{"id":1069420,"date":"2025-12-11T14:14:01","date_gmt":"2025-12-11T11:14:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1069420"},"modified":"2025-12-11T14:14:01","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T11:14:01","slug":"rebecca-hall-on-moving-beyond-the-biopic-and-entering-ryan-murphys-universe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1069420","title":{"rendered":"Rebecca Hall on Moving Beyond the Biopic\u2014And Entering Ryan Murphy\u2019s Universe"},"content":{"rendered":"
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TV & Movies<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Rebecca Hall on Moving Beyond the Biopic, Painting, and Entering Ryan Murphy\u2019s Universe<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n
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By <\/span>Anna Cafolla<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

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Photo: Courtesy of Janus Films<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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As an actor, Rebecca Hall is forever tuning in to the hard-to-catch frequencies and day-to-day idiosyncrasies that make people, people. In 2024, she starred in Janicza Bravo\u2019s eerie drama The Listeners<\/em>, playing a teacher whose life unspools as she begins to hear a low, pulsating sound that nobody else can. This year, she starred in Ira Sachs\u2019s Peter Hujar\u2019s Day<\/em>, an intimate snapshot of 1970s New York that recreates a real-life conversation between writer Linda Rosenkrantz (Hall) and photographer Peter Hujar (Ben Whishaw) over the course of a day. This tender and magnetic movie\u2014about friendship, memory, and the spectre of a generational creative scene\u2014racked up five nominations at the forthcoming Independent Spirit Awards, promising good things for the awards season ahead.<\/p>\n

Over the past year, Hall has remained just as attuned and even more busy<\/em>; this month she appears in James L. Brooks\u2019s political dramedy Ella McCay<\/em> with Emma Mackey, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Ayo Edebiri. She\u2019s also stepped into Ryan Murphy\u2019s flamboyant and expansive universe with a role in the next season of Monster,<\/em> about Lizzie Borden, and a part opposite Evan Peters in The Beauty.<\/em> (The duo play FBI agents who, while investigating a string of gruesome supermodel deaths, discover a sexually transmitted disease that\u2019s making people more beautiful\u2014with horrifying consequences.) Today, Hall is toggling between a stack of new scripts and mulling her next steps, whether that\u2019s picking up her oil paints again or directing another feature. Following her acclaimed directorial debut Passing,<\/em> Hall has plans to make a mother-daughter drama called Four Days Like Sunday<\/em>, inspired by her own life; it will focus on a 12-year-old girl navigating her relationship with her mom (Hall), a fading Broadway star. Her recent exhibition at Half Gallery, which features pieces pulled from different eras of Hall\u2019s life, has also nearly sold out.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a broad palette,\u201d says Hall with a shrug, speaking to me from Los Angeles. It\u2019s a sentiment that applies as much to her various artistic mediums as to her recent sartorial swings: She still finds it amusing that the Thom Browne trompe l\u2019oeil gown she wore to the Academy Museum Gala convinced half the room that she\u2019d painted her own torso. \u201cI mean, it was possible! People were looking at me, quite shocked. But, no, actually, I\u2019m more dressed than you are right now,\u201d she recalls with a wicked smile.<\/p>\n

Below, Rebecca Hall checks in with Vogue<\/em> about independent movie-making and \u201cdodo\u201d films, pushing herself with style, and the simple act of listening.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Rebecca<\/span><\/div>\n
Photo: Courtesy of Janus Films<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Vogue<\/em>: What was your first experience of Peter Hujar\u2019s work?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rebecca Hall:<\/strong> I\u2019m embarrassed to say it was pretty late! He was such an important figure, one who has, essentially, disappeared. For me, for a lot of people, it was always Robert Mapplethorpe who personified that scene. I came across [Hujar\u2019s] self-portraits and felt immediately struck. The way he shoots faces can be brutal and confronting, but also so sensitive. That strange interplay creates something quite intimate, and that interests me.<\/p>\n

