5- Conversations with Margot Robbie of I, TONYA.mp4

Good evening, everyone. My name is Janelle O'Reilly. I'm an editor at Variety. I am so thrilled to welcome you to this Q&A with one of my favorite movies of the year. Well, we're in a new year. One of my favorite movies of last year. Hi, Tanya. At this point, please join me in welcoming the producer and star of the film, since her breakthrough performance in the Oscar-nominated, Wolf of Wall Street. This is an actress who has just continued to make fascinating choices with movies like Focus and Suicide Squad, and she was excellent playing Margot Robbie in The Big Short. Please welcome Margot Robbie. Thank you. Thank you so much for being here. It occurred to me, I meant to say at the top, that for your role in I, Tanya, you've been nominated for every award possible. I think they've made some up, including the SAG Award. Were you a SAG Award winner for your role in The Big Short? Oh, no, they didn't win, but were you nominated as part of the ensemble? Because when you play yourself, I don't know how that works. I don't know. I've never even been to the SAG Awards. This year will be my first time ever. So I didn't hear that The Big Short was even nominated for, I didn't even realize. Well, good news. I remember going to the Oscars that year, because I presented, and I was backstage and everyone was like, well done on your movie, and I'm like, I really can't claim that The Big Short is my... I did half a day of work, like sipping champagne in a bathtub. It was... I wouldn't call it work at all. I said to Adam McKay, I'm like, I've gotten far more credit than I deserve for my part in this film. But you actually make economics interesting. Like, that isn't easy to do. You fully deserve the credit, I have to say. I'm glad, I'm glad. I am curious, I usually, because this is an audience of SAG actors, I usually like to ask about how actors got their SAG cards, but you are not from here. The accent is not just affectation. You're from Australia. What was actually your first job in the business, when you sort of knew you wanted to be an actor? First job in America, or first job at all? No, just as an actress, yeah. It was this indie film, shot on the Gold Coast, which is where I'm from in Australia. And it never got released, or I've never even seen it. But it's like, it was very, very low budget. Like, lower than an indie film, more like a student film sort of thing. But it was a thriller sort of thing. It's called ICU. Do you worry, it's not worry, but do you expect it to come out any day now? I really hope it doesn't. But it was a chance to be on a film set. No matter how small the set was, it was still a film set. And that was like, a dream come true. I have to say, I actually love the title. Yeah, I mean, it's kind of clever. It was all about voyeurism. So you're making this sound good. Yeah, I see it. I mean, I haven't seen it, so I can't tell. But it was, like I said, very, very low, low, low, low budget. I think we've all been there. Shot in my friend's apartment. So obviously on to bigger things with I, Tonya. How did this script find you? Because you were also a producer on the movie. Were you looking for things specifically to act in, or just produce, or both? I read it as a producer initially. Our company was looking for female-driven content. And heard this script was going around. And Stephen wrote it on spec. So it was available. It wasn't attached to any production house or studio. And when I read it, I just was fascinated and mind-boggled. And I knew immediately that I wanted to play Tonya and produce. So I met with Stephen the next day. And Brian Onkelas, who had jumped on board the day before we did, actually. And kind of pitched myself to play Tonya and to produce. And they agreed. You had to pitch yourself? But was there any sort of audition process? Or they were not stupid and said, of course, you can play Tonya. I mean, I thought I was going to have to do a lot of convincing. And I was like, well, it's a very American character. And I'm obviously not American. And I actually, when I read the script, didn't even know it was a true story. So I wasn't familiar with the whole thing. But my angle on it was, I don't have any preconceived notions about this person that the rest of the world seems to hate so much. And I think that's a better way to play the character. We all saw the project the same way immediately. We all shared the same passion for the script and concerns about the script. The gang kind of got along so quickly. It turned into a family very quickly, our little team Tonya. It was great. I mean, when these events happened, I think you were two years old. You can be forgiven for not knowing it was real. But was there a point while reading the script when you started to wonder? A couple of times I was like, no, this can't be real. This can't. I mean, they're just using a mockumentary style sort of framing device throughout. That's all. This cannot actually have happened. And then when I got to the end and it said where they all are now sort of thing, I was like, oh, my god, I think this is true. And I went online. And I found I realized that, you know, it wasn't just based on a true story. Like