/Film Interview: Michael Cera And Sebastian Silva Talk ‘Crystal Fairy’
IsSebastian Silva’sCrystal Fairya drug film? A road trip film, or a comedy? Maybe a drama, or an experimental film? In fact, the movie is all of those things. Filmed on a shoestring budget while waiting to make another movie calledMagic Magic,Crystal FairystarsMichael Ceraas Jamie, an American traveling in Chile hoping to trip on the psychedelic chemical in the San Pedro cactus. Along the way he picks up a crazy American girl named Crystal (Gaby Hoffman) and with three brothers in tow they all go on a very awkward journey of discovery. Basically, it’s a film that defies any real classification beyond “captivating.”
That nature is why I was so excited to talk at length with the writer/director and star of the film. We spoke to Cera and Silva about the film and talked about its eccentricities, its different tones, strong female representation, and the idea of Cera playing a total ass. (OK, we touched onArrested Development, too.)
The film is now playing in select cities and on-demand. Read our interview below.
Note: There are some spoilers in here. They’re clearly marked./Film:What I really like about this movie is the tonal shifts. It can be really funny one moment and uncomfortable and serious the next. How do you guys go about making sure that works in a movie? It can be so unsettling.
Michael Cera: Life is kind of like that.Silva:Yeah, life is like that. We could be making fun now and then my mom could call me crying because of something and then I’m like “No, Michael wait…” Life shifts just like that all the time, so that would be my answer, to keep it really, really honest.Cera: Yeah, and what you said about it potentially being unsettling, that kind of jarring ever changing nature of the film is what’s fun about it. I think that’s part of the ride of it, you’re not quite sure where it’s going or where you’re supposed to be at with it. That’s the joy of it, I think.The movie has a very simple narrative. Jaime wants to take his friends to do drugs and you introduce them to Crystal. Usually actors or directors have a narrative to grasp on to, like “I know I have this arc where we have to go from point A to point B.” Here’s its not necessarily like that. So what is that like when you don’t have the narrative to work with and it’s really just the character arc that’s driving the film?
Silva:I don’t see why there’s no narrative arc within the psychology of the characters. I feel that that’s where the narrative of this movie sort of lives, like maybe yeah it’s A to B, because it’s a road trip and most road trips are like that, but the movies that I like personally are not as eventful as whatever Hollywood movies are where they like steal a car, then the car explodes, then they need to run, they jump on a horse, then they get sucked in by a galactic portal….That sounds like a good movie by the way.[Everyone Laughs]
Cera:That’s true, that’s where it feels really thin.[SPOILER START] Silva:Yeah, an extremely eventful movie with no real narrative arc, because a narrative arc ofCrystal Fairyis really within the characters. Like Michael goes from selfishness to compassion. That’s a huge change. It’s a huge arc and Gaby goes from Crystal Fairy to Isabelle. It’s big. It’s big for our characters.[SPOILER END]There is a narrative arc, but it’s within the characters.Michael, your character here is quite different from what audiences are used to seeing you play. Is that why you wanted to explore a character like this with Sebastian? As I watched the movie a second time I found myself writing down adjectives and it’s impossible to really define him as one person. He’s a total dick. He’s all over the map.
Yeah, everything. There’s a long list of terms to describe him.
Cera:Yeah, there’s a moment where he’s kind of funny and actually enjoying himself, which is one moment when they are playing “Would you rather?” He actually laughs, so he’s having fun, but it’s the only time you see that, otherwise he is really freaked out.You always think he’s going somewhere mean though…
Silva:It’s so unfair, but yet it’s so relatable. He invited her and then is like “Who cares…“You could argue that Jaime here is a step towards to the “Michael Cera” of This Is The End — that character is almost the uber-Jaime. Did you think about that, that when the movies were going to come out that the two characters were kind of similar?
Silva:I want to see that. Is it out?Cera:Yeah, it’s out.Silva:Fun, man.Cera:Go whileCrystal Fairyis screening [at Los Angeles Film Festival] tonight.While at Sundance I missed Magic Magic so I haven’t seen it, but I did notice that this and Magic Magic both have a strong female character at the center, with Gaby here and Juno [Temple] in Magic Magic. When you were developing the movies, was that something you really wanted to explore, the strong female character?
