Elliot Page (1:15)

But add some relaxing lighting and a.

Alison Stewart (1:17)

Comfy IKEA hofburg ottoman. And now it's a cozy retreat.

Dominic Savage (1:20)

Nice.

Elliot Page (1:21)

A cozy retreat, man. Cozy retreat, sir. Okay, find your big dreams, small dreams.

Alison Stewart (1:27)

And cozy retreat dreams in store or online at ikea.us dream the possibilities.

Elliot Page (1:36)

Listener Supported WNYC Studios.

Alison Stewart (1:48)

This is all of it. I'm Alison Stewart live from the WNYC studios in soho. Thank you for being a part of the show today. Thank you for spending your time with us. The new film Close to youo stars Elliot Page as Sam, a young man headed to his small hometown to see his family after years of being estranged. It's his dad's birthday and he's a little anxious, a little brittle. Sam's a trans man. He's not really sure how it's going to go. As he takes the train from Toronto, he spies an old friend, a really close friend of his, sitting a few rows ahead. Catherine, played by Hilary Bach. She is so happy to see him, but behind her eyes, something is going on to the point where she makes a break for it. At the station, we watch as Sam negotiates with his family, but really just wants to be with Catherine, Variety said. Close to you quote, elliot Page makes an affecting big screen return in a fragile homecoming drama, adding, the actor brings palpable personal investment and empathy to director Dominic Savage's study of a strained feminine family reunion. Close to youo starts in theaters on Friday, joining Us now is actor and co writer Elliot Page.

Hilary Bach (2:57)

Hi, Elliot.

Elliot Page (2:58)

Hi.

Alison Stewart (2:58)

Hi. As well as actor Hilary Block.

Hilary Bach (3:01)

Bach.

Alison Stewart (3:01)

Hillary. Nice to meet you.

Hilary Bach (3:03)

Hi, nice to meet you. Thank you.

Alison Stewart (3:05)

And writer and director Dominic Savage. Hi, Dominic.

Dominic Savage (3:09)

Hi there. It's good to be here.

Alison Stewart (3:10)

Elliot, you and Dominic started talking during the pandemic. What were the initial conversations like?

Elliot Page (3:18)

Well, the initial conversations were us just connecting really quickly. I'd seen Dominic's work. The first thing I saw was the film he did with Samantha Morton, one of my favorite actors of all time. And it completely blew my mind. I couldn't stop thinking about it. I couldn't stop feeling it, and was just so in love with his filmmaking. And our initial conversations were really just us connecting as people. Why we like to make things, what films we love. And we started talking about different ideas, and it grew from. It grew from there.

Alison Stewart (3:55)

Dominic, sometimes meeting someone over zoom, it can be kind of hard. What about Elliot made him someone you wanted to work with?

Dominic Savage (4:04)

I think it was. It was literally the. The sense in which I felt that we developed a kind of trust quite, quite quickly on that first zoom. It was a. It was quite an intense discussion. We, you know, we talked about life as well, you know, and I think that was a really important moment because you can always tell straight away whether this is going to become a relationship that something interesting will come from. And I think it was. It was then I was inspired to do this from that initial meeting. And we just kept talking, you know, kept exchanging ideas, developing this. This storyline together, you know, in a truthfully collaborative way, in a way where there was a really quality in terms of the way in which we were working. And it just. Everything started to piece together. It all clicked. And I thought, this is. This is meant to happen. This film is meant to happen.

Alison Stewart (5:05)

Hilary, where were you when you first entered the close to you universe?

Hilary Bach (5:13)

Where was I? I remember actually being in my kitchen, and Elliot texted me and said, oh, my God. I just had a zoom with this incredible director. And I think this might be the perfect opportunity for you and me to finally do something together. Elliot and I had been talking about trying to create something that we could do together and get to work together again. And of course, I was so incredibly thrilled and honored. And I, that night, watched Dominic's film, the same one with Samantha Martin, and was just blown away and just thought, this is exactly the kind of thing that I want to do. And so it's been an absolute honor and. And joy to be a part of it. And I also just loved my meeting With Dominic as well, I felt like we clicked immediately. And it was so easy to talk with him and share with him. And it was a beautiful beginning to making this story.

Alison Stewart (6:15)

So, Dominic, you've got your team together. Much of the people, much of the language in the film is improvised. What do you give your actors to work with?

