Nightbitch director Marielle Heller on her Amy Adams film

Nightbitch director Marielle Heller remembers working with Amy Adams and a particularly anxious canine co-star.

Last updated on December 26, 2024

Amy Adams gives one of the best performances of her career in Marielle Hellers Nightbitchwhich is set to make its debut on Hulu right after Christmas (Dec Friday, December 27). In it, she plays a new mother who finds herself more estranged from her loving partner (Scoot McNairy) and earlier, as she becomes completely consumed by her new parenting role, which eventually leads her to think that she might become a dog. While early reports seemed to suggest that this would be some sort of horror film, it’s actually a gentle comedy about motherhood, and one that will resonate with mothers and their spouses alike.

A little while ago I had the chance to speak with the film’s director, Marielle Heller. Nightbitch marks her fourth film, after the well-received Diary of a Teenage Girl, Can you ever forgive meand the Mister Rogers biography, A beautiful day in the neighborhood. She also acted further Netflix‘s The Queen’s Gambit. The film embraces a somewhat magical realism POV, meaning that Adams, whose character thinks she’s turning into a dog, also appears on screen with a bunch of canine friends.

“You know, the dogs were mostly so incredible and had to do difficult things, but it’s true when she performed, even though we had practiced with trainers, she would act differently than the trainers ever did. You know, because the trainers would just walking through things and not looking the dogs in the eye. And then Amy would look them in the eye and make contact. And one dog in particular, it really scared the dogs and they reacted to her in ways that were fascinating.”

For Heller, the film also came from a deeply personal place.

“You know, I guess my filmmaking credo, if anything, is just trying to make something feel honest, right? I think the only way anything is worthwhile is if you tell a story from the point of view of something being honest. And this film is a very personal story for me. You know, I’m a mother of two young children, and I went through the experience of losing my identity, when I became a mother, and as if I didn’t know who I was anymore, and I didn’t feel like I could put together a good sentence or that I was, that I even recognized myself when I looked in the mirror.”

One thing Heller wanted to make sure is that the film had great sympathy for both sides of the couple. Scoot McNairy is likable throughout as he is portrayed as a character dealing with his own pressures.

“So much of this film came from a really deeply painful personal place for myself. So I wanted it to feel authentic and honest. I think it’s a lot of things about my long marriage that I’ve been in now .I’ve been with my husband for 25 years in there and things about long-term relationships that I think people, whether you’re a parent or not, whether you’re in a heterosexual relationship or not, can relate to long-term relationships . relationship is tough.”

“A lot of the work I did on their relationship was also to give him a more fleshed-out arc and story that way, because I think there are often times where we don’t intend to end up where we .And we wake up one day and go, how did my marriage become like this? And it’s not always a conscious choice that’s just the road to hell paved with the best of intentions. And it was important to me that they’ve both kind of fallen into these roles that neither of them wanted to begin with, but how do you change that ?

Nightbitch hits Hulu on December 27 and is now playing in cinemas. Read our review HERE!