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Elisabeth Moss plays Becky Something, a punk singer struggling with substance abuse, in the new movie Her Smell. "It was the hardest dialogue I've ever had to learn," she says.
Donald Stahl / Brigade Marketing
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Donald Stahl / Brigade Marketing
Elisabeth Moss plays Becky Something, a punk singer struggling with substance abuse, in the new movie Her Smell. "It was the hardest dialogue I've ever had to learn," she says.
Donald Stahl / Brigade Marketing
In her latest film, Elisabeth Moss felt that it was not going far enough.
Written and directed by Alex Ross Perry, Her Smell imagines the chaotic personal life of a musician addicted to drugs. Becky Something is the head of a fictitious all-female rock band from the '90s.
"Becky Something is enigmatic, funny and entertaining," Moss explains. But she's also toxic. "[She] when you're done with your vortex, and then, when she's done with you, spit you out or destroy you. "
Interview Highlights
On Becky's manic intensity
There's pretty much zero improv ad-lib in the movie. That's kind of one of the things that Alex did, did he wrote that character in this stream of consciousness … [it] was my job to make it sound like I was making it up. It was the hardest dialogue I've ever had to learn – and I've done [David] Mamet and Aaron Sorkin. It was by far the most difficult because if you change a word, or if you flip two sentences, it actually really does not make sense.
We do not get all of the references
[Perry] threw every single pop culture reference back to the early '90s that he could possibly throw in there, most of which I did not know or understand. … I was born in '82, so I was born a ballet dancer, so I was very into classical, my family is in jazz and blues … that's where my wheelhouse was.
On how she prepared for the role
I learned the guitar. I guess I guess. We said to you from the very beginning, you know, I was not going to become a guitarist. It's far too difficult, and it's all too much respect for musicians – I just have to play these songs, to understand what they are and to be able to play something very basic.
On being nervous while filming a scene in which she plays the piano while singing to her daughter
It was supposed to show how Becky could behave as she did, and her performance – here's this really vulnerable time when she's not confident and she's singing a love song to her daughter. So it did not hurt that I was a little bit nervous myself. It made me feel really vulnerable, and I think it was a good place for Becky to be.
On going big
I wanted to do the justice script. The script was so beautiful and it was such an incredible role. I just did not want to finish it thinking, Oh I could have gone further, gold I could have done more. … I just did it and just went as far as I could, and … threw it all the way I knew it was not going far enough. … I had to go even higher.
Danny Hensel and Vince Pearson produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Beth Novey adapted it for the Web.
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