M

Mackenzie Davis is absolutely worried

about the rise of the machines.

“Yes,” she says when I ask if, like her

character, Grace, in the upcoming Te r m i -

nator: Dark Fate, she is stressed out about

artificial intelligence imminently exter-

minating humankind. She is emphatic

but incredulous, as if she can’t believe

I had to ask.

Davis had spent the day before voguing

around Lower Manhattan in this season’s

most desirable couture. It threatened to

thunderstorm the whole time and finally

did overnight—drenching the terrace

where we’re sitting on a Tuesday morn-

ing. There’s a nip in the air, so Davis is

wearing a hotel-provided bathrobe. (She

brought one for me too.) She shows me

her two necklaces—one from her sister

that reads KEN, short for Mackenzie,

and an 1880s $10 coin on a long chain,

nicked from her boyfriend for the trip.

“He’s like, old-school American,” says

the Vancouver, British Columbia, native,

who moved to the U.S. to study acting

after university. “It really reminds me

of that Russian Doll coin that she wears.”

Davis hates having her picture taken,

but working with a female photographer

made this less exacting. “I’ve done a few

shoots recently that are just standing

still and having the male photographer

be like, ‘Open your mouth.’ ” She thrusts

out a shoulder, pretending to pose, but

her voice keeps the photographer’s nasal

insistence. “‘Open your mouth. Okay,

good. Chin down. Open your mouth.’”

She unfolds again, and the scene is

over. But her irritation isn’t, even if it’s

couched in laughter.

“Just let me keep my mouth closed,

you know?”

Anyway, the machines. She’s been

worrying about Airpods lately. That the

earbuds will just become smaller, until

they’re a cochlear implant, or a microchip.

She’s animated, talking through the sce-

narios. “And then you’ll just get cables”—

she pauses, searching, and then her por-

tent of doom comes out with laughter

attached—“injected in your head! You’ll

just get cables injected in your head.”

Winsome but bleak—that’s Macken-

zie Davis. Over the course of her short

career, dystopia has become an intimate

part of Davis’s life. Before Terminator,

there was Blade Runner 2049, where

she played a hard-boiled sex worker in

future Los Angeles. Before that there

was her breakout in Black Mirror’s 2016

Clothing by

Valentino Haute

Couture.

100 OCTOBER 2019