2019-09-04 The Hollywood Reporter

THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER 53 SEPTEMBER 4, 2019

and so people have a lot of passion
and a lot of strong feelings and
are angry, and rightfully so. It’s
an intense time.”
Johansson is active in women’s
issues — at the 2018 Women’s
March on Washington, she
delivered a passionate speech
about the importance of Planned
Parenthood and women’s health
and called out James Franco, who
had worn a Time’s Up pin to the
Golden Globes days before the Los
Angeles Times ran a story with five
women accusing him of sexual
misconduct. (Franco denied the
allegations.) “How could a person
publicly stand by an organization
that helps to provide support for
victims of sexual assault while
privately preying on people who
have no power?” she said in the
speech. “I want my pin back, by
t he w ay.”
Johansson got involved with
Time’s Up in the early days of
the organization after Natalie
Portman emailed her about it and
was one of the original signers
of the Time’s Up announcement
letter and donors to the Time’s Up
legal defense fund. “It was almost
like you found something you
didn’t even realize you needed,”
Johansson says of the conversa-
tions she began having with her
female colleagues. “It was when
I first understood what the word

are especially incompetent

Nazis. “She’s such a warm, comfy

character,” Johansson says of

Rosie. “I wanted her to feel play-

ful and just be a really creative,

positive person who was in the

middle of her life, who had joie

de vivre ... so you miss her when

she’s not there.” Waititi says he

modeled Johansson’s character, a

single mother, on his own mom

and other independent-minded

women like her raising children

on their own in the neighborhood

where he grew up in Wellington,

New Zealand. Though Johansson

is the rare sane character in the

comedy, she still is there to land

laughs, a task at which Waititi

feels she has been underutilized.

“She’s so funny; I was always

amazed people had not really

tapped into that,” Waititi says. “If

you get to know her, it feels really

obvious that she should be doing

more comedy.”

Shortly after Disney’s planned

acquisition of most of 21st

Century Fox was announced,

Johansson was at a dinner for

Disney board members with

some of her Avengers castmates

and Disney executives. “The

Disney execs were saying, ‘We’re

excited about Jojo.’ They had just

acquired it,” she says. “I said,

‘How is that going to be?’ Because

Searchlight’s made quite a lot of

subversive films. It’s harder and

harder to try to find a home for

‘triggering’ actually meant. Now

it’s part of the zeitgeist, but it was

like, ‘Oh. Oh, the thing I’m feeling.

That’s what triggering means.’ I

didn’t know. Suddenly, you didn’t

have to take it anymore.”

In Jojo Rabbit, Johansson

plays Rosie, a single mother in

Nazi Germany who is hiding a

Jewish girl in her home. Rosie is

the moral compass of the politi-

cally provocative satire, in which

Waititi portrays an idiotic (and

imaginary) Hitler for laughs and

Sam Rockwell and Rebel Wilson

something that’s more off-color

or subversive and push the limit.

I thought, ‘There’s no way Disney

would bring [Jojo Rabbit] out.

... This doesn’t belong to that

[Disney] family.’ ” Johansson’s

tablemates reassured her, she

says, pointing out, “Whether

it’s Pixar or Marvel, the most

important thing is when Disney

acquires a company that’s work-

ing, they let the studio continue to

have their own style. The creative

freedom of that studio stays, the

DNA of the studio stays intact.

Ultimately when Jojo Rabbit

went over [to Disney], it didn’t

make any difference, which was

cool. Because I was worried that

maybe it would.” In fact, Disney

is so bullish on Jojo Rabbit that

CEO Bob Iger will host a private

screening of the film as part of its

Oscar campaign in a show of his

support for Fox Searchlight.

After making eight Marvel

movies, and with another on the

way, Johansson knows the world

of Disney as well as any actor.

She’s getting a closer look at it on

Black Widow, the first Marvel film

she’s executive producing, provid-

ing input on script, director and

casting decisions. Of holding

down the summer opening slot

usually reserved for male-fronted

films, Johansson says: “The movie

packs a big punch. If that slot is

reserved for movies that pack a

big punch, then we’re in a good,

2

SCARLETT BY THE NUMBERS

Marvel films are a big part of her box office, but she’s bankable on her own

Marvel movies

she’s appeared

in, including

2020 ’s

Black Widow

Lifetime non-Marvel

worldwide box office

$4.1B

$14B

Lifetime worldwide

box office

Woody Allen

movies

Paycheck for

Black Widow

9

+$15 MILLION

3

Highest-grossing

non-Marvel

movie: 2014’s Lucy,

which made

$463.4M

worldwide