Movies
The actor learned a great deal from her character, Dr. Liet-Kynes.
Duncan-Brewsters character a gender-swapped version of Dr. Liet-Kynes, the imperial planetologist fromFrank Herberts novel is a many-sided one.
To prepare for the part, she studied duplicitous elected officials.
Inhabiting the leaders persona lent Duncan-Brewster a new perspective on how to navigate conflict.
Im a different human being because of it.
There is a certain calm Ive acquired somehow by playing her, she says.
I realized how things in our world can be fixed if we just open our ears.
[The repair] cant come from a place of panic.
It only comes from listening to one another and putting peace into practice.
Much has been made ofDunes prescience, of all the conflict and ecological wreckage it seems to have foretold.
But like Liet-Kynes, Duncan-Brewster has hope for her world.
Below, Duncan-Brewster discusses playing a gender-swapped character, the timeliness ofDune, and working with Timothee Chalamet.
Were you a fan ofDunebefore you signed on to the movie?
Not at all, actually.
The other day, I was thinking about my earliest connection to it.
I also remember seeing lots of photographs of Sting.
That was probably my first proper connection with it, but thats about it.
Do you feel like you have anything in common with your character?
You know, I would say yes, but I think thats because most of us do.
We all play different roles [like Liet-Kynes does], dont we?
And sometimes these different personalities never meet.
We dont realize how much we shape-shift and change around different people.
And I dont necessarily think thats a bad thing.
I think we all have to survive in a world that moves and changes so rapidly.
Were bombarded with so many different aspects of living.
Your character is gender-swapped in the movie.
Did that change anything about your approach to the role?
Its not much different.
Sometimes they do, and sometimes they dont.
It depends on the story.
And in the case ofDuneand Dr. Liet-Kynes, its okay to just play the person as a person.
Did you have to deal with any fans who were upset that Liet-Kynes was gender-swapped?
Ive gotten so many DMs on Twitter and Instagram from fans about the movie.
And there is temptation there.
So I did peek onto a few chat forums, just to see what the general consensus was.
There were some things said that were …
I wouldnt say they were eye-openers, but they were informative, to say the least.
But at the same time, there were no defined sides.
There were also people who were ecstatic.
So I did peek for a bit, but then I just moved on.
Its hard to resist not looking, especially with a project like this.
You had a lot of scenes withTimothee Chalamet.
What was it like to work with him?
Ah, oh Timothee!
Beautiful, gorgeous Timothee and what a lovely human being.
You know when youre working with a younger person, and you justknowtheyre destined for greatness?
All I kept thinking about while filming was how excited I was for his future.
Hes just the real deal, and I loved working with him.
There were times he was in the zone, and you knew not to disturb him.
But at the end of the day, hes just his lovely, floppy, funny self.
And you forget that hes the age that he is, because his talent is well beyond his years.
Hes just acooldude, and he deserves all the respect and kudos that he’s gotten so far.
Youve mentioned the timely political undertones in the film.
Is there anything that you feel particularly relevant to the conversations were having today?
Oh gosh, there are so many.
In regards to ecology and our environment, they have the summits that are occurring right now.
Theres displaced people who have been in their own space that somehow encounter someone else taking over.
Theres just so much.
Almost every story line is timely.
Not to mention race and ethnicity and gender.
We talk about ownership of worlds and people taking over.
Thats something that has gone as far back as day one on Earth.
I think were a much more rounded human race now.
We shouldve found ways to live peacefully by now, is what Im trying to say.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
This article was originally published onOct.