Dominic Savage (6:26)

Well, so. So the whole process is quite different to your way most films are made because I do like to keep the initial script quite minimal. I mean, it's. It's got lots of description and it's got lots of things for the actors to sort of understand what this. What the character is and what my hopes are for it. But I'm not prescriptive. That's the point. And I don't like to write dialogue. I like. I like that to emerge as we make it, you know, after. After a process of sort of. Lots of talking about character and about. About the story and about settings and about, you know, our lives and all that. And I think that's, you know, it's a. It's a kind of process that eventually gets to something as we're making it that becomes really meaningful and meaningful to everyone involved. It's. That's the point of it, that everyone feels invested in it, feels like they're really immersed in it. I think that's the point. So, of course, when we actually shoot the scenes, there's a sense in which the actors are totally in it, totally present in the. In the moments that we're shooting that it becomes almost like a real moment in life. It's not like it's being acted out and that everyone knows where it's going and they know where the end's going to be. It's much more like we're actually being where we're feeling. We're being. I don't know what's going to happen here, but we don't in life, do we? We don't quite know what the end of a conversation is going to be like. We just don't know it could be. So that's what I like to. That's how I like to work. It's. It's the surprises that are so important.

Alison Stewart (8:15)

Elliot, for you, creatively, what did the improvisation do for you?

Elliot Page (8:20)

Oh, my gosh. So exhilarating. I. You know, I think I. I'll speak for. I feel like it's okay for me to speak for, like, all of the actors in this movie, where everyone just fell in love with this way of making something does. Not only is it, you know, improvisational, you shoot it. In order. It's all natural light shot on. Yeah. On the same lens. So you're really. You. You don't stop, you know, And I think I'm used to, as most actors, making things in a more conventional way in film and television, of you have your couple minutes in your take, and then maybe you do a couple more, and then you wait as the. The camera and the lights are getting moved to do that. And that comes with its you know, own challenges and. And joys, of course. But working this way, that joy of acting, that inexplicable feeling of creating this other reality that feels so deeply honest, it. That you get to keep going, it just goes. You get to go deeper and deeper and deeper. And then as an actor, to be working with someone who's as extraordinary as Hillary, who's just so present and so open and to truly disappear in these scenes together, it's. It's like nothing else. I feel so lucky to have gotten to be a part of Dominic's body of work and how he creates. It's an absolute thrill.

Alison Stewart (10:05)

We're discussing the film close to you. My guests are Elliot Page, who plays Sam, Hilary Bach, who plays his longtime friend Catherine, and writer director Dominic Savage. Hillary, where is Catherine when we meet her? What's going on in her life?

Hilary Bach (10:22)

Catherine is on a train heading back home to her family, her husband and her children. And I did a lot of thinking and working about all of her backstory, which is not necessarily totally obvious, but when you talked about that, there's something underneath her eye, underneath her look when we first see her. Yes, she's been feeling unsatisfied in her life, and it's really seeing Sam that makes her realize this even more, maybe feeling a little bit unsatisfied in her marriage or about some of the choices that she's made. She's not maybe feeling quite as alive as she used to. And seeing Sam brings back this feeling. The memories of the time that she had with him when she was younger makes her think about the decisions she made when she was younger and how she felt when she was with him. So. Yeah.

Alison Stewart (11:32)

Let's listen to a clip where Sam sees Katherine on the train. It's their first introduction. This is from close to you.

Elliot Page (11:40)

I've not gone home in almost five years, but, yeah, it's my dad's birthday, so I. Yeah. So I'm back. Yeah. Yeah, it'll be. I think it'll be. Yeah, it'll be nice.

Hilary Bach (11:54)

And tell her myself. Happy birthday.

Elliot Page (11:56)

Oh, of course. What do you Mean, of course they do. They always loved you, you know. Yeah. It'll be nice. My siblings will be there. Yeah. Yeah.

Hilary Bach (12:07)

How are they? How's Kate doing?

Elliot Page (12:09)

They're good. She's good. They all. I haven't really been, you know, I've been away and a little. You connected. Needed some space, you know, Needed some. I needed some space from covering, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Hilary Bach (12:26)

I'm always, like, going by places, you know, like where we always used to hang out. I'm always thinking about you and remembering.

Alison Stewart (12:36)

Elliot at first, Sam, he can't quite decide whether or not to approach Catherine or not. What is he thinking as he's peering through the train seats?

Elliot Page (12:46)

Oh, gosh. He's thinking. He's thinking a lot of things. It's been a long time since they've seen each other. He hasn't seen her since he's transitioned. You know, he's. In many ways, it's someone he's never stopped thinking about. And I think the idea of saying hi and sitting down and starting a conversation is. Is only overwhelming in the sense that he does feel so much and always has for her.

Dominic Savage (13:34)

And.

Elliot Page (13:35)

And misses her.

Alison Stewart (13:36)

Yeah. So, Dominic, you have these two actors who are engaging with one another, but there's so much that isn't spoken. It's so much body language. Tell us a little bit about how you talk to your actors so that they can communicate without the language.

