. I think my lack of confidence in this was probably completely unfounded because they are much more mature than I am now. So I really don’t know how much they helped me. And there was a therapist on set and everything, so I think it’s their first time making a film like that, I hope all their experiences are like that. I hope. And I really believe that they will come to their next job with an expectation of what the film could be. I just hope it doesn’t spoil.”
Want to hear more from Foy about her incredibly impressive journey through the industry? Be sure to watch her episode of Collider Ladies Night at the top of this article, or you can listen to the uncut version of the conversation below in podcast form:
Source: Collider
