Glamorous appearances mask darker realities in Sally Potter's new film The Party which goes on limited release this weekend. Stars Kristin Scott Thomas and Cherry Jones joined Sean Rocks on Arena to discuss this black comedy with a twist. In the film, Kristin's character Janet has been announced shadow Minister for Health and the plot revolves around a celebratory dinner party, at which nothing can be taken at face value. Kristin describes what attracted her to the intriguing role.
"It was brilliantly written and it was incredibly funny and the characters were so rich and complicated and grown up and I loved the overlapping stories. I loved the twists and turns of the narrative. I just thought it was a really clever script… Everyone's covering like crazy. All the characters in the film seem to have secrets and that's a delicious thing to play for any actor."
The guests are a group of people whose self-identity is wrapped up in left-wing, open-minded ideals, but Kristin describes the "glorious revelation" of the film to be their realisation that perhaps life isn't as black and white as they thought.
"This film treats really serious subjects such as getting older, motherhood, political choices, the way we choose to live our lives, but it treats these subjects… with such a light touch and with such disrespect sometimes that it's really very, very refreshing, very buoyant. You leave the cinema in a very upbeat way even though what's gone on is very dark and dramatic."
A point to note is that the film is shot in black and white for a moody, noirish feel, a fact that the actors agree affected the costume, set and lighting designers far more than them. A singularity about the process that did affect them, however, was the fact that rehearsal time was a mere week, while the entire film was shot in just two weeks. Cherry describes the preparation as very theatre-esque in nature.
"With theatre, you sit around a table for a couple of days and read and ask questions for a couple of days and delve into the genesis of the play and the characters and we did that with Sally around her kitchen table after a lovely lunch."
Another point of interest is that the Brexit vote occurred during the shooting of the film. While it didn't have an impact on the film itself, it very much dictated the mood on set, bringing some of the film's key tropes very much to life for the actors. Cherry says:
"I think everyone went onto the project a week or two before feeling fairly confident that the remainers would carry the day and like everyone else in Britain either side, everyone woke up stunned that morning. There were tears on the set that morning and it was an international crew and cast. Of course it didn't affect the film… but we did carry it with us, as everyone in Britain has ever since every day."
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Photo: Ian Gavan/Getty Images