the exact specifics, like the moment that Shane Stant after he's hit Nancy was running away with the baton in his hand and comes across locked doors. And instead of hitting it with the he used his head, like even that happened. I mean, it was I just kept finding more. And I was like, this is unbelievable. It's so it's funny that way. I mean, I really feel like real life is often crazier than films for sure. I mean, but obviously it's not a documentary. It's literally not a documentary. And you're allowed to take some creative license. But was there one specific thing other than what you just mentioned that you were like, this can't be true. This can't be true. Oh, my god, it's true. I remember reading the description of LaVonna and just like the fur coat and the bird on the shoulder. And I mean, everything. I was like, wow, this writer is so odd and specific. And then I saw the footage of her with the bird in the shot. I was like, ah, it just never ceases to amaze me. And this is something I love. The writer, Stephen Rogers, he basically told you you had to cast Allison Janney. Yeah. So Stephen and Allison have known each other for years and years. And they went to the Neighborhood Playhouse together in New York. And he kept writing roles for Allison and she never got to play them. They always gave them to, you know, someone else. And since he wrote this script on spec, he kind of had the freedom to stipulate his deal points. And he said, it's Allison Janney for the part of LaVonna or it's a no deal. And we were like, oh, well, twist our arm, we'll take her. And she hadn't actually read the script at that point. So he had kind of made that deal. We stipulated that in his deal without actually giving it to her to read. But obviously as soon as she read it, she loved the character and wanted to play her. I mean, after going like, you wrote this for me? Yeah. She, funnily enough, didn't question their friendship based on the fact that he wrote that for her. She, yeah, no, she was excited to play LaVonna, yeah. At what point did you become interested in producing? I mean, was it, we all know that there's, not so much this year, but there's generally a dearth of good female roles. Were you always wanting to produce or was something you sort of felt, you know, spurned into? No, I never thought I wanted to produce because I don't think I fully understood what a producer does. I thought it was more of the crunching numbers as opposed to, you know, and figuring out the financing as opposed to the creative development, which half of it is the creative development. And I love that side of it. And I do love the business side of it, too. I don't love doing nine-hour closing calls with bonding agencies, but the rest of it I really love. And it's something, honestly, a friend had a script and everyone was like, it's too weird, you can't make it. And I was like, I think it's great. Let's make it. And so that's how it kind of started and then it kind of spawned into the idea of wanting to create more roles, not just for female people in the industry, like female directors, writers, actors, not just me, anyone, you know. That was kind of the thesis of the company to begin with and that's the direction it kind of started going in. But no, once I started doing it and I also thought there'd be a real conflict of interest between, you know, when producing and acting in a project, I thought, well, on one hand, an actor is going to want, you know, the actor in me is going to want another take. And on the other hand, the producer in me is going to say, we can't afford overtime. So is this going to, you know, is this going to be too much of a conflict on set? And it wasn't. They actually really go hand-in-hand. I don't know how many people in this room act and produce, but I found that it goes hand-in-hand beautifully. And in fact, I could kind of recognize potential production issues months in advance because I was looking into it in a more specific way as an actor and vice versa. I was so immersed in the world as a producer. When I walked onto set, it wasn't like, oh, okay, this is, I guess, the house I grew up in. It was like, I've seen every location that we recced. I was here when we recced this. I was here when we picked that wallpaper. I remember the conversation. It was so much easier to immerse myself in the world and the character having done the producing side of it, having been on board for so many months beforehand. We actually have a question from the audience, and you might have sort of addressed this, but it's from William Harrison. Don't be shy. Oh, there you are. Hi. Wants to know, as a producer on this film, what ended up being your favorite part of the filmmaking process from behind the camera? I actually really loved watching the scenes I wasn't in. And do you know, actually, do you know what was a real guilty pleasure, watching audition tapes? Because I obviously have never been able to do that before, and it felt like I was doing something really naughty by watching them. I was like, oh, I shouldn't be doing this. But watching everyone's audition tapes, and I mean, it's awful, because I've done a million audition tapes, and you always have this fear, like, oh, gosh, what