Essie Davis is no stranger to playing immensely powerful and intense characters. Best known for her profound work in the 2014 horror film “The Babadook,” she’s made a career out of taking on difficult and demanding roles. Even with an eclectic career of films, TV, and theater, her latest project, “True History of the Kelly Gang” directed by her husband Justin Kurzel, gives the actress yet another opportunity to display her inner ferocity.
Kurzel, coming off of a rather disappointing video game adaptation, “Assassins Creed,” returns with another adaptation, but this time of the 2000 novel of the same name by Peter Carey. Starring Davis alongside “1917” star George MacKay, the film impressed our critic at the 2019 Toronto Film Festival, who said, “Like Carey’s novel, Kurzel’s film considers itself a corrective work, reclaiming Kelly as an Australian from the English shapers of his legacy. In a flourish of historicity-bending that could be fairly described as Tarantino-esque, the authors erase Kelly’s infamous yet dubiously reported final words of ‘Such is life’ and replace them with a defiant silence.”
We spoke to Davis about her role as Ellen and the unifying nature of the production.
How did you originally get involved with the project?
Justin [Kurzel] was given the book several years ago to work on, and all the time, while reading the novel, he was saying, “Oh, there’s a great role for you in this, there’s a great role for you in this.” So, I read it and thought it was an extraordinary piece of writing. They’d been working on the script over many years and the seed of Ellen was planted years ago. Who she is, who she needs to be for this adaptation, and how it really becomes this central love story between a mother and son and how she really becomes the reason for his whole life.
So you became more engaged with the role once you read the book?
Yeah and then I had heaps of research I had to do to find out who Ellen Kelly was and all of that natural research that you do. But then Justin had this extraordinary way of working where he gives the actor a manifesto of things to do to prepare for the role and to become the character. His brain is so extraordinary and his wealth of information across so many worlds – in music and art and all of history, design – he just really wants to see the minute details. So he’ll give you a list of what to wear, what to watch and eat, how to stand and emulate, who to befriend, what sports to try and watch. He gives you how to prepare for interviews and concerts and it’s this kind of totally immersive homework list.
We had the boys who were the gang, George MacKay and the others, who in pre-production were told to pick up an instrument and start writing some punk music because you’re going to be on in a week, I’m booking you in three weeks. So the rehearsal time wasn’t just rehearsing scenes but the boys rehearsing every day by putting on a dress and picking up an instrument to play out some songs together. That punk music was all through the warehouse we were working in as the boys wrote music based on the space their characters were in, and then a few nights before we were shooting they were booked at a venue in Melbourne.
It was amazing – such an incredible night. It was unifying and bonding but also really empowering; the next day we walked on set and they had become the Kelly Gang. It is such a profoundly connected group of people who are invincible and untouchable and it was a privilege to be a part of.
You and George MacKay also spent some time together so you could deepen that bond between your characters as well – how was that experience?
George has an Australian father and has spent a lot of time here and in preparation for this, he came here to live with us and be with us and also learn to horse ride and chop wood. He and I met and spent time together talking, sharing music and poetry. It was quite interesting because we were quite nervous I guess about telling each other that we were really just kind of goofy people who were nothing like our characters and that we really wanted to impress one another.
There was no mystique, I was kind of just like “here I am” and he was like “I’m the same” so we started from a very genuine and open place. He’s such a good, kind, and beautiful man but also a dedicated actor and I think that we both have a pretty serious work ethic and having met as just a couple of people who might not seem like we have any mystique about us or anything very “actor-y” whatsoever and then go and form our manifesto and transform our bodies, transform our behaviors, physicalities, and accents since we were both using different dialects. We knew what it was to experience this and were unified by it. He is really and truly adopted – though he’s a bit old to be my son – into our family forever. As is Earl [Cave] who plays my other son – he’s a part of the family forever. All of the crew and the cast that were a part of it felt this gratitude of being a part of something that was so profoundly unique, extraordinary, and innately self-created.
This character is immensely powerful, and you’ve certainly played a litany of complex women in the past. Is there something, in particular, you’re seeking out when you take on these roles? Or is it something that comes randomly?
Both. I love the opportunities to play complex and extraordinary women. I feel privileged in the ones I’ve been given the opportunity to play. I really don’t like repeating myself so it’s quite nice to have such an extraordinary difference of characters to play.
“True History of the Kelly Gang” is available on VOD now.