Time is usually a little bit of flat circle if you’re starring in a handful of Marvel movies for over a decade, however fortunately issues have come again round for Scarlett Johansson. After “Avengers: Endgame” and “Black Widow,” she went on to be featured in a quantity Wes Anderson movies, together with the upcoming “The Phoenician Scheme,” in addition to Noah Baumbach’s “Marriage Story,” and has now directed her function debut “Eleanor the Nice.” The darkish dramedy had its world premiere in Un Sure Regard at Cannes 2025 and marks an necessary milestone in Johansson’s profession. In a latest interview with The New York Occasions, Johansson defined how she at all times thought she’d be a director, however acquired misplaced in appearing.
“Once I was a lot youthful, I believed I’d find yourself doing that finally,” Johansson mentioned of directing. “In my early 20s, I grew to become centered on understanding my job as an actor higher. I used to be creatively engaged with the administrators I used to be working with, taking up completely different roles that had been difficult, and I veered off that path.”
Fortunately, as Johansson stepped away from the MCU and devoted extra time to her manufacturing firm These Footage, she got here throughout a script for “Eleanor the Nice” that she felt related to right away. The script got here from Pinky Promise Movies, which just lately produced “The Final Showgirl.” The corporate was co-founded by Jessamine Burgum, who just lately spoke to IndieWire’s Way forward for Filmmaking for “What No One Tells You.” Johansson “wasn’t searching for one thing to direct,” however felt she knew the correct approach to deliver “Eleanor the Nice” to life.
“The timing was proper when the script discovered me. It felt like an extension of the work that I’ve been doing versus this huge unknown,” Johansson mentioned. “And June was able to make the movie. She had vitality and was dedicated to doing it.”
Now that she’s gotten a style for it although, Johansson may positively see herself helming extra tasks.
“It felt very fulfilling. We had such a tremendous taking pictures expertise,” she mentioned. “The sensation on set was so familial and artistic and constructive. It was actually, actually joyful. You don’t at all times have a joyful expertise on each film that you simply make, however as I’ve gotten older, I’ve a lesser tolerance for the disagreeable expertise.”
In our evaluation out of Cannes, IndieWire’s Kate Erbland mentioned, “Written by Tory Kamen, ‘Eleanor the Nice’ hinges on the early attraction of its comparatively feel-good premise — inter-age friendship, what an idea! — earlier than piling on the ever-darker twists and turns. That’s to not say the movie isn’t humorous or candy, however that there’s something rather more profound and uncomfortable at its coronary heart, and one which poses a difficult problem for first-time filmmakers Johansson and Kamen.”
“Eleanor the Nice” shall be launched later this yr from Tristar and Sony Footage Classics.