Florence Pugh & Molly Shannon Ask Each Other Questions About 'A Good Person' | Entertainment Weekly

I love that every time I ran up those stairs I was genuinely scared that you were gonna come and get me. I really felt like I'd said some s*** to my mom and my mom was now gonna come and get me and I was in trouble. One thing that I remember talking about when we were on set that I was fascinated by, you are such a truly brilliant actress and the way that you are on set, the way you know how scenes should play and how you command a set, I was just in awe of you. But I remember asking you about how you memorize lines because I was like, you make it look so easy and you're always so like everything perfect. When you would have giant scenes the next day, I was like, are you worried, like when you, and you're like, yeah, I'll go, I'll go like take a little look at it and then I'll put it down and I'll look at it later. So can you talk a little bit about that, about how you memorize and do you always wait till just the day before if you have like a really big scene or just what that process is like for you? My biggest thing is that I need to, obviously at the beginning I read the script a couple of times and I really understand who they are and at what point they're feeling what. But for me, I really can't, I don't like practicing it too many times. I don't like it feeling like I know what's going to happen by the time I say this line. And actually I feel like the quality of my performance becomes like a bit duller if I know it too well. Yeah. And that's obviously like a huge, huge monologue that I need to start getting in, you know, early on. I truly will either wait like two days or the day before the scene and then I'll start learning the lines, yeah, for the scenes the next day. Unless of course it is like a massive one, like for example with our one when we were chasing each other around the house, like I started learning that a bit earlier. But I like the, I like the freshness and the adrenaline that I feel when I'm doing it the day later. Because I feel like I haven't like used and abused the lines too many times. I need help. I know. Alison, don't run away now because of me. There are thousands of meetings, I'll find another one. Somehow you found your way to this one. But you're different because you very much like would go over your lines on set and it made me feel like I wasn't doing my homework. I was like, oh God, Molly's looking so professional. And I remember your way of processing was like, you would have hand gestures for each thing. You'd have like a thing whilst you said your line, so it'd be like, you have the pen and I have the like, I don't know, I'm just making up a line. But I remember you'd have a gesture for each line that you'd remember. And so then you'd go over in the corner of the room and you'd be doing these gestures and I thought that was really cool. That's so funny. I sometimes like if I'm shooting in LA and I have a pool in my backyard, so sometimes I, when I have to memorize beforehand, I'll swim back and forth and I write all the lines on a poster. So I swim with my head above water and memorize. So I'm, isn't that amazing? And it's kind of fun because I feel like there's something about the back and forth swimming that makes me feel like I'm exercising and memorizing. So that's kind of fun. But it's kind of a pain to write it on a poster board, but it's ridiculous. I love in this bathroom scene where your character Allison is running up the steps to go find pills and my character is chasing you and I want to get the pills. And you're very physical and you're so strong and, but I've done scenes that are physical with other people where they want it very mapped out. Like you grab me here, then I'll fake slap you. I love how real you are and how I felt like we both were the same with how we approach that we both really wanted to go for it. And it felt so, so unhinged and wild. How did you feel during that scene? Like what was your experience? I loved that we were the same. I loved that every time I ran up those stairs, I was genuinely scared that you were going to come and get me. Like really felt like I'd said some to my mom and my mom was now going to come and get me and I was in trouble. Like when I started those steps, I still feel it now. My toes would get adrenaline. Like I'd actually feel my toes go and my stomach would flip like, oh, I've got to go. I loved how every single take we would be like, no Zach, we need to go from the beginning of the scene and we need to do our monologue and we need to run up the stairs. I just love how we were so in it and it was so physical and the reason why it looks terrifying is because we're both just like so emotional and so physical and the desperation to prevent me from getting those pills was just like heartbreaking. And so aggressive. We were both so aggressive. It was amazing. Yeah. It was crazy. I just remember like being like, God, I was like, Florence is tough. Cause I was like, you're like a little tank. And I remember you like the window, the mirror crashing. And I was like, that was wild. It was almost like the kind of thing where you don't feel anything when you're doing it. And then when you go home, you're like, ow. Ow. Yeah, exactly. But it felt so good. There was a moment where you were like, I think we should put pads on. And I was like, yeah, let's put pads on. And we were putting pads on, not like, okay, maybe we should calm it down. We were like, no, let's put pads on so that we can go more. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. What the hell did you do to your hair? It's makeover Monday. It's Friday. Oh. This is incredible. My wife used to hang out with me down here. She liked to whistle. Between The White Lotus, The Other Two, and this movie, you've been playing very different mothers recently. What were you particularly excited to explore with Diane? Well, Diane, I think they have a very close relationship because she's a divorced mother. They have like, they're almost like friends. I think when there aren't the two parents, it can become very like sisters almost. And I really like their relationship. And I think that you could really sympathize with Diane's position. She loves you so much and she just feels powerless. She doesn't know what to do. She's trying to get you off the pills. She's worried. She enables and she's like, oh my, she tries tough love. And then she's like, that's not working. So she gets to the point where she's just like, okay, here, here, here's the pills. Just honey, please. And you can really understand if you were dealing with a loved one in substance abuse that there is no easy answer. There's sometimes ambivalence and wanting to quit. There are good things that obviously your character gets from using. She just wants to numb out and she doesn't want to feel the pain. And so you feel the dynamic between the two makes sense. It's very understandable, you know. They've had to be there for each other for a long time. And I had a few girlfriends growing up who had similar situations, like only had their mom. Or they knew their dad, but their dad didn't live nearby and grew up, you know, with mainly their mother as their parent figure. And it was very similar as like the hot and cold nature of the relationship because they only have each other that they can't bear to lose each other. Like the idea of you accidentally then giving the pills back. It's like you don't want to lose that one person that you have. And so it becomes like almost like a mother relationship and also a relationship. It's like you are each other's couple. You're living together as a couple, as a family. So it completely gets used and I suppose very scary. We started off at the beginning in the sofa and all of that dialogue regarding the doctors and you doing the tapping. And then the fact that it just like it charges. It's like you've plugged in a phone and the more the charge gets, the bigger the scene gets. And I love that it started in a way and in the middle it was like, oh my God, what's going to happen? And then towards the end, you just have no idea that when you start that scene, that's what's going to be the end of it. I remember going home and being like really proud of what we did that day. I was so proud and so excited to watch it. I was so excited to watch it. So I think that was one of my favorite scenes to shoot. Then one of my favorite scenes to watch. I love your scene with Morgan on the porch. Oh, that's great. Thank you. Oh, that's so sweet. No, no, I'm being really serious. I love that scene with you too. Partly because you can see how shocked you are from the get go, but not in like an obvious way. It's just you've been completely caught off guard. I love being able to see your nervousness, like how this person is on your doorstep unexpectedly and you have so much that you can say and so much that you want to say, but you can't. I really, really loved it. And I especially loved your performance in it. That is one of my favorite scenes of the movie. That's so sweet. We could be on Shark Tank. We'll be like, hey sharks. I knew you would like that idea. Do you remember too when you were getting around, you got me to cook a Christmas goose? Yes. I never did, but I was saying that was such, I really still do want to do that because you were telling me that forget turkey for Christmas. You were like, you have to make a goose, remember? And hang it upside down. So someday I want to tell you that I'm going to make a Florence Pugh goose. Well, it's my granny's goose. It's your granny's goose. My granny's goose, but you should definitely do it. It's very tasty, way more tasty than turkey and it is less cooking time. It has nice dark meat, but if you don't like dark meat, then don't do it, but it's lovely. It's so, so delicious. And the goose fat you get from the goose, it's fantastic for roasting potatoes. Oh, good, great. Thank you.