Pansy, a woman in her fifties, systematically provokes conflict with everyone she meets. Between invectives and bad faith, Pansy is detestable. Except that this bellicose attitude is only a defense mechanism. Indeed, every morning, Pansy wakes up screaming. Far from easing, the anxiety that gnaws at her grows throughout the day. As she is played by Marianne Jean-Baptiste in Hard Truths (Two sisters), by Mike Leigh, Pansy often moves people, in addition to sometimes making people laugh. Exclusively, we were able to speak with the actress and the filmmaker.
For the record, Marianne Jean-Baptiste was revealed to moviegoers in 1996 in the remarkable Secrets and Lies (Secrets and lies), from the same Palme d’Or-winning film Mike Leigh. It follows a black optometrist from the middle class, who finds her biological mother, a white worker.
Since then, Leigh and Jean-Baptiste wanted to collaborate again.
“Marianne now lives in Los Angeles, where she has distinguished herself and where she works extensively [tenant la vedette de séries telles Without a Trace et Homeland]. We were supposed to make the film in 2020, but COVID hit. There wasn’t a script as such, because I don’t work like that. When I get ready to make a film, it’s like a painter: I start with a blank canvas,” explains Mike Leigh.
In fact, his creative process is known to be very collegial. The screenwriter and director began by organizing individual meetings with his main cast, namely Marianne Jean-Baptiste, who plays Pansy, and Michele Austin, who plays Chantelle, the infinitely more serene and fulfilled sister of the protagonist.
Note that Michele Austin played the role of the best friend of Marianne Jean-Baptiste’s character in Secret and Lies : complicity, there was already. Previously, Mike Leigh had already directed them in the theater in the roles of sisters.
However, Mike Leigh did not necessarily want the two actresses to play sisters again. The thing sort of imposed itself.
“We explored this idea together, and it quickly became a common thread,” recalls the filmmaker.
All artists
When Mike Leigh says that he and his two stars “explored this idea together,” it’s worth emphasizing that this is actually the case. In that this is always how Leigh works before writing.
“First of all, Mike asks us to make a list of people we know in real life,” reveals Marianne Jean-Baptiste. These may be people we only know very vaguely. In this case, Mike and I went through my list and discussed the people in question, and Mike crossed off names until only a few remained, about five people in my case. Next, Mike and I did various exercises aimed at merging these five people. It gave us the embryo of the character, of Pansy. This is all between me and Mike. The rest of the cast does the same thing with him in parallel. »
“I do it like this with each actress and actor, individually,” confirms Mike Leigh. Then we continue to explore, and the whole thing starts to evolve in a pretty… esoteric way, I suppose. Then, we imagine, all together this time, a universe through further discussions and a lot of improvisation where the performers play their respective characters. We are building a whole world of relationships, family dynamics, experiences…”
Marianne Jean-Baptiste says she finds this way of doing things extremely rich and satisfying: “The reward for us, the actresses and actors, for working in this way is that we participate in creation in our own right. We create with Mike the grandparents, the great-grandparents, the aunts, the uncles, the school they went to, the friends they had, the neighbors, the birthday parties, the holidays… We let us participate in the development of this very detailed common history, but which takes shape in a very natural way. »
-As Marianne Jean-Baptiste points out, Mike Leigh has the last word.
A proven method
However, for the director of Topsy-Turvy, Vera Drake (Vera Drake’s secret), Happy-Go-Lucky, Another Year or even Mr. Turnerthis method, which has been his since the 1960s, makes sense.
“All of this is the preparatory phase, which, in the case of Hard Truths, lasted 14 weeks, which is less than my usual six months, but the budget was smaller, notes the filmmaker. When the time comes for filming, I begin to write a sort of provisional structure, but scene by scene, sequence by sequence, location by location: with the performers, we develop the scenes in the absence of the film crew. When the team arrives, I show them what we have. We decide the best way to film, and we shoot accordingly. What you see on screen is never improvised. »
Asked to elaborate, Mike Leigh explains: “I can only construct a scene or sequence by being on site with the performers. By physically being there, because the place partly determines the action. Doing this ensures that, unlike many films, we don’t do 30, 40 or 50 takes, which are necessary because people can’t stop laughing, can’t remember what to say, or lack self-confidence in a given situation. All of this advance preparation that I’m talking about serves to ensure that I can comfortably direct actors at ease in scenes that are completely organic, organized, distilled, correctly directed and correctly performed. »
Tragicomic dimension
In addition to working with Mike Leigh, then with his playing partners, Marianne Jean-Baptiste obviously did research of her own, in order to add additional authenticity to her character.
“I learned about various mental disorders. For example, Pansy suffers from obsessive compulsive disorder, that’s obvious, but Mike and I decided that it had never been diagnosed. His brain has found ways to compensate or overcompensate… Which ones? And she’s afraid of germs, so I’ve been experimenting with different household products. Another fear of Pansy is venturing outside. But when she has no choice in coming out, what does that look like? »
In this regard, her many phobias, her many disgusts and imaginary sources of recriminations place Pansy in impossible situations. Impossible, but whose content gives the film a tragicomic dimension. What’s more, Pansy shows a boundless imagination when it comes to insults, and sometimes we start laughing almost in spite of ourselves.
We think, for example, of the sequence at the dentist: Pansy is logically terrified because of what such a visit entails, and this terror generates yet another verbal attack.
“I have a lot of compassion for Pansy. I love him, you know, and to play him, I think it was necessary. All this pain that she internalizes, as an actress, I manage it. It is by far the most beautiful and complex character I have ever played,” confides Marianne Jean-Baptiste.
On the subject of what constitutes a long-awaited reunion, Mike Leigh concludes, not without accuracy: “We could have made this film 20, 30 years ago, because it is a film which deals, fundamentally, with the condition human. »
The movie Hard Truths will be on display on January 24.
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