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Interview: Sleeping Beauty Director Julia Leigh

The Australian author makes her debut with a brave Emily Browning.

It's polarised critics and viewers, but we're firmly in the camp who believes Sleeping Beauty is a striking and unsettling film.

In cinemas now, the debut feature from Australian author Julia Leigh (The Hunter) sees Emily Browning as Lucy, a student who willingly takes on unusual escort work. Leigh's script shows us what happens to the drugged, sleeping sex worker, whose wealthy clients are vetted by the mysterious and haughty madam Clara (Rachael Blake). Read our full review here.

We brought you an interview with the wonderfully forthright Browning last week, and now we talk to her director.

Would it be fair to say you're attracted to the disturbing?
I guess the strange thing is, this film and both of my novels, which have been described as disturbing, they come from me. So it's hard for me to call myself disturbing! [laughs] You know the phrase comfort zone? It's safe to say I'm comfortable in the risk zone.

You've said that you were a self-taught director - can you name some of the films that you've learned from?
I'm sorry to be a pain, but I'd prefer not to mention them, because I'll always be linked to them. I watched a lot of films with the sound turned down, as an exercise. I would ask myself: where's the camera, where's the camera, where's the camera.

Do you think a man could've got away with making such a film?
My feeling is only I could've made this film. That's where I come from.

How many actresses did you approach?
We did see a few actors for Lucy - it's a very important role as she's in every scene of the film. Some actors were a polite "no way", some actors really liked it but their management didn't, and other actors, like Emily Browning, really liked it and wanted to do it.



The original Lucy, Mia Wasikowska, has a very different quality from Emily, so what was it that you were looking for in an actress?
Don't mention Mia! [laughs] Emily put her audition on a tape, and I think it was that test that got my attention. I couldn't take my eyes off her - I felt she had that sort of latent, tip of the iceberg feeling. I saw that she could bring this quality of a quiet and willful recklessness. I don't see Lucy as simply passive, I see her much more as a radical person. If anything, her provocation to the world is "my cheek is turned, so try me". I find Emily very beautiful - she has a strange beauty, not a cookie-cutter beauty, if you like. I think she was successful is side-stepping the main danger of self-pity. She's certainly not numb at all. She has a close friendship with Birdmann. It's a big role for a young actor.

Can you tell us more about the casting of Rachael Blake, as she was incredibly affecting as the madam Clara.
I loved Rachael. I'd seen her in Lantana, but she played a suburban role - polar opposite of this character. I guess she had these qualities of that she could bring a genuine care for Lucy, and also a callousness though. Rachael plays Clara as a woman who runs a service, and she also had a poise to her. I felt that was important.

What about the men in the film, as their roles must've been equally difficult?
Very demanding roles for the men, yeah. It was hard casting the men. Peter Carroll, who plays probably the lead male role, he is a renowned theatre actor in Australia. He had no qualms at all about nudity! Chris Haywood, who plays man two - that is a very intense performance. He's a great actor. With all of these things we did a fair amount of rehearsal, so when it came to shooting on the day, on a closed set, we had a very clear idea of what we needed to do. I guess as a director, I tried not to destabilise the actor by throwing something new at them to consider.

What sort of reactions have you got from audiences?
I'm aware that the film does divide people. Some people really love it, but it's not for other people. So be it - I have no problem with that. It's certainly a memorable film. I hope people see it as strange and beautiful, and that it helps the audience use their own imaginations. It's not for me as a filmmaker to say "this film means x,y or z". If I'm being asked to explain my own work I feel like I'm being asked to gouge out my own eye, and then to gouge out the eye of the poor audience member.



I very much liked the monologue in the film - I find them unbearably tense as you're waiting for the tension to break. Was that your intention?
I'm glad you liked the monologue. It's very important to the film, as it goes to the heart of this older man's very, very honest view of the way he's lived his life, even though he's been ostensibly a very successful man out in the world. There is something mesmerising about [Carroll's] performance and his direct transmission to the audience.

You had wonderful production design on the film, but did you have to cut corners at all with funding for a debut feature?
I'm glad you mentioned that, as I had a wonderful production designer, Annie Beauchamp, and she was my first head of department to come onboard. Because we were both living in Sydney, and we shot the film wholly in Sydney, we could begin our dreams and plans together months ahead. We did not have a big budget at all, and we did well to get a couple of key locations. I worked with a great costume designer called Shareen Beringer, and again, she did so well on the budget! I can't stress this enough - when they give awards to designers they should take into account the budget and whether they had a huge treasure chest to play with. Shareen designed Clara's stuff, but Lucy's quite pragmatic. I guess the key thing was, how do we shift from Lucy's every day life into the more magical, otherworldy, sleeping beauty world. It was something we were very aware of. In this film I was not interested in a strict naturalism. I feel the film is very far away from the kitchen sink. I was more interested in a heightened realism.