Dominic Savage (13:56)

Well, I think, you know, that's interesting because the scene that you've just played is a really interesting example because, you know, I met Hillary through Elliot and I really, really liked Hillary. I really felt something again when I did the zoom with her. And of course, you can be very full of excitement about what's going to happen when these two characters come together, but of course it's not. It's only when it happens that you can really, really feel it and know. And I sort of kept them apart, even.

Alison Stewart (14:32)

Oh, really?

Dominic Savage (14:33)

Yeah, leading up to the actual shoot. I didn't. I didn't. They didn't need to speak. They. They shouldn't have done because they haven't as. As characters in the. In the story. So there was this sense in which, yeah, this will be really interesting to see what. What actually happens. And. And of course, what. What did happen was that there was, for me, something really special going on. Almost telepathic between them. There was a. There was a kind of feeling that they got when they just. When they looked at each other. It was really powerful. It was. It was really affecting. And I could see that on my monitor, I felt this was a really. Everything that I'd hoped for and everything that I'd believed would happen is happening. And a lot of that is just those conversations that you have that I had with Elliot and Hillary leading up to the scene, leading up to making the film. It's just all about sort of aligning. So it's aligning with my actors, aligning with them and almost giving them a sort of. I often think when I'm making these films that there is a degree of spirituality involved in the process. Somehow we're sensing things. And I really hope the film that comes across that sort of sensitivity of it, because it is a sensitive subject, it's a sensitive feelings involved. So the whole film is made with a kind of delicacy, I think.

Alison Stewart (16:02)

Hilary, for people who don't know you're deaf, there's very little use of sign language in the film. Was that a discussion? Did you have a conversation about that or just didn't matter?

Hilary Bach (16:18)

That's a great question. It was something that we discussed. And I, in my understanding of Catherine, I felt like she was a deaf woman who had been. Who had grown up orally meaning speaking most of the time, and that she had started to learn ASL and started to get to be involved with the deaf community maybe five, seven years ago. And so I did want it to be a part of her life, but it wasn't. As you could see, she wasn't signing with her husband and she wasn't signing with Sam. So it wasn't something that she used all the time. And that's not exactly my story, but it certainly does draw on a lot of my real lived experience. So it was something that we talked about and thought about. And I was excited to have a bit of sign language in there and also excited to be in a film as a deaf actor, as a deaf woman, where it wasn't about that.

Alison Stewart (17:29)

We're discussing the film close to you. My guests are Elliot Page, who plays Sam, who's headed back home. Hilary Buck, who plays his longtime friend Catherine, as well as writer and director Dominic Savage. All right, Elliot. Sam goes to his home. When he opens the door to the family home, what's he feeling?

Elliot Page (17:51)

You know, nervous. He's, you know, he loves his family, of course, and they love him and are really trying. I mean, are welcoming.

Alison Stewart (18:09)

Are.

Elliot Page (18:11)

He's not. This isn't a movie about someone going home to like, stereotypical transphobic family. And it's full of trauma, you know, that's. That's not this movie. He's. He's just going home to a situation where, you know, people don't necessarily have all the information and are trying their best not always getting it right. And it. We see him having these sort of more nuanced experiences that I think a lot of trans and queer people will relate to. And I hear them relating to it when we're in screenings. People that. Laughter of recognition at so many moments. So, yes, he's. He's going home. Not quite sure what to expect. Embracing. Bracing himself slightly.

Alison Stewart (19:03)

Yeah, Dominic. You know, we see the family. They're really overjoyed to see him. Sometimes a little too overjoyed in some ways. And it made me wonder about. Is this movie a lot about relationships that haven't been maintained and what it takes to maintain them.

Dominic Savage (19:22)

Well, there's that element to it, yes. But I think what I. What I was interested in with it was to get a range of nuanced reactions and senses of those relationships. That there's. There's. There's a. There is a complexity to it, but there's also these differences within the family of their perspective on. On Sam. And I think that's what gives the film a more surprising quality. You don't expect those characters to behave in those different ways. You know, there's. And it tells you a lot about them as well. It tells you a lot about what they kind of want for them, for themselves from it, as well as what Sam wants. You know, it's. But that really ultimately came from, you know, careful casting of. Of. Of people that have their own perspectives and own stories as well, to add to this film. You know, the. Hopefully there's a richness to each character that's. That's in it and that's. That's playing in it. And it's also about what they want from it as well as what they're prepared to offer Sam. You know, I think we see all that complex family stuff going on in a way that's, you know, there's pain there, but there's a kind of beauty to that as well, I think.