Like the one of Candy Darling on her deathbed.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Exactly, and I just had to dig deeper when Ira approached me about this film. Reading the manuscript was eye-opening to a whole other era\u2014a hardship, a lack of money and food, the sometimes surreal day-to-day realities of being an artist in Manhattan.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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As Linda, how did you seek to honor that real-life person and their relationship, but also work without limitations on your own approach?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m so lucky to have had access to this very alive and fascinating person, to have access to the exact words she would have said. Beyond that, I didn\u2019t want to do an impersonation or caricature. It was always about capturing an essence.<\/p>\n

I spoke to her on the phone\u2014she\u2019s 91 now and lives in LA, and at the time I was in New York. My intention was to get to know as much about her as possible. I didn\u2019t approach it to create a mirror image of what happened. I always knew we were making something that had a sense of freedom to it: We\u2019re not wearing the same clothes, her apartment doesn\u2019t look anything like her actual apartment. We interpreted, made it poetic. In saying all this, Linda is very<\/em> difficult to get to talk about herself!<\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure she\u2019s probably more used to asking the questions.<\/strong><\/p>\n

She spent her life doing that! So that was a weird journey for her, and interesting for me to witness. Imagine transcribing these intimate conversations, losing the tapes, and the transcript shows up years later. Confronted with a reality she hadn\u2019t experienced in a long, long time. Turned into a movie. It really got me thinking about feelings of nostalgia, and how we choose to hold on to memory. In a way, I didn\u2019t really want to ask her a lot of questions about that time. I just wanted to know her. We ended up talking about baby names a lot\u2014she wrote books about baby names.<\/p>\n

Eventually I did say to her, \u201cOkay, Linda, I\u2019m going to have to do your Bronx accent.\u201d And she went, \u201cWhat are you talking about? I don\u2019t have an accent!\u201d I would ask her for voice notes on how to say hibiscus<\/em> or something, and she\u2019s changed how she said it a few times. We met for the first time at Sundance and sat together. We held hands. She leaned over at one point and said, \u201cRebecca, I can\u2019t hear an accent at all\u201d\u2014which, to me, was my greatest compliment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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We\u2019ve been living through the era of the biopic, but this movie\u2019s concept feels quite refreshing. It\u2019s set on a singular day, but it feels so sprawling.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think this movie is a dodo\u2014I don\u2019t know how it exists! The fact that this movie was made, when it\u2019s experimental in the real sense of that word, astounds me. It\u2019s just two people talking, with no drama or plot. It\u2019s more portraiture than anything. There\u2019s nothing on paper that would suggest this movie would move you to tears, but for me, it frequently does. It\u2019s a moment in history that\u2019s gone<\/em>. I\u2019m seeing a person who\u2019s going to die soon, a whole era of New York, a whole value system around art and creative expression [that\u2019s] disappeared. We\u2019ve given it space again, and that adds up to something very haunting and weirdly energetic to me.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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How did you and Ben Whishaw build up that tenderness?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We didn\u2019t know each other before this\u2014maybe we said hello at a party over the years, but we\u2019d never actually hung out. Ira does quite a brilliant thing\u2014he didn\u2019t want to rehearse anything, ever. No lines run together\u2014it\u2019s scary! What he does<\/em> want is for you to feel comfortable with each other. He sent Ben and I off to a diner just off the West Side Highway. It doesn\u2019t even exist anymore, but we spent the afternoon just telling each other everything. I came out feeling like I\u2019d made a new extremely close friend. I think that translates in the film.<\/p>\n

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\"Rebecca<\/span><\/div>\n
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Rebecca Hall at the Academy Museum Gala in Thom Browne.<\/p>\n

<\/span>Photo: Getty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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What\u2019s so beautiful about your acting is those super small gestures, in both Peter Hujar\u2019s Day<\/em> and Ella McCay<\/em>. Where moments can be so quick and fleeting, there\u2019s still an emotiveness and feeling of intimacy.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Acting in its purest form is the byproduct of people listening to each other. If you\u2019re in it enough, you shouldn\u2019t be thinking about what you\u2019re doing. I\u2019m just pausing, listening. And these times, I\u2019ve been lucky enough to have someone really extraordinary to listen to. I\u2019m also a director, so I\u2019m interested in watching people. I get to observe on different levels, which in many ways is my comfortable place. Some people find it hard, and I understand. It\u2019s hard to get out of your own way and just listen. But if you do just listen, it\u2019s simple.<\/p>\n

