SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Dad is dying, and his three daughters convene in a small New York City apartment. Simple enough premise, but the new movie, "His Three Daughters," brims with complex emotions. In the opening scene, one daughter, played by Carrie Coon, delivers - well, let's call it a monologue.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "HIS THREE DAUGHTERS")
CARRIE COON: (As Katie) So you've been good, right? - I mean, other than this. He seems OK, at least better than how I was picturing. Not too different than last time I was here. Hard to tell whether he's in pain, I mean, at least while he's asleep. But you've been on top of that, yes? Because I think that's the thing - is for it to be as painless as possible. The trick is - I guess the thing I'm saying is that I hope we can make this easy on him, just not make a thing out of anything. If we disagree, we talk it out without getting heated or yelling or anything that's going to upset him. We handle it like adults, like the age we are.
SIMON: And Carrie Coon, the great actor of stage and the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Tony nominated for "Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?" and on screen, "The Gilded Age," joins us now from NPR studios in New York. Thanks so much for being with us.
COON: Thanks for having me, Scott. I'm so grateful.
SIMON: Tell us how these sisters are different - Rachel, played by Natasha Lyonne, and Christina, by Elizabeth Olsen, and you, Katie.
COON: Well, I think we occupy stereotypes at the beginning. So Katie is the controlling older sister who's working on all of the details that should have been done before she got there. Christina is the more emotional, seemingly unstable harmonizer, who's very comfortable being in the room with their father. And Natasha's Rachel is rather disengaged, a pothead, and everyone assumes she's just there to take over the apartment after he dies. And, of course, those images get complicated as the movie unfolds.
SIMON: Katie does seem a little preoccupied by...
COON: (Laughter).
SIMON: ...The fact that her father hasn't signed a DNR, do not resuscitate order.
COON: Yes.
SIMON: Does this begin to represent something else to her?
COON: Absolutely. What the movie really deals with is what that pregrieving period is like when we're keeping vigil, waiting for someone to die. In this film and I think in real life, people step out of their lives into a different feeling of time. And for Katie, the only thing she can do is control the details because, of course, she can't control the outcome or when it's going to happen. And so it's about the DNR. It's about making food - just taking care of the brass-tacks practical matters of the day to day 'cause it's much harder for her to sit with the more existential questions of what it means for her once he's gone.
SIMON: Does writing their father's obituary become a chance for the sisters to kind of air their different views of the father they knew?
COON: I think it does. I think it's a brilliant way to get to know Vincent, who's looming over the film, but you don't see him, at least not initially. And...
SIMON: Vincent being the father.
COON: That's right. And it's also, I think, a testament to how well-structured the film is. It's the first time you see all three sisters in one frame, when they're working on the obituary and sort of comparing their different points of view. And I think a lot of families have the experience of being raised by the same parents, perhaps, but feeling like they grew up in very different households.
SIMON: Yeah. Some awfully intense scenes and quarrels. Are they intense to play and to film, or is that just what actors do?
COON: Well, it is what actors do. My husband, Tracy, is fond of saying, chemistry isn't pixie dust. It's actually our job. It's our job to create intimacy very quickly. And in this case, we shot that film in 17 days after three days of rehearsal. But what was really gratifying is that Aza was committed to shooting it in order.
SIMON: Azazel Jacobs is the director.
COON: There was no scene we shot where we hadn't shot the thing that came right before. And so we lived through the story, which you really only get to do in the theater. And so in that way, our intimacy deepened over the course of that time, just as the sisters' points of view are getting complicated of one another. Their relationships are being revealed. They're being seen in the same frame.
And so our friendship kind of went along the same lines. And we were thrust into this rent-controlled apartment together, sometimes just cluttered on a sofa while we waited for the small crew to move equipment around. So sitting on each other's laps, essentially, causes a lot of intimacy.
SIMON: You mentioned Tracy, your husband, the great playwright and actor Tracy Letts. You've both recently been nominated for Emmy awards.
COON: Yes, we were, surprisingly.
SIMON: You for "The Gilded Age," your husband for "Winning Time." What does a couple nominated on the same day for Emmys say to each other? How do you celebrate?
COON: Well, we were apart, of course. My parents had actually arrived the night before with my brother and sister-in-law and their two children, and I have two children. I think that morning, I was still in my pajamas. My breakfast was on the counter, and I couldn't reach it, and my son had just hit his elbow, and he was crying in my arms. And my sister-in-law said your phone is ringing. I said answer it. And it was my agent, Jacob, and he said congratulations. And I said, for what? I had no idea. I'd completely forgotten. And then while I was on the phone, I got a text saying, oh, Tracy got a guest star nomination.
Well, he had been in the city listening to the broadcast to see if I got a nomination, and then he very politely turned off the broadcast because he was in a hair and makeup trailer. So he had no idea. So it wasn't until he got a video from myself...
SIMON: Aw.
COON: ...And my son, still crying, saying, you have to go to the Emmys, too...
SIMON: Oh, my God.
COON: ...But on a different day. 'Cause, of course, the creative arts Emmys are the weekend before. And I can't go with him, so he's going alone.
SIMON: Oh, my gosh.
COON: I know. It's bittersweet in a way.
SIMON: Yeah. Well, you've worked on some of the same projects together, including one of the "Ghostbusters"...
COON: Yes.
SIMON: ...And the Spielberg film "The Post." But you're often in separate scenes, right?
COON: It's true. Yes, we've very rarely been on camera together. We collaborate more closely in the theater, but it's usually in the capacity where he's the playwright, and I'm the actor. That's where we've had the most time. But we love working together. We do it very well. And sometimes, you know, with two small children and two careers, that's the only time we get to see each other, so...
SIMON: Oh, is on stage.
COON: ...It's satisfying. Yeah, when we have a job together or, for example, the Emmys. You know, to get a date night, we have to get an Emmy nomination...
SIMON: (Laughter).
COON: ...So we can fly to LA (laughter).
SIMON: So back to "His Three Daughters." Any idea why the film isn't "The Three Sisters"?
COON: You know, what Aza was aware of is that he was a man writing it. He describes his writing process as hearing the characters speak to him. And he understands that he is a man writing that script and that all of these women are operating inside of a patriarchy, where their father has had tremendous influence on them. And it was important to him, I think, to represent Vincent's point of view in the title because that's the thing that the women are reckoning with in the movie, which is a very real problem, right? They're reckoning with how they saw their father and how their father saw them and how they see each other. So Aza was aware of his own point of view in the film.
SIMON: Do you finish the film thinking the sisters have a future together?
COON: I think so. I hope the lesson of the film - I know what I took away from it, playing especially the sister who has the most difficulty seeing her sisters as they are. I find that I am very careful not to do that with my children. I try to see them as the people they are. I try very hard not to project onto them because I want them to be revealed to me.
And what I realized in the course of making this film is that it's something I'm very - I'm less willing to do with my siblings. They're frozen in time. And that I'm much less willing to do with someone on the other side of a political divide. Our stories can get in our way, and we have to be willing to drop the narratives and try to see the person who's right in front of us. And I think that's a lesson for any time of life.
SIMON: Carrie Coon is one of the stars of "His Three Daughters," now on Netflix. Thank you so much for being with us.
COON: Thanks for having me, Scott. I'm so grateful.
(SOUNDBITE OF EL TEN ELEVEN'S "MY ONLY SWERVING") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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