Henry Golding is just like us: When he sees a film directed by the wonderfully inventive Spanish filmmaker Nacho Vigalondo, he’s all in. And, nearly a decade after being floored by Vigalondo’s big breakout, the Anne Hathaway-starring “Colossal,” Golding finally got to join the “kooky” filmmaker in his latest venture. As he tells us in his first interview in support of the film, the experience did not at all disappoint.
Vigalondo’s latest, “Daniela Forever,” will premiere this week at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival, where it will open the Platform lineup. The film, which stars Golding and “The White Lotus” breakout Beatrice Grannò, is a sci-fi love story that blends together beloved films like “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” “The Science of Sleep,” and even a bit of “Inception.” But, being a Vigalondo joint, the film is also very much its own thing.
That’s what Golding is interested in these days. Since first breaking out in “Crazy Rich Asians,” Golding has sought to diversify the kind of roles he takes. The part of Nicholas in Vigalondo’s film scratched a lot of itches for him: It’s a full meal of a part, with a rich arc, tons of emotions to mine, and plenty of off-kilter elements to delight in. Set in Madrid, the film opens with Golding’s character dealing with a terrible tragedy: The death of his beloved girlfriend Daniela (Grannò). When Nicholas is given the opportunity to heal by way of drug-induced lucid dreaming, he takes things in a very different (read: not at all prescribed) direction, using his new power to control dreams to build a world in which Daniela is still very much alive, and their love story can continue.
But what happens inside Nicholas’ head — with Vigalondo cleverly differentiating between the “real world” and the “dream world” by way of not just different shooting styles but cameras and film stock — isn’t at all what he expected. It is, however, precisely what Golding has been looking for, and already one of his “favorite, favorite” experiences to date. Ahead, Golding takes us through his latest leading role, and even makes the time to chat about the franchise he’d join “as a space janitor” and the “cray-cray” directions of his much-hyped return to the “Simple Favor” world.
The following interview has been edited and condensed.
IndieWire: How did this project first come to you? When you hear someone is doing a project with Nacho, it kind of perks your ears up.
Henry Golding: Yeah, 100 percent. I watched “Colossal” when it first came out in the cinema, and I was like, this is a wacky, wacky movie. Whoever made this is brilliant, because to pull it off, a story like that and have it be fun, and also it touches on some really tough violence issues, and having this, creating this monster aspect and sci-fi, and intertwining all of those elements, I was like, wow, that’s an amazing director.
So when my team told me about “Daniela Forever,” and they were like, “Oh, and it’s Nacho Vigalondo, he did ‘Colossal,’” I was like, holy shit. I read the script, absolutely fell in love with it. It had all those elements that I saw in “Colossal,” and I was like, if anyone can pull this off, it’s Nacho, with heart and grace and humor. I was all in.
What was your first meeting with Nacho like?
He is the kookiest. [Laughs] But to be honest with you, in the meeting obviously, he’s on his best behavior, I’m on my best behavior, trying to be professionals in making very serious art. But in fact, it’s not until you meet him in person does the real Nacho come out. I think we have a very special bond, and I think we bring out the kookiest elements of each other, which is hilarious. We’ve very much got a similar sense of humor.
But the first meeting, it was strictly professionals talking about character, and how are we going to execute this, and what he wanted. But then when I got to Madrid and we got all the elements together, Beatrice was there and we were discussing the script, and we’d gone out for some tapas. We shot it in Madrid, which was hell! A horrible place to film! [Laughs] It was the most fantastic experience. Our relationship grew stronger and stronger as the production went on.
In the film, there are two very distinct worlds that your character occupies. What does that look like on the page? How did you envision how that would translate to the screen?
In his day-to-day life, in his real life, he’s gone through such a trauma and he’s gone through such a depression and he’s still in it, so everything is kind of doldrum and nothing excites him visually. He’s not stimulated by his friends who keep trying to uplift him. The times that he’s in his dreams, he’s with the one thing that makes him happy, and that’s Daniela, or the memory of Daniela.
For me, it was quite easy to distinguish where we were in the world, until things start going awry later in the movie. Then it becomes a blur of reality and he’s not sure where he stands anymore. That was more fun. It’s when things started sort of blending in with each other. Where the panic kind of sets in is like, is he dreaming or isn’t he dreaming? It’s one of my favorite, favorite things that I’ve ever done, to be able to play in that world.
The film has some nice comparisons when you’re trying to explain it, plenty of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” and “The Science of Sleep.” Were you thinking of those films while making this one?
“Eternal Sunshine” was always a very soft comp, in terms of reality bending. They are definitely very, very different movies, but I always kind of described [“Daniela Forever”] in that vein. I had seen that, obviously, a long, long time ago.
But how we shot it was really different, we shot the reality with old Beta cams, and so it’s washed out, it’s fuzzy around the edges, it’s this beautiful texture of this very doldrum world. Then once you see the vividness of our cinema cameras, you start realizing like, “Holy shit, he’s dreaming.” It’s so vivid and so surreal. That was a really kind of brave technical thing that Nacho fought for tooth and nail, and I have to commend all our partners on allowing him to do that, because I don’t think it’s ever been done like that before.
