The last two years have been good ones for Emily Blunt, who earned major award nominations for “Oppenheimer” and “The Smashing Machine,” and co-starred in the global hit “The Devil Wears Prada 2.” But to the 43-year-old Blunt, few career milestones can compare with Steven Spielberg offering her the lead in “Disclosure Day,” in theaters now.
“As a child, I remember how it churned me up and left me feeling exactly like Elliott when E.T. left,” she said recently on a video call. “I remember being completely traumatized by ‘Jaws’ and thrilled by ‘Indiana Jones.’ So it is a very surreal thing where he wants to meet you and work with you.”
In “Disclosure Day,” Blunt stars as Margaret, a meteorologist in Kansas City, Mo., who seemingly becomes possessed during a broadcast, halting her weather report to croak out eerie alien clicks. Her strange behavior draws the attention of shadowy government operatives who hope to decipher her message, and soon Margaret is pulled into a decades-old conspiracy that could prove the existence of extraterrestrial life on Earth.
However, Blunt knew none of that when Spielberg invited her to their first meeting.
“It was very, very secretive, and I kind of love when even your agent doesn’t know what the movie is,” she said. As Spielberg described the project, Blunt could hardly believe she was being asked to star in something he considered akin to “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” and “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” — sci-fi blockbusters meant to capture what he felt as a child staring up at the stars.
“I spent the whole time going, ‘Mm-hmm,’ trying to really compose myself into something that is unflappable, when inwardly I was flappable,” she said.
Here are edited excerpts from our conversation.
Had you ever met Steven Spielberg before he offered you this film?
All I remember was being at the AFI luncheon for “Oppenheimer” with [its director] Chris Nolan, and everyone comes up to Chris the whole time — actors, filmmakers — to the point where he’s so used to it that he just doesn’t stand up anymore. And then I saw him look over my shoulder and stand up, and it was Steven!
People have called Nolan the heir to Spielberg. Having now worked with them both, how similar do you think they are?
I find them both incredibly courageous, very bold, able to handle a massive mythic world. But look, one’s very British and one is very much not. Chris is like a lot of members of my family, so that was very familiar territory to me. Even though he’s actually very tender with actors, there’s a no-nonsense, laser-beam throughline of communication, no softening the blows. Brits don’t enthuse about anything, really, because it’s perceived as gushy, so Chris is like a Blunt to me.
But there’s an instinctual thing that they both have. Even though Steven wears it more on his sleeve, something drops in on both of them, like they are touched. You never see either of them with their head in their hands, like, “How are we going to shoot this?,” ever.
Spielberg is known for his inventive blocking. In your first scene, Margaret is continually crisscrossing the room — peering at a laptop, making toast — and there’s a precision to all that movement that’s almost like choreography.
He wanted Margaret to constantly be in flight in the beginning — that restlessness, that inability to grab purchase of something — so she’s always moving. When we rehearsed it, he didn’t have any preconceived idea of how to shoot it. He just goes, “I was thinking you could start here, and whatever you want to do, kiddo, you should just feel it out.”
So you’re kind of doing it, and he’s watching you. He has this unlit cigar and he will hold his ear — all his little tics that I find so adorable — and he’ll walk around for a sec and go, “OK, here’s what we’re going to do.” He likes the spontaneity. I don’t think he orchestrates too much, and a lot of directors get very technical with the camera. But it’s so exciting to watch him build it right in front of you.
In your research, what did you learn about the personality of the American meteorologist?
They have this way of inviting you in and making you feel a part of the weather, like, “Isn’t it exciting?” They sort of sell you on it and make it fun, even if it’s going to be an absolute nightmare. Whereas in England, we’re a bit more defeatist about the weather, probably because it’s crap most of the time.
I talked with this amazing meteorologist — I don’t want to give her away, but she’s a very well-known one — and it’s a very full-on occupation. There’s an agility they have to think on their feet, because no matter what has happened in the news cycle that morning, the weather has to adjust. And they do their own hair and makeup, they do their own wardrobe. The woman that I spoke to said it was around the clock, and once she started having children, she couldn’t do it anymore.
