By Rhiana Davies-Cotter
Susanna Fogel is a Los Angeles-based writer and director who made her first film when she was just 14 years old. In the two decades since, Susanna has written, directed and produced numerous projects for film and TV. Susanna is also an avid writer, and her first novel, Nuclear Family: A Tragicomic Novel in Letters, was published last year. The Spy Who Dumped Me is Susanna’s second feature film after 2014’s Life Partners.
The Spy Who Dumped Me tells the story of Audrey (Mila Kunis) and Morgan (Kate McKinnon), two best friends who unwittingly become entangled in an international conspiracy when one of them discovers that her ex-boyfriend is a spy. Co-starring Justin Theroux, Gillian Anderson, Hasan Minhaj, Ivanna Sakhno, and Sam Heughan, the film was also co-written by Fogel with David Iserson.
How did writing and directing The Spy Who Dumped Me compare to making your small-budget flick Life Partners?
Well, you know, it was pretty much the same but with more explosions and high-speed car chases [laughs]. No, it was different, but it was also the same in some fundamental ways. The people were all equally as wonderful. A large part of my job was creating a team that was going to get along well for six months or more – a team of people who would inspire each other to do their best work. I think the biggest difference was just the scale of this film – the number of days, the number of months prepping, the fact that there were trailers and movie stars and assistants. Everything was scaled up. My first feature film felt like I was making something with a couple of friends, and at first, with this film, it felt like I was making something with a large army of strangers [laughs]. For a while I was like ‘oh my god, this set doesn’t feel as personal and comfortable’… But by the end, I was just making something with a large army of friends.
Did you find coming onto such a large budget film intimidating?
I only felt intimidated when I thought about making the film in the abstract. People would be like ‘oh my god, aren’t you scared?’ and then I’d think about it and get really scared [laughs]. But when I was actually doing the job itself, it was really just about making a million tiny decisions. The decisions you make as a director are relentless and they go on for months – every time you get up and walk across the set, a million people come and ask questions, and that is exhausting. But if you know what you want and you’re comfortable asking questions when you don’t know an answer, it’s not actually an intimidating job. It’s just like being the boss of a corporation – it’s just dealing with people, answering questions and having convictions.
I had this great plan when I moved into my apartment in Budapest – to get a treadmill so that I could run every day and de-stress. I used it once before we started shooting and then I never used it again. So that’s not something I would recommend you do [laughs].
The film doesn’t shy away from violent action scenes – how did you prepare yourself to direct the action genre?
Well, I didn’t really know what to expect. When I hired my stunt coordinator, Gary Powell – who is responsible for the incredible stunt sequences in the Bourne and Bond films – I was nervous about talking to him. I thought he’d immediately see that I’d never made a film like this before and just see me as a novice. But I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was all more intuitive than I thought. Even though I’d never directed an action movie before, I knew what I liked and what I wanted. I think, when making a film, you really just need to make something that you’d like to watch. It sounds so simple, but it’s true. I would say to Gary ‘I don’t like it when movies do this or that… I don’t like it when action comedies try to make the action funny, I feel like it’s too slapstick, so let’s not do that’ and he’d listen and help me to turn my ideas into something more practical. I was really lucky that I had a great partner.
Were there any particular action movies that you looked to for inspiration?
I looked to lots of different movies for different reasons. I love the Bourne films because they are so grounded and real and visceral. They’re almost documentarian style. But I also love the Bond movies because they’re so stylish and classic and fun. It was interesting because each action sequence sort of required a different style. We wanted everything to feel fun and exciting in different ways, so the opening is like our nod to a Bourne movie – we were introducing the spy and we wanted him to seem like this grounded, real-world guy. Then, later, we have these more polished sequences where people are dressed in tuxedos, and Bond was definitely an inspiration for those.
Were there tropes of the action or ‘gal pal’ genres that you tried to avoid?
Not really, I just felt a need to make something that I hadn’t seen before. I love female friendship stories – movies like Bridesmaids and Beaches and even Walking and Talking, and I just felt that I’d never seen an action movie that felt personal in that way, especially not for women. I felt like this genre hybrid hadn’t been done, and I thought if I could make something that I really wanted to see, maybe other people would want to see it too.
The film centres around a very close friendship – is it hard to represent the closeness, comfort and support of female friendships on screen?
For me it’s actually the easiest thing in the world to write, because my friends absolutely define my life. They’re my most steadfast and close relationships, and I have a million examples of the sort of language we use, the jokes we have, the idiosyncrasies of our bond. It’s a relationship that’s very close to my heart, and writing it almost feels like I’m just writing in a diary. The little personal and emotional connections between women are what I’ve spent most of my time as a writer and director focusing on, so it’s really just a joy for me. It was the other stuff in the film that I had to learn!
How did you choose Kate and Mila to play the main characters?
Well, I knew Kate already. She had a small role in my previous movie and we kept in touch. When David and I wrote the script for this film, we loved the idea of Kate playing the role of Morgan. We felt like she was the perfect person to play the ‘bigness’ of the character but also the nuanced emotions of someone who loves performing – because that’s pretty much who Kate is. She’s a thoughtful and sensitive person, yet she’s blessed and cursed with this insanely bold, really out-there talent and sense of humour. She’s also grappling with not necessarily wanting to be in the spotlight all the time – and these are all things that her character Morgan is dealing with too.
As for Mila, she was one of the first actors we had in mind for Audrey, and we were so excited to have her on board. We thought Mila was the perfect, relatable girl – she has such confidence and self-assuredness about her. So, even if she’s playing a girl who’s been broken up with and is heartbroken, she always has a baseline of strength and self-worth. Mila has a really rare combination of both strength and vulnerability, and I think it’s really important to see that combination on screen.
Kate is renowned for her improvisation… Did the actors have much room to adlib?
There was improvisation within parameters. With an action movie, you’re balancing so many different plates. You’re trying to pull off technically difficult things and you’re trying to work with a huge crew, so you just can’t be rewriting dialogue all the time and the actors can’t constantly be taking the scenes in wildly different directions. But then again, you also have to give people like Kate the chance to go a bit wild, otherwise you stifle what’s so magical about her. It was all about being disciplined and figuring out when I needed to let the actors be creative and when I needed them to stick to the script.
Did you try to make the film so that it would appeal to both male and female audiences?
I didn’t really think about that. I have noticed that men are reticent to see movies with female leads – or if they do see them, they’re like apologising for it or embarrassed about it. So, I think regardless of how much progress we’re making in terms of gender equality behind and in front of the camera, there is still this weird bias.
I mean, the film has action sequences with high stakes and I brought on the guy who’s responsible for the opening of Casino Royale – that’s really all I can do to convince men to see the movie [laughs]. I can’t do more than that. I hope they give it a chance, and I really do hope these gender norms break down a bit because I think people are really missing out.
From your experience, are these gender barriers breaking down at all?
I do think they are starting to break down… I always feel a bit skeptical of progress that comes on really suddenly though, because usually, progress takes a lot longer than we want it to. I do feel a shift, I just don’t think it’s as absolute as the more subtle gender biases that occur all the time – like what I mentioned about men being averse to female-centric content.
I think that there are plenty of people out there who want to hear from women and hear our stories, but at the same time, I think some of this is motivated by a compulsion to tick off certain boxes. Some people really are hungry for new representations, but for others, it’s just a trend they need to support.
I think, looking back at the quality of the movies that are coming out in this time, it will be pretty obvious which films are authentically-conceived projects and which are just a nod to the political trends of the day.
The Spy Who Dumped Me hits Australian cinemas on August 9, 2018. Read our review here.