moment to make you feel small. We all have
women in our lives that we’re frightened of
and they exist in literature and they do exist
like that in film and telly. So I think for me,
it just comes back to what I have always been
interested in, and it’s women.But does it come down to that granular detail,
like the example you gave with a nana?
InKilling Eve, you’ve got big set pieces but
it’s the mundanity and the everyday in the
villainy that makes it interesting.
Yeah. The domestic. This is going to make me
sound like such a wanker...and I should frame
this by saying I was railroaded by a friend into
going to see a five-hour Greek play, and one of
the bits of the translation said, “I don’t know
why more people aren’t frightened of women
when there are knives in every kitchen drawer.”
And it’s something David Lynch said: “I like the
home. Things happen.” And that’s what it is.
Actually, the first thing ever, which was going
to be in my short film [Careful How You Go],
and I think looking back it was probably the
seed of the storm, was how easy would it be
for me to get a drunk, teenage girl into my car?
And how hard would it be for my husband? My
husband couldn’t do it without snatching her
and I thought, “What would I do?” And it’s what
Cassie does in the film. And it’s just that stuff of
what we can getawaywith, what trust society
and the world has in us — that we’re not going
to just fucking lose it. We’re in their houses.
We’re making their food. We’re raising their
children. So what if we’re doing stuff that they
don’t notice. It’s just so interesting to me. It’s
something I go back to again and again and
again for some reason. I guess when I was a kid,
I didn’t think there was much for me, maybe.Is that what drove you from being a kid
— telling those stories?
I don’t know. I read a lot but didn’t sleep. So
I thought about things a lot. About things that
would go wrong. People climbing in through the
window and taking my sisteraway. Falling down
in the middle of the night in the cellar, hurting
myself and nobody being able to find me. Mad.
And then, I suppose, that just developed. I often
find that I think horrific things and they come
to be unbidden in a weird way.You were showrunner on Season 2 ofKilling
Eve. What was the biggest challenge of
continuing something that successful?
The biggest challenge, actually, was a practical
one — we were truncated because they brought
it forward. The volume of writing was incredibly
alarming because it was eight hours, and what
was really lucky, to be honest, was to hit the
ground running so fast that it’s a bit like film.
I think why it’s amazing is because again, it’s
the same thing, tight, tidy, not too much
interference...it’s just a major undertaking
physically — but fucking amazing. The first day
of shooting, I was like, “I can’t believe this.”and quite overbearing. I know my personality is
such that I might just say, “Well, yes, of course!”
just showing off , and that would be the worst
possible thing. That’s why writing something gives
you so much confi dence and power, because you
just know everything. They can ask you a question
about cable that you don’t know but they can’t ask
you about the shade of nail polish [in the script].
All of the stuff I was micromanaging like a lunatic,
stuff that’s usually overlooked because people
are like, “Oh, we don’t care.” We cared so much.Can female fi lmmakers be concerned about
not knowing all of these elements when they
fi rst make fi lms?
Chanya Button, who directed Vita & Virginia,
in the fi rst few days of a project she was doing,
she banned anyone from saying, “Are you sure?”
She looked at her shot list and realised she was
dropping shots. She’s very, very diligent and then
she was like, “Oh, it’s because I have to explain
myself all the time.” She’d say, “I want to do...treat
it like this.” And somebody would say, “Are you
sure, because if you...” People don’t often realise
they’re doing it. And I’m sure it happens to
male directors, too, and God, I’m sure times
a million if you’re a woman of colour. If people
are questioning, double-checking, suggesting,
every time you set up, that’s going to put you
back two hours a day. So then female directors
aren’t getting things done. It’s just like with
childcare. A shoot, if you’re lucky, is a 12-hour
day. It’s more likely — in lots of still traditionally
female departments, make-up, costume — 14-, 15-,
16-hour days. How can you have a family doing
that? And for the men, too, of course. And it’s
unacceptable to me that women should have to
choose between [them]. The thing about this
industry is that it is amazing. I’m so lucky and
I couldn’t be more grateful, but it is a job, and
that’s where I think everything ’s a bit sticky. It
sucks so much that what is fundamental to being
a human being — if you want it, which is to have
children — is something that’s basically, for most
people, almost impossible to do because the
childcare, that stuff.How does it shift?
People need to budget for it. People with power
— and a lot of those people are men. It’s diffi cult
because when you’re in it, part of it, it’s so
complicated. I don’t know the answer. I’m
not experienced or knowledgeable enough or
a good enough person. I wish I was. I feel very
disingenuous to be like, “It’s very hard” when
I’ve just made my fi rst fi lm and I’ve been allowed
to do it the way I wanted to do it, for better or
worse. I think all of us want to make things
better but frankly, at the moment I’m so terrifi ed
that we won’t even have a world. Will fi lms even
exist in 20 years’ time? Will we even exist?Well, we’ll be dead. Probably.
Yeah.PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN IS IN CINEMAS FROM 16 APRILThat experience must have prepared you
for your fi rst fi lm.
Yeah, you just have to get it done. But, also, it
gives you so much experience and confi dence.
And other people confi dence, because I think
it still is diffi cult for women. I was incredibly
lucky...and I’ve always worked with people
who are all really amazing, but I think there
are psychological barriers of your own, that
you need to be a thousand times better than
anyone else. The one rule that I had was that
the stuff that I knew, I knew inside out, but
the stuff that I didn’t know, I wasn’t going to
pretend. Because the advice is always there in
this business. Like, fake it to make it! I think
it’s horrible advice, because people know
you’re bullshitting and it’s not fair to the
people you’re working with because it slows
them down, but it’s also not fair to you.That takes balls, though, right?
I think it was more, “I know my instincts,”
because I was such a little fucking goody two-
shoes and I can also be a horrible know-it-allTop to bottom: Emerald Fennell with cast and crew on
the set ofPromising Young Woman; Carrie (Carey Mulligan)
means business; Fennell as Camilla Shand in Season 3
ofThe Crown; Jodie Comer’s Villanelle in Killing Eve.Alamy, Getty Images