‘Cat Person’ director Susanna Fogel talks about turning a viral New Yorker short story into a movie
Director Susanna Fogel sits down with Yahoo Entertainment’s Kevin Polowy to discuss her new movie, “Cat Person,” which tells the story of a toxic love affair and is based on a New Yorker magazine fiction piece.
Video Transcript
KEVIN POLOWY: Were you aware of the "Cat Person" article when it first dropped? I think it was 2017. Like what do you remember being your first reaction to it?
SUSANNA FOGEL: Yeah, I was. It was talked about widely with my group of friends. And this article was really provocative, and polarizing, and made people really angry and really passionate, and so did the movie. And the movie will continue to do that. And I'm totally game for that.
KEVIN POLOWY: I think one of the most clever and memorable, and also like most well executed aspects of the film is these little visions that Margot has of like all of the violent and dangerous things that Robert can do to her in the moment. I mean, that was-- I think that was one of the first things my wife and I discussed or sort of after we watched it. Because it just felt like, I was like, that has to be that-- I was aware of that. But it was like that feels like it's really cemented that's probably a really universal experience for women.
SUSANNA FOGEL: Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think that like as women, we live in like a multi-genre. Like our lives have many genres. You know, like we're always afraid for our lives to a subconscious pervasive degree.
Because we are always aware that like we are vulnerable to people that are bigger than us, specifically men. So that's always going on, no matter what else is going on. There's always like a bit of a fight or flight that exists in our brains.
KEVIN POLOWY: There are so many cringey scenes. And I do mean that as a compliment. Including that first kiss, tongue all down the throat. It was so incredibly awkward to watch. I mean, what were the rehearsals like for that? Like did you guys have to strategize how bad and offputting that would look?
SUSANNA FOGEL: Honestly, it was-- we didn't rehearse that kiss. We talked about what was bad about it. And then we just did it.
Like it was fun. It was really hard not to laugh. I mean, it's really hard for the actors to not like laugh into do each other's mouths the entire time. Like the minute we would call cut, they would like be completely beside themselves laughing.
KEVIN POLOWY: I mean, similarly, like you know it's probably also one of the cringiest sex scenes we've seen in a long time. And it's not over all that quickly. You go through the wringer with her, really. You feel for her.
SUSANNA FOGEL: Yep, yep.
KEVIN POLOWY: What was the mood like capturing that?
SUSANNA FOGEL: We made these storyboards. And they kind of looked like a comic strip version of what the scene ended up being. And it was so funny to look at.
Because it has every awkward look, every time she's talking to herself, every time he's like, what? You know, it's like presented in a-- just in these panels. And it is like the funniest flip book to look through.
But when I showed the actors, they were like, this is hilarious. We can't wait to shoot this. And then actually making it was really fun.