are the people going to say? Are they going to, like, nitpick me and say, oh, what is she wearing? Or why did she say it like that? Or, you know, make fun of me or whatever. And now I've been on the other side. I'm like, oh, yeah, everyone does watch the audition tapes, and they're, like, pretty harsh. And it's kind of terrifying. But, no, it was great. It was exciting to, like, see someone like Paul Walterhouse's audition tape come through and just be like, wow, his take on the character was so different to the last hundred tapes I've just watched. And, you know, he just made this dialogue, he turned it into something else completely, and that was so exciting to discover, being on that side of things. Yeah, I really loved watching the audition tapes. So you had a lot of say in not only the director, Craig Gillespie, your fellow countryman, but the cast? Yeah, yeah, no, yeah, we were in a really wonderful position where we could genuinely cast the best people for the role. It wasn't a, oh, find a name, find a name, you know. Our financiers were incredible like that. They were like, no, pick the people who were right for the job. And that gave us the freedom to be like Julianne Nicholson, one of the greatest actresses that people don't talk about enough, and it's like, yeah, she would be perfect for this. And same thing, like Paul's tape coming through and Sebastian, Sebastian's tape coming through, I was like, who is this unknown actor I've never seen before? This tape is incredible. And then I IMDb'd him and I was like, whoa, it's the guy in the Gossip Girl TV show and Marvel movies? Like, are you kidding me? He just was so Jeff. He just totally transformed. And yeah, we did chemistry reads together, Sebastian and I and a couple other actors going for Jeff. So that whole process was great too, kind of like doing audition but knowing I already had the part was lovely. Unfortunately, you were saddled with Allison Janney who just brought the whole thing down. Oh, God, what a drag. Yeah, it was amazing. And I was like, I've been quoting Allison Janney one-liners my whole life and now I'm like watching her create new Allison Janney one-liners. It was wild. You're like, yay, I get to have a knife thrown at me by Allison Yeah, I was like, do it again, do it again. I am curious because you mentioned auditions. You've been working in this business for quite a while. Are you good at auditioning? I still am terrified. Public speaking scares me. This actually, I'm not scared doing this right now. But the idea of doing a speech, that scares me. Auditions terrify me. You should get used to that idea. I get nervous doing the chemistry reads even when I'm like I said, when I know that I've already got the part and I still find that nerve-wracking. Yeah, I find them really scary. Did you have any of those nightmare auditions that we hear so much about? Yes. Oh, my God. I had a terrible audition once. It's kind of a long story. Do we have time? I think we have time. I just want to get out of here. In America, obviously, the name of medications is different to it is in Australia. I had this really small day surgery thing the day before a big audition that I really wanted the role for. I was in so much pain. But my friend, I was at my friend's house. He had just had a root canal. I was like, oh, God, I'm in so much pain. But I've got this audition tomorrow. He's like, oh, well, here. I've got painkillers from the root canal I just had. Take them when you wake up before your audition. You'll be fine. I was like, okay, thank you so much. He's like, here, take. I was like, what is it? He's like, it's Percocet. I was like, I've never heard of it. It must be like Panadol, which is like Tylenol. Not a big deal. He's like, here, take two. I was like, got it. When he said take two, I thought he meant like, here, you should take two of them as the dosage. But really he meant, here, take two just in case you need to. Anyways, I wake up. I'm getting ready for this audition. Don't get time to eat breakfast or on an empty stomach. I have two Percocets for the first time ever. I'm like driving to this audition. Halfway there, I was suddenly like, oh my god, what a lovely day it is. I've got like one hand out the window. I mean, I was off my head. I was like, this is a great day. I'm feeling great about this audition. I was completely off my head. It was a terrible audition, I'm sure. But I was trying to do this audition. I remember curling up on the couch. The whole thing was terrible. I was going for my driver's test right after. I was like, I am not okay. I cannot do a driver's test. Fortunately, my friend worked at Sony, which is where I was doing the audition. I ran to her office. I was like, can you give me food or something? I think I'm high. I'm not sure, but I think I'm high. Help me. It was hilarious. This is one of those situations where I do hope that tape exists somewhere. I have no idea what I did in that audition. I didn't get the role or a call back. I'm sure it wasn't good. Preparing for Tanya, we have a question. Is it Brendan? How much interaction did you have with Tanya in preparation for the role? I purposely didn't meet her until right before we started shooting. Because