Cera:Why?Silva:I don’t know, because he felt that I was not exploring men enough and it was more interesting that I would see that weakness in a man. But then it’s sort of like forMagic Magicshe’s having early schizophrenia, and a young women triggers schizophrenia at that age, like early twenties, and men don’t. Men, I think, have that later in their late to mid-thirties, so it was also like a clinical thing with why I decided to make her a woman. I guess that’s the answer. And thenCrystal Fairy, I don’t know if you know, but it’s something that really happened. Twelve years ago I went with my buddy to take mezcoline and we invited a woman that went by the name of “Crystal Fairy” and the story just came with a woman.Cera:It’d be interesting if Crystal Fairy was the guy.Not knowing that, I saw Crystal Fairy and Jaime as a ying and a yang where he’s really high strung and she’s really laid back. Is that a dynamic that you guys were honed in on or did that happen in the characters?
[SPOILER START] Silva:Yeah, they are similar. I don’t feel that she’s actually that laid back. She is so conflicted with herself, like when she’s in the grocery store and she’s like “Don’t buy sugar. What are you doing?” She has this whole premade speech and then you see her gulping on a Coca Cola bottle. She doesn’t know what she’s doing. She’s really not chill and she’s going by this name and she finally reveals that she was raped and then after she tries to bring that bunny back to life and she is completely frustrated by her…. Yeah, this fantasy life that she’s been trying to lead and then she knows the bunny is not coming back to life, so what is she doing? She is so frustrated and then after that I feel that she becomes Isabelle.[SPOILER END]Cera:Yeah, they are both escaping themselves through different means basically.You said you had real life inspiration, but when you’re making a movie of it, do you have like road trip movies or drug movies in mind? It’s a cool genre with great movies in there.
That was one thing, like I almost felt bad laughing at Jaime being an ass.
Cera:Limiting…Silva:Yeah, it’s so limiting.Cera:It does feel like the impetus to do a genre movie is to make it really consumable or easy to understand for people, but otherwise I think if people are really doing expressions of something that’s really authentic to themselves, it’d be hard to pigeonhole it like that.Silva:And how could you not enjoy a little bit of drama and a little bit of comedy within an hour and a half? It’s so much richer, the experience. I would feel dumb laughing for an hour and a half.Maybe you shouldn’t see This Is The End. [Everyone Laughs]
This is such a beautiful movie, since you shot on all of these great locations. Did the script dictate location or vice versa? It felt so organic.
Cera:It’s kind of where it happened for you.Silva:Yeah, it’s actually where it happened for real. That little town… then that national park… that’s where it all actually happened. We improvised, like one location I think is where the guys stop to get the empanadas. Do you remember? Where you received the first phone call? That’s the only place that was not in the shooting schedule and it was a place that we hadn’t visited before and it worked great. So to answer your question, we knew where we were going to shoot. The screenplay determined the locations we were going to go to, but that one was the country. That was the exception to the rule. Photography-wise, we were following the characters. Photography was determined by the movement of the characters, like there was no pretentious…Cera:You didn’t have any shots in your head.Silva:No, not at all.Michael, what do you feel about your two Chilean movies? What did the experience teach you as an actor?
Did people recognize you in Chile?
Are you going to work together again, maybe forge another Scorsese-De Niro type thing? Become the famous Silva-Cera partnership?
Silva:Yeah, I think so. I mean we are really good friends and Michael is planning on moving maybe to New York? So I’m there and he’s already helped me a lot with a screenplay calledCaptain Godthat I’m trying to pursue. It’s a bigger movie, but yeah we will keep on collaborating.Cera:Unless something happens. Unless some crazy shit goes down. You never know.I watched Arrested Development, all of season four in like a day.
I really, really enjoyed it.
Totally. What was it like breaking that complicated story down? Not even as George Michael, but as a producer and a writer too?
Well I hope we get to see more of that and you guys soon. Thank you so much.Crystal Fairyopens July 12 in select cities and on-demand.Get more info here.
