“’Madeline’s Madeline’ is about a young woman whose interior life is so big and glorious that it can eat anyone,” writer-director Josephine Decker told us before the film’s world premiere at Sundance in January. Now a trailer has landed for the pic about a teen who becomes a part of a prestigious physical theater troupe, and it’s every bit as unconventional as Decker’s description of the film.
Featuring zero dialogue and little in the way of plot details, the immersive spot seems to drop us into Madeline’s (newcomer Helena Howard) chaotic world. We see footage of rehearsal and her pouring a drink on someone. There’s also a major emphasis on the film’s ecstatic reviews.
“Madeline’s Madeline’s” official synopsis offers a clearer idea of what to expect from the project. “Madeline got the part! She’s going to play the lead in a theater piece! Except the lead wears sweatpants like Madeline’s. And has a cat like Madeline’s. And is holding a steaming hot iron next to her mother’s face – like Madeline is,” the description hints. After Madeline becomes involved with the troupe, the workshop’s ambitious director (Molly Parker) pushes her “to weave her rich interior world and troubled history with her mother (Miranda July) into their collective art, [and] the lines between performance and reality begin to blur. The resulting battle between imagination and appropriation spirals out of the rehearsal space and rips through all three women’s lives.”
“I met Helena Howard while judging a Teen Arts Festival in New Jersey,” Decker explained in an interview with us. “She is talented — I mean talented — and so we decided to build something around her artistry. That very process of building went, well, not as expected, and eventually became the content of the film itself.” She added, “Our project is all about the light and dark of imagination.”
Decker’s other credits include “Thou Wast Mild and Lovely” and “Butter on the Latch.”
“Madeline’s Madeline” opens August 10 in NY and August 17 in LA. The genre-bending film will close BAMcinemaFest, which runs through July 1.
