Emma Stone explains why she loved ‘The Favourite’ script

Emma
Stone.
Dimitrios
Kambouris/Getty

• Emma Stone talked to Business Insider about how much she
  loved the script for her new movie, “The Favourite.”
• The Oscar winner said it was the first time in four years she
  wasn’t constantly “writing, fixing, begging, pleading,” for
  script changes, admitting she’s “usually very involved.”
• “The Favourite” director Yorgos Lanthimos also told us why he
  had Stone audition for the role, an unorthodox move for the level
  of stardom Stone is at.

Emma Stone really means it when she says that for her latest
movie, “The Favourite” (in theaters November 23), she was excited
to only have to act. The Oscar winner explained that for years,
she’s not only had to act in many of her starring roles, but also
had to be a heavy collaborator to make them better.

Stone opened up about this when she and “The Favourite” director
Yorgos Lanthimos (“The Lobster,” “Killing of a Scared Deer”) sat
down with Business Insider in New York City earlier this month.

The movie — which follows two cousins who go to extreme lengths
to top the other and court favor with Queen Anne in the early
18th century — is something Lanthimos had been developing
alongside screenwriter Tony McNamara for seven years. The script
made it to Stone in 2015 (she plays one of the cousins opposite
Rachel Weisz), and she could immediately tell from the first read
that the work had been put in.

(L-R) Rachel Weisz and Emma Stone in “The
Favourite.”
Fox
Searchlight

“Just to read it and say, ‘Okay, it’s great as it is,’ is pretty
infrequent,” Stone told Business Insider. “So it’s incredible
when you find it.”

Stone even went a step further and gave this surprising
revelation to compliment the work done by Lanthimos and McNamara:

“I would say ‘The Favourite’ is the first film that I’ve done in
four years that I wasn’t constantly calling, writing, fixing,
begging, pleading, changing,” she said. “I’m usually very
involved.”

“The Favourite” was shot in early 2017, and previous to that
Stone had starred in the Cameron Crowe flop “Aloha” (2015), the
acclaimed “Battles of the Sexes” (2017), and “La La Land” (2016),
which she won a best actress Oscar for.

Stone said it felt great working on “The Favourite” and not
having to worry about changing a single line of dialogue or piece
of story structure.

“It feels amazing when the script is right and the director is
right and you are like, ‘Now I can go and have fun and trust the
process,’” she said. But for Lanthimos to get to that comfort
level with Stone, he admitted he needed some convincing first.

Back in 2015, before Stone had even begun shooting “La La Land,”
Lanthimos had Stone audition for the role of the cousin, Abigail.
It was less to gauge her acting skills, the director said, and
more to see if the two were a good fit to work together and to
make sure Stone could deliver a convincing English accent.

(L-R)
Yorgos Lanthimos and Emma Stone.
AP

Though an audition was an unorthodox ask for someone at Stone’s
level of stardom, she said she didn’t feel insulted having to
come in to read because it gave her the same opportunity to make
sure she could work with Lanthimos. And at the end of the day,
Lanthimos got the confirmation he needed.

“We had a few sessions with a dialect coach and we went through a
few scenes and I worked with her the way I work with all the
actors during rehearsals,” Lanthimos said. “Then after hearing
the dialect coach and English people I know saying, ‘That is
fine, you have nothing to worry about, just go ahead,’ we were
good. I just didn’t want her to feel uncomfortable while we were
making the movie, or make a fool of herself.”

Stone is far from that in “The Favourite.” Playing the scheming
Abigail, she delivers a layered performance that’s filled with
manipulation and dark comedy as her character cooks up ways to
make Queen Anne forget about Sarah (Weisz). It’s led to Stone
once more gaining Oscar buzz for her performance.

But Stone being just an actress didn’t last. Soon after
wrapping on “The Favourite,” she was back to being an involved
collaborator, this time alongside director Cary Fukunaga on the
Netflix series she starred opposite Jonah Hill, “Maniac.” She
admitted that her style comes off “probably annoying” sometimes,
but it’s the only way she sees the material going from good to
great.

“It’s exciting to work on things that aren’t fully there yet and
you get to help shape and be a part of it in that way,” she said.
“But ‘The Favourite,’ it was completely unique.”