Rebecca Lenkiewicz is one of Britain’s most compelling contemporary writers. A prolific playwright, she made history in 2008 as the first living female playwright to have an original play produced at the Olivier, the largest of the Royal National Theatre’s stages in London. She’s written productions for BBC Radio and three television series. Her screenwriting credits include the Oscar-winning 2013 film Ida (co-written with Paweł Pawlikowski) and Colette (Wash Westmoreland, 2018), and she penned the screenplay for the 2022 film She Said, based on the book by the reporters who uncovered Harvey Weinstein’s crimes and sparked the #MeToo movement.
This year, Lenkiewicz made her directorial debut with the film Hot Milk, an adaptation of Deborah Levy’s novel of the same name. The film, which premiered in the Competition section at this year’s Berlinale, the feature stars Fiona Shaw, Vicky Krieps and Emma Mackey. Rose, a wheelchair-bound ill mother (Shaw) and her daughter Sofia (Mackey) head to the sun-drenched Spanish coast to seek a cure, where Sofia becomes obsessed with a mysterious local woman, Ingrid; an exploration of intergenerational pain unfolds. The Berliner sat down with Lenkiewicz to discuss her new film, out in Berlin this July.
You’ve worked on both originals and adaptations. How did you get attached to this particular story?
Well, I didn’t actually know the book to begin with. Christine Langan, our producer, had originally asked me to adapt it into a screenplay. I read the book and absolutely loved it. In fact, I loved it so much that I really felt like I didn’t want to adapt to it and give it away. So when I went back to have a meeting, I let them know that alongside adapting it, I also wanted to direct. Which was really not expected. But Christine took a leap of faith in me and the project. That meeting was nearly seven years ago now. There was a lot of time spent raising the money; the ins and outs of pre-production can be very time consuming. And then there was Covid. It’s been quite a mountain, to say the least. And really, all independently funded films that get off the ground are miracles. They really are. We kept saying on set: ‘Wow, this film truly is a miracle.’
What was interesting to you about the story of Hot Milk?
I think what appeals to me about the book was just the complexity of each psyche, and that nothing was black and white. Monsters are not necessarily monstrous. It’s really just about love. And how to love. And can you love, if you’ve been brought up in an environment where huge lies have been told? And can you open your heart, when that’s when you’ve been brought up with? It’s very much about resilience – especially female resilience. And about how whatever is thrown at us we still manage to love. Even though the love affair in the film is brief and painful, it’s still love, it’s totally valid.
Was there anything you changed or built on from the book?
The Irish past that I wrote for Fiona [as Rose] was not in the book, and that was something that came naturally to me because she’s an Irish actress, to look into what could have brought on the trauma – I wanted to expand further on that, as there’s so much there. It was interesting to look at why Rose doesn’t walk. It’s more mysterious in the book, and so it was about how to get the emotions across on screen. I just loved thinking about people’s pasts – how Ingrid would grow up with the shame of hurting a family member. And how Sofia seems like she has everything, but she’s very fragile. Each of them seem what they are not. Each of them are trapped in various ways.
You have a background of adapting screenplays. Was the director role different?
It felt very different, and in order to proceed I had to sort of forget I was directing it. Because at first I found myself flattening out the material a little. For instance, because this is where my writing mind usually starts, I’d be mapping out how to get from the cafe to the beach, writing quite dull little scenes, walking from here to there. Because I had the picture to direct, I was thinking quite logically at the start. This was a shift, as normally I’m writing and thinking, ‘Well, the director will find a solution there!’ So I had to sort of forget I was directing it while I was writing it. And then it was strange not to have a director to sound off against in terms of the script. The producers – Christine Langan, Kate Glover and Giorgos Karnavas – were very supportive. So I felt I had my people, and we had a strong team around us.
The film is set against a backdrop of heat, and I always find heat can create such a tension and almost become a character itself. You really do that in this film. How did you work with your department specifically to create this atmosphere?