Do you see a throughline in the roles you\u2019re choosing?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure there is one but I don\u2019t really think about it. I have quite a broad palette. I\u2019m more drawn to the director\u2014and James L. Brooks and Ira Sachs have made some of my favorite films. Broadcast News<\/em> is as good as it gets. I love seeing these people operate.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re also now officially in the world of Ryan Murphy, with The Beauty<\/em> and the next season of Monster<\/em>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

That is super fun and I am having a totally delightful time. I am loving just getting to explore some wild, fun, crazy characters. My first introduction to his work, properly, was Feud<\/em>, the Bette and Joan story\u2014because I was so jealous that he got to make it! I really wanted to make it! I\u2019ve been obsessed with Bette Davis forever. It got me into all the other stuff\u2014I love how neat his worlds are, and tremendously fun, flamboyant, and colorful. He shows how many different ways there are to tell the stories, and so many different stories to be told.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Are you keeping up your painting practice?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have a show on at Half Gallery in New York right now with five of my paintings\u2014I\u2019ve sold everything else. They\u2019re from disparate times in my life. I\u2019ve not had much time in the studio, and I can\u2019t travel with my oil paints everywhere I go. As soon as I\u2019m done here, I\u2019ll get back in the studio and start churning them out again, because that\u2019s therapy for me.<\/p>\n

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I love your audience paintings.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I only had two of them left from the whole series to show! I collected photographs and images from people, various performers across various disciplines\u2014photos of the audience before they walked on stage, screen grabs\u2014all so I could paint audiences in different ways. I\u2019ve had an entire career doing things that people watch, and I\u2019ve built up this relationship with them, and I wanted to engage more thoughtfully with it. One in the show is just from my brain, of a generic cinema. Another is based on a photo I took of the audience, behind me, on the first night of the play Sarah Paulson was in called Appropriate<\/em> on Broadway. People are filtering in, someone has a COVID mask on, someone looks stressed. It was such a fun series, I will return to it!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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What\u2019s happening with your next proposed directing project, Four Days Like Sunday<\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The status is\u2026that independent cinema is really hard to get financed and I\u2019m still trying to raise a large chunk of money. I\u2019ll make that film one day. I might put it on hold for a minute and direct something else.<\/p>\n

What are you watching, reading, or listening to right now?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I still check in on The<\/em>Real Housewives of Salt Lake City<\/em>, but otherwise I\u2019m just reading a lot of scripts. I just read Enter Ghost<\/em> by Isabella Hammad. I\u2019m behind on all the recent new movies.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve hit the ground running with awards season. What will you wear? Your Thom Browne look at the Academy Museum Gala was incredible.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It was so fun to wear because everybody in the room assumed that I had just painted my naked torso. I mean\u2026possible? People were looking at me, quite shocked. But no, actually, I thought, I\u2019m more dressed than you are right now! I\u2019m always excited to play around with fashion and push myself. I love Kallmeyer\u2014she\u2019s my go-to for everything. I love Aflalo\u2014the balloon pants, the draped pieces. I\u2019m working up to a big press tour for The Beauty<\/em>, so there\u2019s lots of opportunity for something fabulous.<\/p>\n

Peter Hujar\u2019s Day and<\/em> Ella McCay are out now.<\/em> The Beauty will debut in January 2026. \u201cInnerdisciplinary\u201d at Half Gallery is on show through December 13, 2025.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

Source URL: http:\/\/vogue.com\/article\/rebecca-hall-ella-mccay-peter-hujars-day-interview<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TV & Movies Rebecca Hall on Moving Beyond the Biopic, Painting, and Entering Ryan Murphy\u2019s Universe By Anna Cafolla December 11, 2025 Photo: Courtesy of Janus Films As an actor, Rebecca Hall is forever tuning in to the hard-to-catch frequencies and day-to-day idiosyncrasies that make people, people. In 2024, she starred in Janicza Bravo\u2019s eerie […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1069421,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[50],"class_list":["post-1069420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-vogue-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1069420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1069420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1069420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1069421"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1069420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1069420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1069420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}