there was such a huge amount of footage online, I could kind of study her from afar pretty thoroughly. Actually, very thoroughly. I did. I did that for six months. I watched every clip on her on repeat and listened to her constantly. I mapped out the character as if it was a character, not based on a real-life person. Just a fictional character. I made all the decisions based on the information I had. I could study her mannerisms, her dialect, all that kind of stuff from afar. Then in that way, I could keep the character and Tanya separate in my mind. I felt I needed to do that. I felt if I kind of muddied the waters and knew that it was just too intimidating, the thought of playing a real-life person who was going to see the film. I feel like I would have held back on set and tried to sugarcoat things and make her seem as great as possible. That's not really doing justice to the character or her story. Then right before we started shooting, I flew to Portland with Craig, our director, and met her. By that point, it didn't alter anything I'd already decided to do with the character at all. Because she's very candid. Her interviews, she was exactly the same in real life. There was nothing really to alter anyway. I just explained to her, I'm playing a character, and I see Tanya as a character. I'm embodying your spirit and your circumstances, but I'm not trying to replicate you, if that makes sense. She was great about it. Very understanding. Then I didn't see her again until the premiere. We'd text throughout shooting, but she wasn't a consultant. She wasn't allowed on set. She wasn't allowed to have a say in what we shot or how we shot it or anything like that. We really wanted to try and be unbiased in that way. We spoke throughout, just out of respect. I'd be like, hey, it's day one. Or, hey, happy Christmas, or whatever. She was very understanding. What was her first reaction when she saw it? Did she say anything to you? Yeah, not to me specifically. I think Stephen was the first person to speak to her. I gathered that she found it to be a very emotional experience watching it, as I imagine it would be. It was very emotional. She said she laughed and she cried. She said there was something she didn't agree with, primarily the moments told from Jeff's point of view. She's like, I didn't know about the letters. I was like, I know, I know. We have to say Jeff's point of view. She said we were pretty spot on. When Sebastian started yelling, it just took her right back. Yelling as Jeff, of course. Levana was practically her mom. She said that she felt like she finally had some closure, which was nice to hear. Now that the movie's out, you mentioned she came to the premiere. I saw her at the Golden Globes. Yeah, she came to the Globes as well. It's okay to have fun with her now? Oh, yeah. The Globes was hilarious, sitting next to Tonya. It was, like I said, very unapologetic. She was like, I'm going to go say hi to Oprah. I was like, oh, God, don't say hi to her. She's like, okay. She's like, Meryl, let's get a picture. I was like, oh, my God, Meryl Streep. She's like, okay. She asked Tom Hanks to take a picture of her and I. I was like, oh, my God. Hi. At one point, when she was about to do the press line, because it is really scary doing the red carpet. It's really intense. You're kind of on your own. It's like a cattle call and whatever. Apparently, I wasn't with her at this point, but she was kind of getting a bit panicky and scared about doing that. A lovely lady in the line helped her. Okay, Stan, I'll be waiting for you, blah, blah, blah. We're sitting at a table. She's like, that's the lovely lady. Here, come here. This is the lovely lady who helped me when we were doing the red carpet. I was like, oh, hello, Sharon Stone. Lovely lady. It's amazing. It was hilarious. Can we talk about the physical preparation for the role? I believe it was Juanita wanted to know if you had to learn to actually skate and how difficult was it? Yes, I did. Very difficult. It took a lot of practice. Anyone here figure skate? Anyone done it before? It's a brutal sport. It looks like it's not, but it really, really is. I grew up in Australia. There's no ice where I'm from. I didn't ice skate, but I was obsessed with the Mighty Ducks films. I wanted to be an ice hockey player so bad that I'd just wear my roller blades and have my hockey stick and skate around like that. I thought, oh, well, when I moved to America, I was like, I'm in America now. I can finally play ice hockey. I joined a league seven years ago, and I played for like half a season until I started working on Pan Am. That was the extent of my ice skating knowledge, and I really oversold that part of it. When I did my initial pitch to Steven, I was like, oh, yeah, I played ice hockey. I'm a great skater. In hindsight, I was really just running on the ice with so much padding on. There was little to no repercussions. Once I had no padding and a toe pick on the end of the ice skates, because figure skating skates and ice hockey skates are very different, it was like a world of pain. I really had to go back to basics and learn how to do it, but I had an amazing skate coach who actually choreographed for Nancy Kerrigan