Oscar nominee Michelle Williams on The Fabelmans: ‘I don’t think awards are anyone’s goal’

Although lightly fictitious, Fables tells the story of Spielberg’s upbringing, as a rift between his beloved parents forces him to rely more heavily on filming family films as a means of managing his anxiety. In the most revealing scene, young Sammy Fabelman is taken to see his first film, Cecil B DeMille’s 1952 great epic. The biggest show on earth.

While sitting in the auditorium with his parents, Burt (Paul Dano) and Mitzi (Williams), Sammy was overwhelmed by the scene on screen, especially the scene of a speeding locomotive crashing into the carriages. stalling and tossing them up. in the air like a matchbox.

Cinema is just a trick, Burt, an engineer, later told his son, and went on to dryly explain the mechanics of moving pictures. But Mitzi, a concert pianist, has a more imaginative reading, and says movies are like dreams. “Dreams are scary,” Sammy replied, and was so confused at the sight of the Technicolor train crash that he could only banish its power by recreating it at home with a car. toy fire and an 8mm camera. In that moment, a great storyteller was born.

Spielberg had been harboring the idea of ​​making a movie inspired by his childhood for years, but it was only after the deaths of his parents Leah Posner and Arnold Spielberg (in 2017 and 2020 respectively) that he feel comfortable telling their stories — and their lives. I asked Williams, in the name of God what would it be like to play the beloved mother of the great director he was following?

“You know, in some ways, there’s no pressure,” she said. “Paul” [Dano] and I’ve worked together before, and it’s such a great experience to think, oh, you’re in a Steven Spielberg movie, but we just look at each other and say OK, if he chooses them We will trust him. So that allows me to put aside any feelings of unworthiness I might have, and just come and do my job. And what I did before that was a TV show called Fosse/Verdontells about choreographers Bob Fosse and Gwen Verdon, and their daughter at the studio with us every day.

“So I had the experience of working with someone who was the top authority in the world on who these characters are, and through that process, I dispelled a lot of the energy of emotional anxiety. that sense.”

In the film, Mitzi’s love of music and art greatly influenced her son. And in creating the role, Williams had what she describes as a treasure trove of resources and firsthand information.

“We talked to Steven about it all, and we also talked to his sisters. And because Steven has been given a camera since he was a child, there are a lot of recordings, a lot of good memories that exist on tape, and so if we’re not with Steven, talk to Steven , we were at home watching his parents. There’s a beautiful soundtrack of laughter that someone put together, about his mother’s laughter throughout the years, and to listen to this laughter grow and reach a full experience that you can hear make others laugh because it’s so exhilarating, so contagious it’s irresistible.

“It’s really a bonus to have so much information to use,” she adds, “and it’s something I will always come back to. Everything is centered for me on an iPad, and it’s like a room I can walk into between shots, just to keep her in my eyes, in my ears, and be with her as much as possible. body.”

The Fabelmans are a loving couple devoted to their children, but the dramatic heart of the film is Mitzi’s growing affection for ‘Uncle Benny’ (Seth Rogen), co-worker and friend his father’s body. Spielberg’s parents divorced when he was a teenager; In the film, Sammy accidentally captures evidence of his mother’s infidelity in a family movie of a camping trip.