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THE ENVELOPE LOS ANGELES TIMES TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2019the project came to you?
Erivo: I was lucky that in
my school we actually
learned about her. So I knew
what she did. I knew that
she had taken the run for 100
miles to freedom. I knew
that she had come back
again and again and again. I
just didn’t know the details
of her. And I think this
experience was so cool,
because we were able to fill
in the blanks. I was thinking
of it like painting by num-
bers. You see the picture,
but there are no colors. But
then we could fill in all the
colors, giving people the
detail of just small things to
make her real. This gave her
her humanity, her woman-
hood back, because that’s
what she was, first and
foremost, a human and a
woman.Jennifer, how did you
decide to do the upcom-
ing Super Bowl halftime
show with Shakira? It’s a
hot-button topic, as some
performers have said they
wouldn’t do it. How did
you come to that decision
for yourself?
Lopez: I think it’s super
important for two Latina
women to be headlining the
Super Bowl, especially right
now in Trump’s America. So
for me, it was somethingthat I was excited to do.
Theron: Do you get
nervous?
Lopez: Sure. Absolutely.
But here’s how I get nerv-
ous. And I think maybe you
guys, because you’re all
performers, feel this. It’s like
you get that nervous energy,
and it’s just you’re used to it.
Like I’m used to feeling a
little bit of nervous energy
and butterflies and every-
thing before I’m getting
ready. And a minute or two
before, right when I’m about
to go out and everybody’s
rolling and I’m staring at the
crowd and they can’t see
me, it just goes real quiet.
And something drops into
my body where calm is yoursuperpower. And then
you’re in control. But abso-
lutely I feel nervous and
excited and butterflies and
my heart beating out of my
chest, all of those things. But
in the fun way, not in the
debilitating way.Jennifer, you’re a pro-
ducer on “Hustlers ,” and
Charlize, you’re a pro-
ducer on “Bombshell.” Is
there something about a
specific project that
makes you want to take
that extra step and be
more in control of the
project?
Theron: I have produced
most of the stuff that I’ve
done probably in the last
decade. I have to love it,
because it’s a year, if not
more, of your life where
you’re needed and you have
to see it through all the way.
And it’s very time-consum-
ing, so I try to do things that
I know are subject matters
that I want to stay engaged
with for however long it’s
going to take to make. And
that I know I’m going to be
continuously interested in
and excited by and want to
sit in an editing room day
after day and figure it outand fight for it. I mean, we
finished “Bombshell,” and
last week we were still
trying to figure stuff out.
When you are producing
something and you love it
and you want to see it all the
way through, it never stops.I’m wondering if in the
last couple of years you
all have noticed concrete
changes on sets, like
there’s been discussion
about intimacy coor-
dinators and sort of a
different vibe, having
more women around.
Have you seen practical
changes in that way?
Zellweger: It’s just that
people are conscientious
about it in a way that they
hadn’t been before. Consid-
ering things, that someone
uses the word “consider-
ation,” that there’s consider-
ation. Just things that people
took for granted, that this is
fine. You know, no one ever
thought to question, “Oh,
wait, no, it’s really kind of
not.”
Lopez: For “Hustlers,” it
was an amazing thing to see
all women on a set. All the
producers, mostly women,
and the ones that were on
the set every day were
women. The director was a
woman. The writer was a
woman. All the cast were
women, the editor ... there
were just women every-
where. And what you real-
ize is, like, “Wow, I’ve never
been on a set where it was
like that.” And I’ve done I
don’t know how many
movies in the past how
many years.
And they didn’t want to
make the movie. A lot of
people passed on it, on
“Hustlers.” They were, like,
“Oh, you know, the guys
have to be really bad if the
women are drugging them.”If you’re looking at “Boogie
Nights” in the porn industry
or if you’re looking at
“Goodfellas” and the Mafia,
this is a story. The day-to-
day life of an underground
world. And this is what
went on. And that’s the
thing that’s worth telling.
This is a certain type of
person that is in a certain
type of life. And we want to
tell it with no judgment and
just see if you like the story.
Erivo:“Harriet,” this
particular script has taken
20 years. It was written 20
years ago now. And then
Debra Martin Chase, theproducer, got her hands on
it about 10 years ago, and it’s
taken that long to get here
because people just didn’t
want to make movies where
there was a woman of color
at the center and in a period
movie. It just wasn’t being
made. And so it just was one
of the most refreshing
things to be doing that and
still have emotional agency.
And with my director, Kasi
Lemmons, another woman
of color, that’s never hap-
pened in my life. I think I’ve
been directed by one wom-
an in theater as well. So it’s
one of those amazing thingsLUM
LOPEZ
‘IT’S ALWAYS
ABOUT: HOW
CAN WE DO IT
BETTER NEXT
TIME? BECAUSE
YOU MAKE
MISTAKES.’‘DIFFERENT
KINDS OF
STORIES ARE
BEING PUT ON.
BUT WE HAVE
TO REALIZE
WHAT WE’RE
CHANGING
FROM.’