back in the day. You're kidding. She was asked to choreograph for Tonya as well, but she said no at the time. It was really hard. I did it four hours a day, five days a week for four months. It was a lot. Did the choreographer let you do it? Did you ask her about Nancy? It's not really about Nancy. I just wanted to know about the figure skating world. I'm like, wow, when Tonya talks about it, it sounds like there's so many politics. She's like, yeah, there is. It was fascinating to hear about what the world was and the sport was like. She was amazing. She had no idea that Tonya had the upbringing she did or was going through. None of us knew. We just, kind of like everyone else, kind of went with the flow and judged her based on the headlines or her appearance. She's not a dainty little thing. No one really thought of her as being a victim. It was easy to kind of categorize her as the villain, I guess. She said she kind of saw that now in hindsight. Not only capturing her physicality, but some of these really intense fight scenes with both Allison Janney and Sebastian Stan in character. Did you ever get hurt? No. I did when we were doing the skating, but not during any of the fights. You always get bruises and stuff. I do anyway because I get caught up in the moment and kind of don't feel it at the time. The next morning I wake up and I'm like, whoa, like black and blue. So, yeah, just like bruises and stuff like that. But I did herniate a disc in my neck when I was skating. While you were ice skating? Skating, yeah. Were you able to continue skating? Well, had I not been a producer, I probably would have been like, checking out now to go do rehab and figure it out. Because I was a producer, I was like, we can't afford that. I'm just, shoot me up with some steroids. Let's keep going. So, yeah, I just would get MRIs at the end of each week to make sure it was safe to keep going. That sounds really bad. That's the other thing I don't think people understand because this movie looks so terrific. You were working with a pretty tight budget and not many shooting days. Yeah, we had 31 days. That's crazy to me. $11 million. What weight? Really? Yeah. And 267 scenes in like a 110-page script. So, I mean, like a lot of scenes in 31 days. And two Olympics. And the whole thing was period, which always makes it more expensive, obviously. And the skating sequences. I mean, we were like scratching our heads trying to figure out like, how can we shoot them? How do we shoot something on ice? We can't afford cranes. Wait, we can't do that. How are we going to do it? And our camera operator like piped up and he's like, I can skate if that helps. And we were like, huh. What if we put the camera on him on the ice and he's skating? So, that's what we did. And we shot on film. So, the camera was heavier than, you know, if you're shooting digital, obviously, slightly less equipment. So, he was on the ice, camera on the shoulder, on his ice hockey skates, me on my skates. And we would kind of do this dance around each other. And yeah, it was great. And then we kind of nominated our crane shots. So, we did that dance very carefully. Well, and also, one of the things I really appreciate about the movie is, I don't think, I knew that Tonya Hardy was a good skater. I don't think I knew just how good and how strong she was. No. I mean, that was her point of difference, really. She was a powerful skater. She didn't have the grace, but she had the power. And when you watch it on TV, I think, with like a long lens and a static shot, it all looks very graceful and easy. You know, and that is half the art, the way it is for ballet. But I think that's what was so perfect about shooting it on the ice. When you're up close, you can see how much power it really requires to launch yourself in the air and do three and a half rotations and land. I mean, it's insanely difficult, what she did. And we didn't realize how difficult the triple axel was going to be until it came time to shooting it. And we were like, okay. We said to Sarah, our skate choreographer, okay, so, because we had skate doubles to do the big jumps, and you've had 10 years to practice, I couldn't do the big jumps. And insurance wouldn't let me. But like, it was impossible anyway. But we're like, okay, so can the skate doubles do like a triple axel? She's like, what? No? And we're like, oh, will we fly someone in who can do the triple axel? She was like, no. Like, no one can do a triple axel. Six women in the world have done it since Tonya did it 25 years ago. It's still like a crazy impossible thing. And that's when we really appreciated the magnitude of what she had done. And so we had to CGI the triple axel in the end because it was just, no one could do it. That is amazing. Yeah. And going back to some of these intense scenes, the movie is very funny, but then it has these really heart-wrenching scenes, and it like depicts abuse like so unflinchingly. Were they hard scenes to shoot? Physically, no. Because I've done, like both Sebastian and I have done a lot of like fight choreography before. So just like blocking it out with the cameras is more of a mechanical thing. Emotionally, yes. To kind of track that and know that you're going