Nicholas is still mostly the same person at first, and then there’s a real divergence. It’s the same thing with Daniela, but to a much higher degree. Beatrice must have had so much fun in those first scenes, and you must have enjoyed watching her shape Daniela in so many ways.
She did a fantastic job in juggling that, because she needed to know where and when she was, lack of a better word, programmed, or had evolved to become who she was like Daniela originally. In the beginning, she’s a very much a blank slate and does whatever Nicolas tells her to do or likes, whatever Nicolas tells her to until she becomes sentient. Such a weird word to associate with a person!
But for her, until that point, she’s kind of this love doll in a weird way, because he’s like, “Oh, you love me and only me,” and she’s like, “Oh, I do love you.” Follows him around like a puppy dog, whilst he’s exploring this world that he’s continuously building, and therein lies the God complex. He starts abusing his powers in some ways because, why wouldn’t you? You have this ability to create feelings and create worlds. You would get carried away.
Even though the film is called “Daniela Forever,” you are in every single scene. What is it like when you realize that? That this a true leading role and you really can’t hide.
It’s the first time that I’ve been able to really build a character like that. You always have a character that starts on a high, and then goes through a challenge, and then comes back on a high, when it’s the exact opposite in this film. He starts off in the ditches of depression, and then finally he realizes he has this access to this amazing drug, and then suddenly he’s falling off the cliff again because he’s taking advantage of it, and he’s realizing his world is crumbling. He has a very distinctly opposite character flow. It was really nice to be able to explore that off the page and try to build in these little moments of him realizing his own shortcomings. There’s moments where he just breaks down and just can’t believe what’s happening, and he’s so scared of losing her again. It was such a layered character to play. It was an absolute joy.
The film has a lot to say about what it really means to love someone. Nicholas learns that the hard way. How did you approach that?
I think there’s this sort of ingrained fallacy of “one true love,” and we’ve been sold this dream about one true love. For some people, when they come to the stark realization that someone can love somebody else, it’s very, very challenging. I think that’s what Nicolas sort comes across. He has these lofty dreams of being in love with the same person and having this perfect life. When that all comes to end, he’s absolutely distraught, and I think that’s why he’s so stuck in that depression because he thinks he’s lost his true love.
Then he gets her back, but then he realizes that, “Oh, was I her true love?” His world starts to crumble, and then he starts trying to control the outcome, … “I want to make this world the perfect world, how do I do that?” By changing her memories and changing her outlook, then is it really her? He’s changed her so much.
When you first signed on for this, most of the headlines were about you making a turn into sci-fi. Do you consider this sci-fi?
I would say it’s more fantasy sci-fi in a very soft, grounded fantasy sci-fi. We’ll just keep adding descriptive words. [Laughs]
It’s certainly a different kind of film and role for you. In the years since “Crazy Rich Asians,” you seem to have purposely taken on a very wide range of roles. How are you choosing roles?
A lot of it is really diversity. It would have been easy to fall in to rom-coms and love stories and being the love interest after “Crazy Rich Asians,” “A Simple Favor,” and “Last Christmas,” those were my first pretty much three films. So doing something like “The Gentleman” or “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare,” all of those were choices to sort of diversify that range.
Doing something like this, the emotionality really drew me to the character. I’ve never been, on-screen, as emotional and distraught and happy all at the same time with a character like this. It was an important one, to show a lot of my range, and to have heartbreak and to have joy. It’s really rare to find that in a character’s arc in a movie. He has such a complete arc.
When choosing roles, it’s about, “Can I find those pieces of a portrayal I’m yearning to really grip onto?” But then also, sometimes it’s my taste in movies. If a big sci-fi role, like an “Aliens” or something came up, oh my God, I’m such a big fan. Have you seen “Romulus”?
Yes!
Pretty damn good! I was a huge “Alien” fan. If anybody called me to be a space janitor on one of those spaceships, I’m like, I’m in. You don’t even need to say anything. … That’s like the dream, growing up with those movies. It’s one of the franchises that it doesn’t matter what film it is, I will always watch an “Alien” movie. I kind of want a “Prometheus 3,” though. I’m waiting for that storyline to keep going, and I see what happens!
What’s the actual next thing for you?
Next, next thing? Oh my God. Coming out or to film? I just got off “Nine Perfect Strangers,” and we shot that in Munich for six months, which was kind of crazy. We have “The Old Guard 2,” which is kind of in the can with some adjustments that need to be made. What else do we have? Geez.
“A Simple Favor 2”! Dude, I’m telling you, this movie is cray-cray. You guys are going to be like, this is brilliant, this is exactly what we needed from a sequel like this. If people thought the first film was a little strange and kooky, this just amps it up. Paul [Feig] did such an amazing job. There’s many great new characters.
I’m really looking out for roles like Nicholas and “Daniela Forever.” I really love the art of making a film like that and being able to dedicate a lot of energy to creating the character in the way that I want to see it portrayed. Always on the lookout for something new.
“Daniela Forever” will premiere at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. It is currently seeking U.S. distribution.
