Make Me a Mildred

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I didn't realize that HBO's Mildred Pierce miniseries, directed by Todd Haynes and starring Kate Winslet, was out in just over a month! March 27th is when it starts. How exciting is that? I feel like I haven't had the pelasure of wading in Winslet in far too long. I miss you, my Kate!

There's a conversation with her and Haynes over at Collider about the material that I found worth reading today. Here's Kate talking about deciding whether to watch the Joan Crawford version (she hadn't seen it before! Shame on you, Kate!):

"Todd said to me, “How do you feel? Do you want to see it? What’s your feeling about it?” I hadn’t seen it, and I really wasn’t sure if I should. I didn’t know what to do. When you’re playing Mildred Pierce, and you know that someone utterly extraordinary has played that role before, it’s a really fine line. What do you do? So, Todd said to me, “Look, if you do want to see it, that’s completely your choice. You should know that the film is very, very different to the novel, and it’s very different to what we’re going to do.” So, I saw the first five minutes and I thought, “You know what? I actually shouldn’t watch this.” I wouldn’t have ever been able to unsee it. And, I also knew that I had to honor the book. I had to be very true to the Mildred Pierce that is in that brilliant novel, and she meant something different to me, within the context of the way that Todd had scripted this. I could feel, almost immediately, watching Joan Crawford’s brilliant performance, that what I was working towards with Todd was just something different. It was not cleverer or better, but it was just simply a different character, and I knew I just hang onto my instincts about who she meant to us."

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