to go back to this person when they've done that. And it really, it clicked for me. I think when I saw, there's a documentary about Tonya when she was 15. And she's very, very matter-of-factly saying to camera, my mom's an alcoholic and she hits me and she beats me. And you know, she was just listing it off like a grocery list, like it was just nothing. And that's when I was like, oh, wow, I think the most horrific part of this abuse was the acceptance that it was just going to be a fact of life. It was always going to happen and there's nothing unusual about it. And that's what was important with the breaking the fourth wall and kind of saying, speaking to camera in a matter-of-fact way was really to give a glimpse of how habitual the abuse was and how desensitized people become to it and how they can just accept that. And that, to me, was the most heartbreaking part of it, I think. But what I love, and people may think this is weird, is that I think the movie has kind of a happy ending. I love that the final note is she wants you to know she's a good mother. And she broke that cycle of abuse. Yeah, and she did. When you talk to her, it was like what really gave me a sense of like, oh, okay, she's okay. When I met her, just to hear her speak about her husband now and her kid who she adores, adores. And it just, yeah, you can just tell that that's where she's found peace in her life and she has broken that cycle of abuse. It's really, really nice. Something I think would be hard to do multiple times is when Allison throws the knife at you because you know it's coming as a person. But as a performer, you have to pretend like you don't, repeatedly. I don't know how many times you shot that and how did you not flinch? We didn't have a lot of time to shoot anything really. That was kind of like, yeah, we kind of really went for it hard and fast and then we moved on. But it was a fun scene. It was more trying to, I was like, just throw anything because she couldn't just straight away pick up a knife but we didn't, you know, we didn't have time to block it out. We didn't have like breakaway glass and our stunt choreographer there and all that kind of stuff because it's an indie film so we were just picking up, finding anything in the house that we could throw at each I was like, throw that, yep, throw that too, throw that if you want. Sure, throw the glass, I'll dodge it, don't worry about it. By the time it came to the knife, I was like, whatever, just throw the knife, it's fine. We had a rubber one for the real intense throws, it was fine. You know what I actually wanted to ask is the young actress who plays Tonya at an early age, McKenna Grace, who's so lovely. If you haven't seen Gifted, see it. She's incredible. When you're both playing a character at different ages, do you sort of consult with each other about mannerisms or anything? Yeah, that's an interesting question. Sort of. I did definitely let her know these are the mannerisms I've picked up on, this is how I'm going to play her, but because I didn't have footage of her really at that age, it was kind of like, you know, you do what you think. I think that's one of the best things about this job and being an actor is age is so inconsequential. It's really a level playing field. She's a fellow actor and that's her character too and it's not for me to tell her how to do it. I really respect her process and however she wanted to play that role. I did say these are the things I've picked up on. I've done animal work or whatever it is and my walk is like this and whatever, but you do you. Whatever you think. She's so talented. It's very evident you don't need to give her any advice. She knows what she's doing. I want to take a couple audience questions. This is Steven Payne. Oh, right there. Wants to know what was your favorite scene to perform in the film and why? I love doing the wedding. I love a wedding. I've gotten married on screen maybe six times now and I always love a good wedding. It's so fun because it really does feel like a wedding day. Everyone kind of, there's cake and everyone's kind of happy and dancing and we obviously had this 80s dress and the hair and right before we were shooting it because we were just kind of making that bit up. It was just kind of a montage sequence and I was like, Sebastian because I fall down, I don't know about you guys, I fall down YouTube rabbit holes all the time and one of my favorite things to YouTube is when people choreograph a dance for their wedding dance when they start as a nice dance and then they break into doing the running man or something. I think that's amazing. I've watched a million of those videos and I was like, don't you think Jeff and Tonya would have done that and he was like, what do you mean? I was like, I'll show you on YouTube. I was like, let's just break out into a ridiculous 80s, 90s dance and so we choreographed it two minutes before shooting it and it was just hilarious and then we cut the cake and then Sebastian threw it in my face which wasn't planned and the whole thing was just so fun. Always love shooting a wedding. It actually was the first dress we tried on. We had a couple to try on and as soon as I put it on, I was like, it's