G re t a
Amy’s ‘women and marriage’ speech evolved from a conversation you had
GERWIG
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with Meryl Streep, right? She is obviously the queen of all things, but she’s also just so clear and intelligent about texts and filmmaking. At a lunch she said, “The thing you have to make the audience understand is it’s not just that women couldn’t vote, which they couldn’t. It’s
Rebooting Little Women involved rediscovering its truly feminist origins and injecting fun, physical comedy BY A N T O N I A B LY T H
not just that they couldn’t own property, which they couldn’t. It’s that they couldn’t own anything when they were married.” They didn’t even own their children. They could leave a bad marriage, but they would leave with nothing, not even the kids. So,
G
RETA GERWIG HAD ALWAYS LOVED LITTLE
Women, Louisa May Alcott’s tale of four Civil War-era sisters, especially its protagonist, rebellious writer Jo. “It’s impossible for me to tease out at this point if Jo March was like me, and that’s why I was drawn to her,” Gerwig says, “or if I liked Jo March, and thus I made myself like Jo March.” Following her directorial debut success with Lady Bird, Gerwig’s Little Women adaptation not only grew wings but also gathered a stellar cast, including Lady Bird’s Saoirse Ronan as Jo, Laura Dern as matriarch Marmee, and Meryl Streep as Aunt March.
when you’re talking about marriage, you’re talking about the biggest decision you’ll make, because if you yoke yourself to the wrong person, you will suffer for the rest of your life. And it’s not just an economic proposition, it’s all-encompassing, and it was the decision you have to make. You have no possibilities outside of that. You’ve also talked about the gender fluidity between Jo and Laurie, who’s played by Timothée Chalamet. Jo spends the entire book saying she wishes that she was a boy, and it’s all
Had you been considering Little
the crux of my story. I wanted to explore all
over the book. Almost every other page
Women as an adaptation for a while?
that. I think I said it with enough confi-
she says she wishes she was a boy. I think
I hadn’t read it since I was 14 or 15, and
dence that they accepted my analysis.
there are lots of ways to read that. We
then I happened to read it when I was 30,
have our own particular 21st century lens
just because I thought I would re-love it.
I don’t think people liked Amy until
on it. But I mean, to go back to the Amy
My experience with the book completely
they saw your version of her.
proposition, she’s really stating a fact,
changed. First of all, there were things in
One of my experiences of reading the book
which is that boys have options and girls
the book that I hadn’t remembered at all.
was actually re-experiencing Amy as a pro-
have none. So wouldn’t it be better to be
And there were things that seemed much
found character and equal to Jo, and some-
a boy? But so much of Jo and Laurie—I
spikier and stranger and more modern
one that is a worthy opponent in some
read in an essay about Little Women, they
and very relevant, and who they were as
ways of Jo. And her lines in particular, some
said that the gender reversal is so striking,
adults suddenly became fascinating to
of them are lines that stood out to me as if
even in their names. Laurie is the boy with
me. I said, I’d like to make a film with this,
they were written in neon, as if they could
the girl’s name, and Jo is a girl with a boy’s
because now I see this completely differ-
have been said yesterday. Like, “I want to be
name. And Laurie in many ways is a dandy
ently. And I think that there’s something
great or nothing.” Which is so ambitious and
or flâneur in that kind of 19th-century style
interesting here that is completely press-
big, and such a statement from a 20-year-
of masculinity.
ing to make a film about.
old about art. It’s not a cute pursuit. It’s a
Laurie buys too many neckties, which
completely egomaniacal pursuit in the best
Jo always chastises him for. He’s really
How did you sell your idea to Sony
way. Or, “I don’t pretend to be wise, but I am
into fashion and she’s like, “You shouldn’t
and Amy Pascal in your initial meet-
observant.” You think, Holy shit, this girl sees
be that way.” He’s preening a little bit, and
ing? What did you say?
everything. She knows everything. Amy is a
Jo thinks he’s ridiculous. There’s gender
The thing I said to them was, it was so
character of profound desires and lust that
reversal stuff all over the book. What I
clear to me when I reread the book, this
she has no problem expressing. I think it’s
loved about Jo and Laurie as embodied
book is about women, ambition, money,
interesting that for years, the character we
by Saoirse and Timothée, is they’re both
and art. And it was about the intersec-
hated the most is the character who most
so physically, simultaneously handsome
tion of those things. I want to make a
expresses her desire.
and beautiful. They are each other’s mirror.
movie that focuses in on that, because to
Timothée is both handsome and beautiful.
me, that’s what this book is about. And
That was shameful for women then.
Saoirse is both handsome and beautiful.
moreover, that’s what Louisa May Alcott
Yeah. Because to want something is to be
And when they stand together, they both
liked, in fact. And this distance between
too much, too desirous. So that to me is a
look like they are occupying some middle
Louisa May Alcott and Jo March is also at
fascinating shift in how we view a woman.
gender, which is superior to all of us. ★
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D E A D L I N E .C O M / AWA R D S L I N E
1218 - 3 - Dialogue - Greta Gerwig.indd 40
PHOTOGRAPH BY
Josh Telles
12/13/19 10:19 AM
