A few years ago, aspiring actor Marielle Heller was given a copy of the graphic novel “The Diary of a Teenage Girl,” and it spoke to her experience with that time in her life with such poignancy that she adapted it into a stage play, and eventually (with the help of the Sundance writing and directing labs) a screenplay with the help of some seasoned writers and feeling free to inject a bit of her own experience into the story of 15-year-old Minnie (British actress Bel Powley) who has an affair with her mother’s (Kristen Wiig) boyfriend (Alexander Skarsgård).
THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL is a really remarkable experience that feels, at times, almost too real. It asks you to get over being shocked at the relationship itself and examine the family dynamic that leads to it, and into the soul of this young woman who isn’t afraid to admit she enjoys sex, especially with this man. And that’s just where it begins. Powley is a substantial talent, and Heller gives her the perfect backdrop to explore her acting gifts. I had a chance to chat with Heller earlier this week about all aspects of the production. But before we dive into that, I had to ask her about one of her acting roles, in MACGRUBER, which just happened to have been directed by her husband, Jorma Taccone, of Lonely Island fame.
Marielle Heller: Hi, Steve. How are you?
Capone: Good. I just realized something that I didn’t until I was doing research for this, that you’re married to Jorma. Were you actually at the MACGRUBER premiere at SXSW in 2010?
MH: You know what? [laughs] Actually, I missed the MACGRUBER SXSW premiere, because I was doing a workshop of DIARY the play. So very sadly I missed the best screening of MACGRUBER that ever existed, but I was around for every other phase of MACGRUBER. I hear it was a wild night.
Capone: It was a lot of fun. If you had asked me to bet money on how successful that movie would have been as a result of that screening, I would be very broke right now.
MH: I think everybody felt that way. It’s alright, it’s been made up with cult status.
Capone: That is absolutely true. I applaud your movie for many reasons. One of the weird things that happened to me while I was watching this was that I started to think about Minnie as a real person; I started to wonder what movies does she like, or what music does she like? I started to think about aspects of the character that aren’t even a part of the movie. She’s such a complete character. From your initial exposure to the graphic novel, what do you remember connecting with and what resonated with you?
MH: I love that you said that. I think I felt that way too. I felt like this was the most complete teenage girl I had ever seen painted in any type of medium. It felt like, this is finally a version of a teenage girl who is smart, who is really, truly thinking and curious about the world around her. She’s not just being bounced around by other people. She’s actually as smart as anyone she encounters, if not smarter than anyone she encounters. She’s curious, she’s earnest, she’s not sarcastic and quippy as you often see teenage characters to be. I fell in love with her, truthfully. I found her to be this hero that I wanted to spend time with. I loved the way she thought about the world; I loved the way she saw herself; and I love how honest she was about all of that.
Capone: The film doesn’t just treat sex for sex’s sake. It marks a milestone in her life, which it does for a lot of people. But for her, it’s a definitive shift in her just behavior. She walks into a room after realizing that not only has she had sex, but she actually enjoys it. She feels more mature than a lot of the people she deals with on a regular basis. Can you talk a little about that?
MH: We spoke a lot about every character in the movie being sort of 15, emotionally, and they’re all seeking and searching, and Minnie’s the only one who grows. She’s the only one who matures in any way over the course of the process. And that’s something that you learn at some point in your life, that age is just a number, and a lot of people really don’t have the world figured out just because they’re older than you. But at some point, you think that that’s true when you’re younger, and it’s a disappointing fact to realize.
Capone: There does come a point in this movie where Minnie is the only adult in the film. That is absolutely true. The lack of maturity of any adult in this movie is maybe the most shocking thing about it.
MH: Yeah, it’s true. In some ways, that was the ’70s in San Francisco. It’s the place of no adults, no grown ups, where rules were being thrown out. Everybody had left their lives to go live in this promised land, which was San Francisco, and being a grown up was thought of as being a bummer or being a part of the system. You wanted to be open minded, living out some other fantasy of what the world could be.
Capone: I was going to ask you about that. How much of this story is about the time and place, and how much of it is universal?
MH: It’s a tough question, because I do think stories like this happen all the time. I think these are still stories that happen today, but I do think this particular story was very much influenced by the time and the place, specifically. The culture of the Bay Area is very, very specific. The value put on being open minded and not being square is very real. I grew up there. And that can be a confusing thing at times. So I wanted to make what I feel like is a very universal story, but I think it becomes more universal almost in the details, and the more specific we got into the place and the time I think, the more it kind of came alive.
Capone: I also applaud it for presenting something that some people are going to be shocked by. This is how the world is. Teenage girls are having sex—they were having it then, they’re having it now, some of them actually enjoy it. It sounds even shocking to say it out loud, but that’s the way the world works. Was that important for you to remove that stigma to a degree?