perfect. Is there a real wedding video you were able to model it after? I seem to recall. There's pictures and stuff of their wedding. We replicated the hair and everything. The look of it. It was fun. It was great putting that wedding together. Plastic plates and forks and it was great. It was really fun. You got married in real life like a year ago. Right before we shot Tanya actually. Tanya was our honeymoon. It was so romantic. Middle of winter in Atlanta. It was cold. I just heard you had to delay your honeymoon and then you ran into Barack Obama? Yes. Did you watch Ellen today? No, someone told me this. Was that today? It was on today. I filmed it yesterday. We postponed the honeymoon part because we were shooting and then afterwards we went to Tahiti and we got to this island. It was the last couple days of our honeymoon. We were going to stay somewhere really fancy but we'd just come from staying on an island that had no electricity and it was just a shack on the beach. It was amazing but it was bare bones living. Then our last few days we were going to be at this fancy resort and it was lovely. We got there and it was raining and we were like, oh, what can we do here when it's raining? It's only like 20 villas on the island or whatever and they're like, oh, there's a small gym and we're like, oh, I guess we could go to the gym. Won't really do much but whatever. We go to get on our bikes to ride there and my husband, Tom, who's also a producer on this film, is wearing his oldest gym shorts. Really old gym shorts. Really short. Really wide-legged old gym shorts with nothing underneath and he goes to go on his bike and I was like, whoa! I was like, hey, you can't wear those shorts. Literally your balls are hanging out. No, you cannot wear them. He was like, oh, please. Who are we going to see? Who are we going to run into? I was like, yeah, you're right. There's like 10 villas. We're not going to run into anyone. We walk into this gym which is legit the size of this platform here. Very small. We walk in and there's Ellen running on a treadmill. She was like, hi! Hi, I'm Ellen. I was like, hello. This is my wife, Portia. I was like, wonderful. Ellen and Portia are here. She was like, have you met Barack? I was like, no. Oh, my God. Come again? Yes, it was literally Barack Obama. Then we had to do this whole stretching yoga class with Tom in these little shorts and Obama stepping over his legs to put weights down and stuff like that. The gym instructor keeps going like, lunge, Tom, lunge. Tom's like, he's trying to cross his legs while lunging. It was so funny. It was hilarious. Former President Obama. He was familiar with your work? Yeah, he was like, he knew who I was. He was like, you're a very talented actress. I was like, oh, my God. Obama knows who I am. He was like, yeah, we were just talking about you the other night. I was like, where are you? Wow, oh, my God. It was crazy. I want to believe he's a big Harley Quinn fan. He didn't say that, but maybe he is. By the way, what was it like for you? There were so many Harley Quinns last Halloween, but the Halloween before. Does that tickle you to see that? It was amazing. It was so cool. Especially because heaps of dudes dressed up as Harley as well. That made me so happy because every Halloween, the funnest, craziest characters are always a dude character, so I'm always dressed up as the dudes. I was like, ha, this Halloween, the chicks are the coolest, craziest character, and you're going to dress up as that one. I have a feeling there will be some Tonyas this year. I was going to go as LaVonna this year. I was really excited about it, but then my best friend also has her birthday on Halloween, and she picked a Mexican Fiesta themed, and I was like, ah, I'm going to have to do LaVonna next year. Oh, my God. Everyone will immediately know. Everyone will actually know what I'm dressed up as this time. Finally, we have a question from Maggie. She wants to know if you can talk about the time before you broke through as an actor and how you dealt with having doubt or fear. It's a pretty exciting time with the whole Time's Up movement and so many strong female roles this year. Can you compare when you first broke through to now? Yeah, I've definitely seen a huge shift in the material, and everyone's obviously cottoned on to the fact that more females buy movie tickets than males, therefore maybe they'd want to see more females on screen. I've definitely, in my opinion, I've seen way more scripts that are more female-centric with great female characters, and I think the next wave of change is to have female storytellers tell those stories, which is amazing, and everyone's really making an effort to do, I find. Are you interested in directing? I am, yeah. Not yet, not for a couple of years, but yeah, that's always been a dream of mine. That's amazing. Well, I do want to remind everyone this movie is still in theaters. Go see it again. I've seen it four times, actually, because everyone wants to go see it. I would have watched it tonight, but it was full. Thank you so much for being here. Congratulations on a great year, a great performance, and thank you guys for being a great audience. Thank you for watching it.