Let’s talk about Equals, because I love Drake’s work. I think he’s a really talented director. For people that don’t know, tell people what it’s about and the fact that you got to film all over the place.
HOULT: Yeah, we filmed all over Japan and Singapore. You know from Drake’s work, he’s all about love stories, he’s all about connection, humans…just that, he’s all about that. It’s honestly one of the best experiences I’ve ever had on a film. I felt really inspired working with him and Kristen each day. I’d sit down and I’d be like, “Wow.” His style of filmmaking, I love. There’s so much soul in it. I’ve seen little clips of that film now and it evokes so much emotion and he evokes so much on set. I felt as though – I haven’t seen it, I don’t know – but in terms of my acting, it felt like the best experience in terms of him guiding me and just wanting…it’s simple what he asks for. He wants you to be vulnerable and he wants you to be honest. He’s like, “You don’t have to portray anything. Don’t say anything if it doesn’t feel real to you. Just be honest.” This is the first time he’s worked with a script, but there would also be a fair bit of improvisation and…yeah, sorry [laughs].
The film’s about this kind of futuristic world where humans destroyed the world, and then they’ve kind of made this collective where everyone works for space travel and all that stuff, but because human emotion was essentially what caused us to destroy the world, now when you’re kids you get genetically modified essentially so that you don’t feel and you don’t feel love. You’re not like an autobot, you can still create and you can still work. It’s all still there, but the soul’s kind of been taken out of you. Then my character starts to see things in this world, it all starts to unravel around him, and he starts noticing Kristen Stewart’s character and he’s like, “Hang on a minute, there’s more here going on and I’m starting to feel things,” and then the movie takes off from there.
So basically the modification maybe has failed a little bit.
HOULT: Yeah, so basically there’s this thing called “SOS”, which is Switched On Syndrome, and it’s a utopian world, but if you get this disease you’re taken to “the den”, which is this horrible place where essentially you end up dying and it’s all over. Yeah, feeling is not what they do. So then it was amazing because you’re playing this character who has never experienced or felt all these things before, so you’re doing all these things, which is kind of similar in some ways to the character I played in Warm Bodies where its that thing of awakening and then feeling too much, not being able to handle it, and wanting to try and get away from it – we’ve all been there. You know what? I just can’t wait for people to see that film. I can’t wait to see it.
I can’t wait either. Especially when it’s filmed around the world like that, because it adds so much production value to something when you’re filming on location in real places, and maybe places that are off the beaten path.
HOULT: Yeah, and it’s also the look of it. The look of it and the music. Drake created this thirty song playlist for me, which before going up to do the movie I’d listen to it pretty much every day and walk around and just hear this music. On set I’d be playing it the whole time in my ears, and he’d play it on set as well for kind of the mute stuff where me and Kristen are doing scenes but the sound’s not going to be used, he’d have the music playing. I called him Dream Flare, Dream Flare Doremus [laughs]. He loves a bit of flare in his movies. It’s shot beautifully.
I would expect nothing less. Whiplash was shot and wrapped in October and then they premiered at Sundance. Has he mentioned to you that maybe he’s going to try or is it too soon?
HOULT: He’s already in the edit. I don’t think it would be ready for Sundance, I think he probably needs more time with it – not needs more time with it, but you know.
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