There was a great freedom on set. People were very welcome to give ideas. And I was very grateful because it was my first time directing, so it was just really beautiful to work with all the artists. Our cinematographer, Christopher Blauvelt, had his own ideas about the composition, and so did Sophie O’Neill with costume, and Andrey Ponkratov made incredible structures in production design so that these great shadows would be cast. This also made the heat even more intense. Greece was up to 45 degrees at some points, so some days we weren’t allowed to work. On days like these we’d have to make it into night shoots. Some locations burnt down [because of the heat]. It was quite dramatic. But despite the geographical challenges, I just wanted everyone to feel free with ideas, including actors. I just loved the collaborative aspect of it. Although I felt very set in my ideas as a director and what I wanted to see and how I wanted it to feel, I was also really open to ideas. We all set out not wanting to make a picture-perfect postcard film. We wanted some edge. For it to be more flinty. That way the music was quite flinty too, from Matthew Herbert.
Did you have certain actors in mind from the start?
Well, Deborah Levy and Fiona Shaw are friends. And Fiona Shaw is a legend. So that was a natural thought; I’ve always loved her work, so Fiona was on from the beginning. And that very much helped us see the film through. Having Fiona Shaw attached was a great start. I would go to Fiona’s house and talk about the script and that was brilliant. Vicky Krieps was on early too, also taking a leap of faith. We just had one phone call, she said she’d love to do it, and then I met her later in London. Emma came on later. And that was just absolutely wonderful, as I loved her work. I just really, really hoped she’d respond to the script. And she did. We went and had a cup of tea in Soho, and within a couple of minutes I was saying ‘Look, I really want to do this,’ and she was like, ‘I really want to do that!’ I loved that there was no sense of games or cool, it was all open ideas and sharing. And Vincent Perez [Gomez] – I went to Paris to kind of pursue him. He’s just brilliant and he said he loved Christopher Blauvelt. So it was all a really nice network. I just kept pinching myself [about] the actors – I kept thinking not just ‘Is this real?’ but ‘Can I make them stay?’
And how was it directing them?
I just loved how organic each of them were. Some of them even had a notebook – Emma had one, which she kept as a kind of chronology of emotion, because obviously we’re shooting out of [order]. Fiona and Emma shot that last scene on the second day of shooting. There they were, shooting this intense final scene after knowing one another for a day. So what they brought to it in terms of emotion was kind of incredible. We didn’t have a big communal rehearsal; we had no time, no budget, so everyone just came in with their approach, and they were all so open to each other.
Did you use any references during the filming process?
Christopher had a huge binder, but they were references from films. But there were a lot of stills too: Francesca Woodman’s photographs, and Bill Brandt’s photographs of bodies, which are kind of abstract on beaches. We were trying to build up a visual language. And Christopher was very much about sticking with the character – you don’t suddenly have a drone looking down at them, you know. You’re intimate, which was interesting. I talked to the other directors about practicality, about how a day goes. We had an incredible location scout. And I thought the landscape was part of the character – I was waiting for the energy to happen in each place.
Do you find it hard to read just for enjoyment, or do you always find yourself in adaptation mode?
It is hard to do, but then I leave it behind and [just] love the words, and then revisit and see if I want to adapt. But sometimes if someone drops a spoon in a cafe, I feel it’s cinematic!
How was it going to the Berlinale?
It was an absolute dream. Especially because I’ve watched Tricia Tuttle [director of the Berlinale] at the London Film Festival for so many years and have a huge admiration for her. It was truly exciting to be welcomed by Amazonian women into the Berlin fold. It was snowing, and it was magical.
Do you have any future plans to go behind the camera?
Yes, I really want to direct again, because it’s so different to simply writing. It was so intense – it was such hard work and such hard pressure, but I haven’t known such joy for a while. It was really a wonderful synergy, because everyone on board was so great. And so to culminate in Berlin – Berlin is such an amazing festival. Because it’s not about the glamour, it’s really about the films. And there are so many workshops going on, and it’s so accessible to the public, and that’s important. Festivals are the lifeblood.
- Hot Milk in Berlin Kinos Jul 3
