Jordana Brewster has returned to the silver screen with a twisty psychological thriller, and during a conversation with Newsweek, she opened up about the “biggest challenge” she faced starring in the project.
While Brewster first landed a role on television when she was a teenager, her breakout role was as Mia Toretto in the action film The Fast and the Furious, reprising the role in a variety of its sequels. Other film credits include the drama The Invisible Circus and the horror film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning.
The actor’s latest role is in Cellar Door as mathematics professor Sera. Looking for a fresh start after a miscarriage, Sera and her husband John (Scott Speedman) find themselves being gifted the house of their dreams by the wealthy and mysterious homeowner, Emmett (Laurence Fishburne). However, there is one caveat—they can never open the cellar door. Whether they can live without knowing triggers shocking consequences.
Now, Brewster has revealed how she used her own pain to help convey Sera’s and explained that once filming is over, she tries to completely remove herself from the characters she plays.
“Playing a role where you can relate to certain aspects helps you heal from that stuff because you’re using pain in a way for art or it’s a way to get it out and purge it,” she told Newsweek. “I read a lot of scripts where it’s like, ‘Oh the supportive housewife, supportive wife period,’ and I was like, ‘I’m really tired of playing that.’ So, it was really fun to play the, you know, how torn she is about wanting to start a family and not being able to succeed initially, and then the betrayal. It’s super layered and so it was a really fun role to take on.”
Like Sera, Brewster has faced fertility issues. Brewster and her ex-husband, Andrew Form, welcomed sons Julian and Rowan via surrogacy in 2013 and 2016 after a few failed rounds of in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatments.
The actor wanted to portray Sera’s struggles as authentically as possible but found it difficult transitioning back to her normal life once the project was over.
“I find the difficulty in going from a set back to home life—because that is a very structured, active, productive environment—and then to switch gears back to soccer mom, that’s the biggest challenge for me,” Brewster explained. “It’s like, how to go, ‘Oh OK, now we’re not doing this, I don’t have a driver taking me to set, and now I’m taking my kids.’ That’s the harder transition for me as a woman, but as an actor, usually I’m purging aspects of myself when I’m playing roles and that’s really helpful.”
Brewster said the kind of environment that’s created on set can make it easier or harder to let go of a character. Thankfully, Brewster said director Vaughn Stein was a joy to work with.
“I think it depends on the tone on set, like Vaughn [Stein] is very light-hearted and funny and sweet and so I never felt like a dense, gross energy, you know? So that really helps as well, so that you can just slow it off in a way,” she said.
Even though Stein created a good environment to work in, the film is still ominous and psychological with emotional layers. While the luxurious home seems like the answer to all the couple’s problems, things eventually take a dark turn, turning John and Sera’s relationship on its head.
Over the years Brewster has perfected a routine when it comes to making sure she doesn’t bring a film’s dark energy home with her.
“I remember when I shot Texas Chainsaw. There were so many, and this was so long ago, but there were so many night shoots. I was being chased with this gross guy with a giant chainsaw. I had to put myself in a state of hyperventilating and freaking out and when I finished that, my system was shot,” she explained.
Brewster continued: “So I did do a lot to make sure, OK, [I’m] leaving that and now coming into my space but you have to do it consciously…I also really believe in energy, so I don’t want to bring any of that stuff and carry it around. So, whether it’s saging, whether it’s a bath, whether it’s consciously just cleansing all of that out. I think it’s important because the reason these films appeal to people, the reason these themes appeal to people is because they’re real and you can either tap into them or not.”
Without giving too much away, Sera ignores a lot of the things that are happening around her in an effort to build her dream life and maintain some kind of normalcy after experiencing the trauma of a miscarriage. This is something Brewster said she could resonate with.
“I totally relate to it because I feel like sometimes, when you build an idea of what you want, you’re so threatened by anyone shaking the boat at all and it’s almost like, I think of it as like a Jenga tower. If you take one piece off, the whole thing’s gonna come down,” she explained. “I think that that’s how she feels and that’s why she’s blocking out, like ‘No, no, no, there’s no there’s, no problem, there’s no reason to look there.’”
Brewster added: “I think she knows deep down what’s happening…but you really understand the Stepford wife of it all because you’re just trying to keep things together. So, I related to that, I could understand that and so it was very fun to play.”
As to whether Brewster could move into a home where the caveat is you can’t go into the cellar? That’s a big fat no.
“I couldn’t because I’m really good at mind-effing myself and I’ll find every possible awful scenario. And I would probably make stuff up that was worse than what’s actually in the cellar,” the star explained. “I think the cellar is a reflection of, hey, can you compartmentalize? Can you look at that? Do you see the glasses half full or half empty? And I’m working really hard on it, but generally I see it as half empty, so I absolutely could not make that Faustian bargain. There’s no way.”
Lionsgate launched Cellar Door in limited U.S. theaters plus on-demand platforms on November 1.
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