Lily Collins Q&A / Mank
Lily Collins is happy that her upcoming movie, MANK, was able to complete filming just before the coronavirus pandemic forced Hollywood to abandon many ongoing film shoots and join the rest of the world in lockdown: “We got really fortunate in that within a matter of weeks before quarantine was enforced we were able to finish shooting,” Collins says.
Directed by David Fincher (The Social Network, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), and starring Gary OIdman in the title role, Mank is a big-budget Netflix production which is expected to be released in September. Set in the early 1940s, the story revolves around the life of its eponymous subject, legendary screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz who co-wrote the screenplay for Citizen Kane with director Orson Welles. It’s Fincher’s first feature film since he shot Gone Girl in 2014, and Collins was thrilled to be able to work with arguably America’s most gifted director.
“Being able to shoot in Los Angeles with the ultimate genius of David Fincher was a complete dream come true, and working with Gary Oldman (who plays Mankiewicz) was something I never thought I’d get the opportunity to do.”
Collins plays Mankiewicz’s secretary, Rita Alexander, who was of vital help in keeping the hard-drinking writer from going off the rails. The film also co-stars Amanda Seyfried as actress Marion Davies, Tom Burke (The Souvenir) as Hollywood wunderkind Orson Welles and Tuppence Middleton as Mankiewicz’s wife, Sara.
Mank is one of the most highly anticipated films of 2020. Set for release in September, it has all the makings of an Oscar contender in a year that has seen many projects postponed or otherwise had their release dates pushed to next year. The screenplay for the film was written by director’s late father, Jack Fincher, and explores the process by which the hard-drinking, hard-living Mankiewicz wrote (with Welles mainly editing his many screenplay drafts) the script for one of the greatest movies in history…