You’re doing an American accent in this movie, even though Spielberg has surrounded you with other actors from the U.K. like Josh O’Connor, Colin Firth and Eve Hewson.
It was ridiculous! It really was the British invasion on Steven’s movie. Normally I’ll sort of try to stay in a midway point [with her American accent between takes], and then Josh O’Connor swans in and it’s over.
And you also have to speak seemingly fluent Korean and Russian. Was that hard to master?
I was always into languages. I really loved Spanish at school and my mom is a great linguist, so before I became an actor, I wanted to be a translator in Spanish for the U.N. I wish I could speak languages, but it’s like the same as me saying I should get good at the ukulele. I just need to really do it.
How did you conceive the alien clicking noises Margaret makes?
I have endless voice memos of various bizarre sounds that I would send Steven Spielberg. He really wanted a kaleidoscope of noises, he was trying to find it with me. Then when we had this range of sounds, from hums to singing like Barry White, we went into the sound booth and laid it all down. By then, he just said, “I think it needs to be mathematical and not terrifying. Strange and unsettling, but not scary.”
Your characters in recent movies like “Smashing Machine,” “Oppenheimer” and “The Devil Wears Prada 2” don’t always do the right thing. I sense that you like that ambiguity, but is it different when you’re playing someone like Margaret, who’s more straightforwardly the “good guy”?
Yeah. However they behave, I don’t have to agree with it, but I do have to understand it. Still, there is a darkness that burrows a bit when you’re playing people like Dawn Staples [a mixed martial arts fighter’s girlfriend in “Smashing Machine”] and Kitty Oppenheimer, and that’s not always a fun place to live as you’re doing it. With Margaret, I loved her so much and I admired her, and I missed her when the movie ended.
Do you often find that to be the case?
Sometimes, not always. Actually, more often than not, I’m like, “I made it through,” and occasionally you’ll have an experience that you cannot wait to see the back of. But all I’ve wanted is to keep discovering different human beings dwelling in me. I do find it very therapeutic doing this job — you can sublimate things you’ve experienced into something really artistic.
You said at the beginning of your career that you hoped “The Devil Wears Prada” would break you out of the British costume-drama stereotype. When you look at the very different parts you’ve played recently, do you credit the first “Prada” for putting you on that path?
That character in “Devil Wears Prada,” even though she’s a lunatic and a complete disaster as a person, it opened up a lot of doors to comedy and character roles. If you’re from England and you’re required to don a bonnet or be in “Foyle’s War” or do your time on British television in that way, it broke me into a different way of being seen. And I was very grateful.
In “The Devil Wears Prada 2,” when Miranda Priestly tells your character, Emily, “You’re not a visionary, you’re a vendor,” it’s the most scathing line in the movie. If Meryl Streep said that to me, I’d dissolve.
I did dissolve! We were very close, and then she fixes those minty green eyes on you, and I shriveled. She really relished the word “vendor” as well. But you need Emily to get a dressing down. It’s vital that character gets her comeuppance. I think it feels very Greek, that scene.
There have been some notable box-office success stories lately, including the massive worldwide success of “The Devil Wears Prada 2” and the surprise horror hits “Obsession” and “Backrooms.”
Isn’t it great? I’m so psyched that people are event-izing going to a movie again. This summer has been so exciting for all of us in the industry.
What do you think Hollywood will learn from those success stories?
With “Devil Wears Prada,” it felt like it had the potential to be a bit of a juggernaut because of the fever around it, though I don’t think we thought it would be to this extent.
But I love that something like “Project Hail Mary” comes along and people go, “Wait a second, so what’s the formula for what gets bums in seats?” I think it took people by surprise how well that movie did. We experienced it on “Quiet Place” [in which she starred with her husband, John Krasinski, who directed]: When that movie hit, we had so many friends going into studios afterward and being told, “OK, we need one of those.”
So what is the formula? Do you sense any throughline happening?
I don’t know if there’s a formula other than an extraordinary story, and that will catch fire. It just does. I think if you can move people and create something familiar but new, maybe that’s the formula. Maybe that’s the thing that works.
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