Alison Stewart (20:44)

Let's listen to another clip from Close to youo. We have another moment between Sam and Catherine escaping the family, walking on a beach and sharing a moment. This is from Close to you.

Hilary Bach (20:55)

You look so good. You really do. You look just so. Like. You just look the same, just more you. I love it.

Elliot Page (21:03)

Thanks. Yeah, that's how I feel. Yeah, it's cool to be like, oh, yeah, there's. There's that guy. I was wondering where he was I love that.

Hilary Bach (21:11)

I'm so happy for you.

Elliot Page (21:13)

Thanks. I'm happy for you, too.

Hilary Bach (21:16)

Thank you.

Elliot Page (21:17)

Yeah.

Hilary Bach (21:20)

When you think about us back then, what was it. What was it for you?

Elliot Page (21:35)

I was in love with you.

Hilary Bach (21:38)

All right.

Alison Stewart (21:38)

Hillary, your eyebrows go up when he says he's in love with you. Do you think Catherine knew?

Hilary Bach (21:50)

Yes and no.

Alison Stewart (21:51)

Yes and no.

Hilary Bach (21:54)

And I think maybe deep down she knows and she knew, but it's new for her to see Sam come out and say it. I think she's just overwhelmed with maybe the truth of his feelings and also her feelings in that moment.

Alison Stewart (22:18)

Elliot, there's a moment in the film when your mom uses the wrong pronoun and she's beside herself, and Sam is pretty cool about it, sort of. He has to deal with it. How did his feelings for his mom come through at that moment? And then his feelings to. To protect himself.

Elliot Page (22:38)

Yeah.

Alison Stewart (22:41)

Yeah.

Elliot Page (22:42)

I mean, I think that's a moment so many people will, of course, relate to trans people, where, like, particularly a moment like that, like, say, I've known Wendy, for example, for a long time. Like, if Wendy was to misgender me because things take a second, or my mom, if still, it's so, like, I probably wouldn't even. Correct as Elliot, you know, I'd just be like, oh, they're figuring it out. I don't care. You know, I know the difference between when someone's trying to be purposefully negative versus someone who's trying and what have you, and. But I'd say, yeah, sometimes the inclination to not want to correct, because in some ways that could just be seen as being helpful. Oh, let me just. Let me just help you. Because I get that it takes a second, but then it can turn into those sort of moments when then you see someone kind of crumbling, full of shame, and it's like, oh, I don't want you to feel that way. It's fine, you know, and it's okay. So I'll. I'll avoid that. But then that means you're the one sort of navigating these moments all the time, you know? You know, but at the same time, wanting, of course, people to, you know, having patience, because it's these things. It's. It's hard to. It's a hard thing to just sort of switch immediately, you know, and hopefully, you know, that scene in these certain moments are examples of. Yeah. Those sorts of experiences and more nuanced moments that we were ideally hoping to capture while we made the movie.

Alison Stewart (24:18)

Dominic, the cinematography tells us a lot about the feeling of the film. What conversations did you have with Kathryn Lutz, your cinematographer?

Dominic Savage (24:26)

Well, the conversations always sort of. They involved really the process that I go through a lot with the films I make. And as Elliot's just said, I do like to keep the process as simple and as pared back as possible. You know, I don't like to make it complicated. It's a small team around actually on the set. To minimize the sort of. The process of filmmaking. I like everyone to feel. I like the actors to feel like actually they're just. They are. They are in the scenes really themselves. And there's no process of filmmaking that visible. So it was a lot about that and keeping it simple. Again, using one lens throughout. We have to change things, but always going with what we felt was a degree of truth in the way that the film was shot and representing those. Those locations and those moments and those times of day with a feeling. I think there's a. There's also a feeling in the cinematography. There's a. There's a sense in which it's empathizing with the scenes and what's going on. And to that. To that effect, I like to choose the locations carefully so that they have an atmosphere. And I think the. The photography does match and almost exemplify that atmosphere. It sort of. It goes with it. It's. It's not trying to manipulate anything. It's being as pure as possible. I could go on. There's. There's so many. There's so many aspects to it, which one is. Is conscious of but doesn't. I don't want to be too like, you know, too prescriptive about all that because it's. Again, it's all about feeling. I think for me, everything is dictated by the feeling of a scene. And that includes the photography. So Catherine Lutes, the DoP, was amazing. She was always in the scene as well. She was always feeling it. And I think the film reflects all that.

Alison Stewart (26:23)

Close to youo will open in theaters on August 16th. I've been speaking with Elliot Page, Hilary Block and Dominic Savage. Thank you so much for your time today.

Hilary Bach (26:35)

Thank you so much.

Dominic Savage (26:37)

Thanks very much.

Elliot Page (26:40)

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