Rebecca Miller’s family ties to the stage are now part of her onscreen inspiration.
The writer-director, whose father is playwright Arthur Miller, takes on the world of opera with her latest dramedy, “She Came to Me.” Peter Dinklage stars as opera composer Steven Lauddem, whose marriage to Patricia (Anne Hathaway) is one of the many stagnant aspects of his life. As Steven looks for creative inspiration, he finds a spark with a tugboat captain (Marisa Tomei) and a love triangle ensues. Hathaway’s character meanwhile is an OCD-addled therapist with aspirations of becoming a nun.
Miller enlisted composer Daniel Felsenfeld and Metropolitan Opera general manager Peter Gelb to consult on the film for an authentic peek into the world of composers and opera. Lead actress Hathaway additionally produces the film, rounding out her slew of new releases this year with “Eileen” and “Mothers’ Instinct,” while currently in production on A24’s “Mother Mary.”
“She Came to Me” premiered at the Berlin Film Festival and went on to screen at the Hudson Film Festival. The film features a new original song by Bruce Springsteen, titled “Addicted to Romance.” Miller told Entertainment Weekly that life imitated art as Springsteen said he was inspired by “She Came to Me” to write for the first time in over a year.
“When the composer of the film, Bryce Dessner, and I were talking about who could write a song for the movie, I said I wanted a song that was purely American, and timeless,” Miller said. “And Bryce said, ‘Well, there is one person for that, and it’s Bruce Springsteen.’ But it seemed unattainable.”
She continued, “It’s a song that seems like it could have existed forever, right out of the American Songbook. And the really extraordinary thing is, Bruce told me he hadn’t written in over a year, but the film inspired him to do so, parallel to the way Steven is unblocked in the movie. Again, the mysteries of creativity, and how we are all creating each other, day by day.”
IndieWire’s Kate Erbland reviewed “She Came to Me” out of Berlin, praising Miller for “grounding some of the kookier details in the trappings of a typical NYC romance: sunlit streets, dreamy brownstones, interconnected tales, hammy declarations of devotion, miscommunications, and (of course) trips to the opera.”
Erbland wrote, “The surroundings are familiar, but Miller wants to use these tropes to interrogate what romance actually means, the true value of love, and how following your bliss might land you in the nuthouse.”
“She Came to Me” premieres September 29 in theaters from Vertical. Check out the trailer below.