MH: It wasn’t about making it acceptable, I don’t think, as much as it was about presenting it as truth, because it is true. Whether that makes us comfortable or not doesn’t really matter, I guess. I don’t think teenagers would be shocked by this movie. I think grown-ups are shocked at the thought of teenagers watching this movie [laughs]. There’s something about female sexuality and teenage girl sexuality that makes us very uncomfortable as a society. It’s something we do not want to think about.
We want to protect our young women and pretend that this part of their lives doesn’t exist, when the truth of the matter is, most young women develop sexually before their male counterparts. Girls start thinking about sex just as early as boys do, if not earlier, and most teenage girls are sexually active, and this is something that our ignoring has not changed. If anything, it just makes you feel, as a teenage girl, that you’re a freak if you’re having those thoughts, because you’ve never seen anybody talk about it before, and then you get older and you talk to everyone you know, and you’re like, “Oh, we were all thinking that and feeling those things? I thought I was all alone.”
Capone: I know you worked this as a play before you worked it as a screenplay. Did you find ways in both of those adaptations to work in a little of your own experiences as well?
MH: Oh god, yeah. Are you kidding me? I’m all over this script and movie and everything. Yeah, I think ultimately when we got down to our Minnie in the film, there’s elements of me, there’s elements of Bel, there’s elements of Phoebe [the author], there’s elements of Minnie from the book, and then there’s this Minnie who has grown into her own self separate from all of us, who I would think about while we were filming as this almost separate fictional entity who I wanted to do proud by. She became this Everygirl, but this very specific girl in my heart who I wanted to do right by.
Capone: I know you worked with the Sundance writing and directing workshops. Can you tell me about how those added to this piece?
MH: It was huge. Anytime you get to have a room full of people challenge your work and question every word, I think your piece is going to become better. That is a really loving and harsh reality of what happens at the Sundance labs, your work gets torn apart in the most loving way, and you’re forced to come face to face in every aspect of your work, whether it’s functioning in the way you want it to be or where it’s failing. You’re pushed to keep working until it is truly what you want it to be. I think because I went through that process, I’ve come out on the other end having made the film I actually wanted to make. I would have conversations with people where I would express “This is what I want this scene to do. This is how I want this to feel” and they would say, “This is not doing that. Go further.” So in the end, what that gave me was whether this is a film everyone will love or not; it’s the film I want it to be.
Capone: How did you find Bel? I’ve never seen her in anything. I know he’s done some things in the UK, but did you see her in something?
MH: No, she submitted an audition tape. Nobody gets cast from audition tapes. It was so random. She submitted the tape and put a personal message at the end of the tape, where she looked into the camera, went into her British accent, and told me how much the piece meant to her and that no project had ever meant so much to her before, and would I please have a conversation with her, and I was so touched. When you’re working on a passion project for so long, and you care about it more than anything that’s ever existed, and you see this wonderful actress who also seems to care a great deal about it, it really meant a lot to me.
Capone: Did the actual audition part of her tape stand out as well, or was it that message that really got to you?
MH: Oh my God, yes. Her audition was incredible. The message wouldn’t have mattered if she would have been terrible. Her audition was incredible, and she had totally nailed it, and it had blown my mind, and I had probably watched it 100 times, and then we Skyped a number of times. Eventually, I had to get her and Alexander in a room together to make sure this was all going to work. Then I finally cast her. But right off the bat, I was just sort of mesmerized by her.
Capone: Let me ask about Alexander Skarsgård, because I think he might be a biggest surprise for a lot of people, though I’ve seen things in the last couple of years like THE EAST and WHAT MAISIE KNEW that lead me to believe he’s game for just about anything.
MH: I think he gives the most brave performance in this movie, and it’s going to blow people’s minds. I saw him in WHAT MAISIE KNEW and I knew I needed to find somebody to play this part who was almost like a big man-child, who could bring a humanity and a lovable-doofus quality to this guy where you went, “I know what he is doing is wrong, but I don’t hate him, because we needed to go along with where Minnie was, and if she found him charming, we needed to find him charming.”
So when I saw him in WHAT MAISIE KNEW, I saw this gentle giant. He gave such a nuanced, sensitive performance and I thought “Oh my god, yes. This guy could do this.” I actually stalked him, and I tired to get him the script through his agents, but one day I was flipping through some tabloid magazine and saw a picture of him with Jack McBrayer and it was like “Surprising Best Friends: Jack McBrayer and Alexander Skarsgård,” and I knew Jack from “30 Rock” because my husband worked at “SNL.” So I called up Jack and was like, “Can you get this script to your friend Alexander Skarsgård?” And he was like, “Yeah!” And a week later I got a call that was like, “He loved the script. He wants to meet you.” It was amazing.
Capone: That’s a crazy set of circumstances. Well, congratulations with this. Are you going to continue directing or go back to acting?
MH: I’m going to keep directing for now, and if the right project comes along, then I will definitely act too.
