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"That dark humor shows up at just the right moments."
When it comes to dolls, you either love them, think they're creepy, or are indifferent. Fortunately for Allison Williams, she falls into the latter category. "I don't have a deep-seated doll aversion." Which makes her the perfect person to star in a film like M3GAN (January 6), about a realistic robot doll that is supposed to be a child's best friend, but turns out to be everybody's worst enemy. Williams plays Gemma, M3GAN's creator, who suddenly is forced to care for her niece after her sister's untimely death. "This very human thing happens to her and she does not know how to deal with it, and she reaches for the thing that is most successful and understandable to her, which is a piece of technology." While the film is scary, it's also funny. It opens with an absurd yet realistic toy commercial. "They're just like one degree off the mark, which is what allows it to be funny." But for Williams, what stood out was how much of a "Bechdel dream" for female representation M3GAN is. "This movie is not about she's got it all, but she doesn't have a guy. It's not about that."
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When the trailer dropped, it immediately went viral. Especially M3GAN's dance. I'm pretty sure it's going to be a dance on Drag Race someday. Were you surprised how quickly it spread?
Oh my God, I would be so thrilled. It was the most exciting day, honestly. It was so great. We were so determined to introduce M3GAN to the world and get it right and try to make sure that we conveyed her vibe and the way she is iconic to us and try to translate that and make sure other people understood it. There's no guarantee that that's going to come through. There's no guarantee that people are going to connect with it and get it in that way. So when people started interacting with it, making memes, dressing up like her for Halloween, putting her dance to other music, we were just like, this is better than we could have dreamed of. It was so exciting and we thought, at very least, people get her. They understand her. They know how to use her for humor. The memes were hilarious. We were just so tickled and and relieved honestly.
Have you ever had a terrifying doll?
I had a bevy of Barbies and American Girl Dolls and stuff like that, but I was never into them. And then once I wasn't into them anymore, they did not live on my shelves, which must mean that I was wary, but I don't have a deep-seated doll aversion that I can connect with. The same with clowns. I don't love a clown, I'm not seeking them out, but I don't get chills down my spine when I see one. My fears were much more like home invasion, being haunted by a ghost, of that variety.
With M3GAN, she's certainly creepy in an uncanny valley sort of way. How did the team find the balance with her appearance?
I wish I could be like, I did all of it. I was the engineer behind M3GAN, but I was only her engineer in the movie. There were so many people who contributed to it because it was, without giving away the actual magic of how she appears on screen, basically every department is involved in creating the M3GAN you see in the movie. Which is kind of cool when you think about it. Everyone from the crew is helping in that endeavor in a way that they aren't necessarily when it's a different kind of performer, so I feel like it was a process that was full of [director] Gerard [Johnstone]'s sensibility, and his tonal specificity, just knowing when the costume was right with that bow and everything, just testing and testing and testing and seeing things and tweaking and just finally getting it right with her hair, her eyes and everything like it. We just got there eventually and I give a lot of credit to all of the people who designed those things and also to Gerard who just had this idea in his head and was able to realize it. Eventually the uncanniness comes from the fact that she's so human, and she's human in person, it's just a very surreal experience.
How did you act against this doll that's real but not real? As a performer was it difficult to act against?
Well, I can't really answer that because of the way we achieved her. Part of my job was making sure that calibrated for where we were in the movie. Gemma's interactions with M3GAN were either that of her boss, or her subordinate at times, her creator, whatever the dynamic was, for me just trying to summon wherever we were in our arc of telling the story and what M3GAN wanted in that moment and what Gemma wanted and all of those old-fashioned acting things. In some ways that stuff never really changes, no matter what or who you're acting across from, you just have to get there somehow, and sometimes it's harder than others. This movie was really challenging but rewarding. I learned a lot.
As a millennial, I related to your character so much because she's exactly like so many of my friends: not having kids, not even thinking about it. What about this story stood out to you that made you want to do it?
I really thought Gemma was cool, and I wanted to bring her to life. I wanted there to be a character like her, who hadn't ever thought about having kids, probably doesn't want them. Fifty percent of my friends, they're just into their jobs and into their friendships and into being able to play video games and just have time to yourself and collect toys, etc. I thought that was so cool and she's brilliant and she's so good at what she does. So I thought this is a character that I don't see a lot, but that I think is awesome. And this movie is not about she's got it all, but she doesn't have a guy. It's not about that. It's just her obsession with what she does to the detriment of other people and this very human thing happens to her and she does not know how to deal with it and she reaches for the thing that is most successful and understandable to her, which is a piece of technology that she's built to help her deal with the humanity that has confronted her. I just thought that was a kind of extreme version of something that, to your point, is relatable for people in our generation. But I feel like I haven't seen it a lot.
Even her explaining to a kid why she keeps a toy in its original packaging.
It's one of those things that the minute the words come out of her mouth, she's like this sounds crazy. Little girl looking at me like I have lost my mind. And yet, how do you tell her this is not a toy? It's so much more than a toy. It's just such an abstract concept to a kid. The moment where Gemma tears open the box, it is one that a couple of my friends said they felt like they were being stabbed with that box cutter.
