Rhianna chats to Maika Monroe about the making of It Follows … (Screencaps)
It Follows Star Maika Monroe On The Most Chilling Thriller Of 2015. It Follows is looking to be the hottest, most horrific thriller of 2015, garnering five star reviews from every angle. Featuring a young, and up-until-now unknown cast, it stars Maika Monroe as Jay, a 19-year girl who has sex with her boyfriend, only to find that he has passed on a fatal curse – she will be relentlessly followed everywhere and anywhere. We meet 21-year old California girl Maika as she discusses her love for kite boarding, Australia and most of all scary movies.
Grazia Daily: So talk us though It Follows…
Maika Monroe: The director told me the idea came from a nightmare, it was a consistent dream that he had had as a kid. It was this ‘thing’ which would slowly follow him and it was always there and wouldn’t go away. He could run from it and try and get away from it but it would always be there and he had this feeling of dread.
GD: Have you got any recurring nightmares or situations that would make a good horror film?
MM: That’s a good question! I better start paying attention to my nightmares. I have nightmares all over the place and most of them are not even coherent, so it probably wouldn’t make a great movie.
GD:It’s looking to be one of the most buzzed about movies of 2015, how do you cope with the hype?
MM: It’s very odd! I don’t know, I never expected it and it’s been pretty amazing!
GD:But you started off as professional kite boarder?
MM: Yeah! My dad taught me when I was about 13 and so it kind of started from there and I fell in love with the sport. Acting happened when I was about the same age. I grew up doing dance and I think the production company contacted the dance group I was with and they needed young kids as background dancers so I kind of just fell into it by chance.
GD:What kind of movies did you grow up watching?
MM: I remember my dad showing me a lot of old films like One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and the Shining. Those were movies that I loved, the old Star Wars as well. For me I read a script and I look at a character and if it is something that I am interested in doing then I want to do it.
GD:You sound very chirpy on the phone, but do you think you have a dark side that casting directors are seeing?
MM: I am drawn to those darker, weirder roles for whatever reason but I am a happy person! I think with everyone there is a darker side. I think for me it’s very easy to tap in to the darker side in roles and for whatever reason I find those roles more interesting
GD: How dark did it get on set? A lot of directors tend to do some horrible things to their actors…
MM: [Laughs]No we were lucky, we had a very nice director but there were definitely some very creepy places where we were filming which added to that tension. We were filming in Detroit so there were a lot of abandoned buildings and there were a lot of night shoots. There are all these plants, vines and trees are growing over these massive buildings and then you see houses that are burnt down and are just left there. It is quite a bizarre place.
GD: What do you imagine when you’re summoning those fearful looks during the scary scenes?
MM: I never really thought about how difficult it would be to make a horror movie at least as real as possible. I have never experienced running for my life (which is a great thing), and feeling that complete terror, so I guess you just have to try and tap into the darker places in your mind and then the other half is your imagination.
GD: Do you have an escape plan if that was to happen to you?
MM: I would get on a plane and go to Australia! It’s my happy place… Happy, happy, happy!
GD: So what are you working on at the moment?
MM: I just finished production on The 5th Wave which is a young adult novel with a pretty massive fan base so we’re turning that into a trilogy and then up next is a movie called ‘The Tribes of Palos Verdes’ which is a dark drama. I play Ringer – she is the badass of the group which was really fun. There was a lot of training involved, which was probably one of the coolest parts. It takes place now, but in a really insane situation.
GD: Do you feel like you’re going to become Hollywood’s kind of ‘go-to’ action girl?
MM: I’d like that! I didn’t ever think about it, but hell yeah, I hope so!
Maika Monroe discusses 2014 sleeper hit The Guest and new horror flick, It Follows.
With two excellent back-to-back horrors under her belt in The Guest and It Follows, sat in a London hotel Maika Monroe’s demeanour is one fans aren’t used to seeing – specifically, she’s relaxed.
This isn’t to say that Monroe is never like this of course – by all accounts she’s a charming, laid-back individual – but for the characters she plays in 2014 sleeper hit The Guest and new horror flick It Follows, relaxation is not a feeling that’s expressed too often.
For the title of ‘Scream Queen’ – which has been bestowed to a number of impressive actresses over the years – now has a new holder. “Being called scream queen is cool!”, the 21-year-old says. “For me, It Follows and The Guest came just by chance, back to back, and it was not really a conscious decision that I’m doing two horror movies.”
The Guest was predominantly the vehicle of Dan Stevens – himself a burgeoning movie star – but Monroe still managed to leave an impression as the smart and capable Anna. In It Follows Monroe has been promoted to chief protagonist status as Jay, and her talents shine all the more brightly for it. “It was really after seeing David’s [Robert Mitchell, Director] first film The Myth of the American Sleepover that I wanted to do the film because it’s so unique and stylised. Putting a horror film in that kind of world is something very different.”
In both It Follows and The Guest there are a number of instances where Monroe has to depict fear, and rarely has it felt more genuine on screen. “To convey it as real as possible you have to [go to some dark places], as unenjoyable as it can be. You’ve got to mentally go there. A lot of times on set I’ll just have my headphones in, to stay in my own world. It’s only until the weekend when I’m able to shake off that week and go back to being fully me. When I’m filming during the week I stay in that world, which makes it easier for me.”
When asked about the most challenging scene to film, the answer comes surprisingly quickly: “The wheelchair scene was the hardest. It was the last day, and it was very cold that night. The wind was terrible, I was wearing basically nothing. And it was not a pleasant spot.”
That’s not to say no fun was had on set though, no surprise when you consider the camaraderie between Monroe and her co-stars on screen. “All of us bonded pretty quickly. Even the giant was super nice!”
Though her current title may be ‘Scream Queen’, Monroe is conscious of the need to try other things and avoid typecasting: “It’s really cool to see that people are responding to both these films and loving it and being called scream queen is awesome. But the projects in the future are quite different from horror.”
One such project is The 5th Wave, a sci-fi flick which will see Monroe line up with thespians such as Chloë Grace Moretz and Liev Schreiber.
“I just finished filming that. I get to play this super kick-ass character which was amazing. I had fight training, gun training, I dyed my hair black and it was my first studio film so it was all very exciting and kind of different from anything I’ve done. I’m excited for people to see it.”
It’s not hard to envision Monroe starring in a superhero film in the near future, especially with there being more and more options to pick from with each passing year.
“Someone was asking me the other day about Captain Marvel? That would be what I want. Start campaigning me to be Captain Marvel!”
Keep an eye out for the #Monroe4CaptainMarvel hashtag on Twitter soon.