Because the toys could be worth money someday.
I remember when we were younger, Pokémon cards were all the rage and pogs and Beanie Babies. I had some friends who had the self-control to get a Beanie Baby and their parents were like listen, this thing is straight gold. You keep it. You put a thing over the tag, you put it in a glass case and you leave it. Those kids grew up to, I don't know, be really disciplined, probably intense lawyers. And then there was me who was like, but I'm going to make this polar bear make out with this swan and I can't do that with the tags on. And my parents were like, well, we're not going to be making any extra income off this.
I always enjoyed putting the Barbie clothes on my G.I. Joes.
How did it look?
Great. I've turned out great. Everything's fine.
Same. Well established. Nothing's wrong over here. [laughs]
What really surprised me was how funny the film is, but in a seriously dark way. Did that stand out to you?
Yeah, definitely. I mean, a lot of it is on the page for sure. Akela [Cooper] is so good at writing everything and then Gerard's sensibility, his tone is so Kiwi humor, it's super specific. It's very sardonic. Dark, dark, dark, dark, dark but for a genre movie and for a movie like this that has to do with the doll. Dark humor is the dream. That dark humor shows up at just the right moments and just the right intervals where you still are like OK, I'm in a thriller, that's for sure, but what a nice release valve to have. Where I can giggle at this spontaneous song that I did not see coming. Because who would sing in this moment? That's ludicrous. In my mind, that's the best execution of the genre, because it means that you're still in the subject area that's interesting and rich, and you're still having serious high stakes moments, but you're not bathing in it the whole movie, which would make for a pretty heavy experience I think. I give [Gerard] a lot of the credit for the tonal specificity throughout.
It's so true. Even in the beginning, starting with that absurd toy commercial.
A line in it that kills me every time, '"ives longer than you do." The idea that her dog died and it was sad and now she has a pet that lives longer than she does. Dropping that into a kids commercial is so funny and weird. And, of course, these battery-operated toys will outlive all of us as long as there are batteries and that is just unsettling.
Yes, and even though it's a wild commercial, it feels like a real toy commercial you'd see on TV.
A lot of things in the movie are like that. Where they're just like one degree off the mark, which is what allows it to be funny.
Do you see a world in which a doll like M3GAN could exist in the world?
Definitely. I think it's really interesting because there will probably be robots that do various elements of what she does. It seems obvious that someone would try to package them into one form. The thing that will take the longest is her locomotion. When I was doing research for it, it seems like we're very far from anyone being able to move the way she does spontaneously. Her verbal life is a little bit more within reach, but the movement is what would take the longest. In terms of realism, there's so much out there once you start diving into the world of A.I. and where people are and how advanced the technology is, it's kind of breathtaking. We have crossed many, many lines that most of us who aren't in that field assume we just haven't crossed yet. Whereas people who work in that world were very happy to engage with the ethics of it and talk about everything the rest of us are kind of behind on. That conversation, which I think is a little scary because it's already here and we haven't decided how we feel about it, but there's many ethical questions like if you're giving something any kind of artificial intelligence, what are your responsibilities to it? What do you owe it? How do you keep it safe from itself when it becomes self aware, etc.?
Also not once does your character talk about needing a man or falling in love. That really stood out to me.
Yeah, this is the Bechdel dream. I love that element of it. She really misses the mark in some ways, and it's also a meditation on what does parenthood, guardianship, whatever you want to call it, do to work? What does this say about her ability to stay in her job and keep doing what she loves? I love that part about her.
Looking at your iMDB, it feels like, because you don't do a film every year, you're very specific about the projects you do. Do you feel that and how do you navigate what you'll do?
It's a total combination. I wish I could be like I just sit in meditation and then I point to a script. But it's a combination of things that don't work out, stuff I pass on. But it definitely is part of the privilege of being able to be selective, which from being on Girls so early in my career, I have been able to. So it it taught me to step back and really wait for things that are good. The time may come when things stop coming my way, in which case things on my iMDB are about to get real interesting, but for now I get to be selective and keep digging and digging away from the last character into the next one in a way that I think is interesting. And playing around with tone, playing with genre, playing with format, all of that stuff. Another part of it is that, you said you don't do a movie every year, I feel like I do because I work on these from the moment I sign on very granularly and with a lot of investment until after it's come out. It feels like I'm always working because I am always working on something. I might just not always have something coming out.
Is there a world in which you think we could have a Girls reboot where it's like "Girls" in quotes because y'all will be middle-aged or something?
100 percent. Are you kidding? Are you kidding? Totally. I would love that. I also think it would be so interesting to revisit these characters after a couple decades and just see what they've been up to. I absolutely I would love that. Sign me up.
Where do you think Marnie would be?
Oh my gosh, no idea. Maybe another marriage? She's done a line of jewelry that is not successful. Maybe she went back to school or something. I think she's still searching. She feels to me like someone who will forever be looking for something.
I love the idea of her having a moderately successful Etsy shop.
No. I think she's too lazy for Etsy. [laughs]
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