Mike Leigh: “We all have someone in the family who is always in a bad mood”
Mike Leigh is back. Six years after directing the epic drama The Peterloo Tragedy , an ambitious project about the events of the Peterloo massacre that occurred in 1819 in a square in Manchester, the British director is back behind the camera to portray the routine life of a woman angry with the world in My Only Family , focusing on the protagonist, a member of a black working-class family living on the outskirts of London.
The film, which competed for the Golden Shell at the last edition of the San Sebastian festival, reunites the filmmaker with actress Marianne Jean-Baptiste three decades after Secrets and Lies , one of the most recognized films in Leigh's filmography. The actress, wonderful in a demanding role full of nuances, takes on the role of Pansy, a middle-aged woman of Caribbean origin who carries a physical and mental pain that pushes her to be constantly angry and disappointed with everything around her. From her apathetic husband, who doesn't know how to treat her; a son who doesn't say a word, eats all the time and walks aimlessly through the city, to the saleswoman in a furniture store, her dentist or the cashier in the supermarket. It's all shouting and reproaches. What you'd call a real grouch.
British filmmaker Mike Leigh, 82, during the filming of “My Only Family”
Efe/Bteam PicturesShe only finds some solace in her relationship with her sister Chantelle, the only one who understands her - Michelle Austin, who also appeared in Secrets and Lies -, a single hairdresser with two daughters who always tries to get by with good humour. “I wanted to talk about the relationship between people, how they talk and express themselves, the importance of affection. I thought it was a good time to focus on British characters with Caribbean origins, what their families are like and their past. I mean, this story is part of a continuous exploration of all kinds of aspects of what we are, life, families and all that,” the veteran 82-year-old director told La Vanguardia during his time at the San Sebastian festival, where he was moved by the “enthusiastic” response from the audience.
I make all my films for the public to see, that's all that matters to me. Mike Leigh
“I make all my films for the public, for them to see, that’s all that matters to me,” said Leigh, who believes that a film like this could not have been made “without these fantastic actors, who manage to play ordinary people.” Especially Marianne Jean-Baptiste. “Before working on Secrets and Lies, we had already worked together in the theatre and knowing what she is like, what she has been doing, and that she has an extraordinary sense of humour with an ability to reach very extreme feelings and always go beyond, I knew that she had to be Pansy.”
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The actress is infinitely grateful for the director's trust. "Actors don't normally have the opportunity to use all their skills, so to speak, to tackle a role. But Mike collaborates with the actor to get him to delve deeper into the character in a way that you can't do when you're given the script. He creates the whole arc of nuances with the actor and that's wonderful. We imagined what Pansy was like as a child to create her as she is now. It was a very organic process," says Jean-Baptiste, whose performance has been awarded by the New York Critics Circle, was nominated for a Bafta and many regret that she is not among the five actresses shortlisted for an Oscar.
Marianne Jean-Baptiste as grumpy Pansy
Bteam picturesThe director of Vera Drake and Another Year refuses to openly answer questions about Pansy's mental health problems, alluding to the fact that his films "deal with a universal human condition, it's very sad and very funny because that's life." He admits that Pansy's development as a character depends particularly on the past she shares with her sister, including the mourning for their mother. "They are two sides of the coin. Pansy has this burden from the past that we all carry in our lives. The film is about how we face life. She is very angry with the world, she is very angry with herself. In some way, the film raises the need to take time to be aware that we can change our existence."
The filmmaker says that everyone knows someone with the attitude of his protagonist. “Parents, in-laws, grandparents, uncles... We all have someone in the family who is always in a bad mood.” Even he has a reputation for being a grump. And he doesn't care.
My cinema has to do with a universal human condition, it is very sad and very funny because that is life. Mike Leigh
Pansy keeps her house spotless, she likes everything to be tidy and neither her husband nor her son are willing to help. She complains about being a servant. She is overcome with fear and just wants to disappear. “Pansy would complain about anything, really. She has the need to do these things, but at the same time she complains about doing them. That’s how she is,” says the actress, who is not given to interviews. “I don’t like to talk much and I am quite a loner,” she confesses.
Pansy and her sister in a frame from the film
Bteam picturesThe protagonist also asks her son if he has no dreams or hopes when she herself has lost hers. There is no dialogue in her family and a lot of loneliness, a theme that Leigh has dealt with quite a bit in her films. “They don’t express their real feelings, they don’t talk. They are always arguing, but they don’t listen to each other. It’s a problem, a global problem. I think it is endemic to the human condition and it has become more acute after the Covid pandemic.” The film is co-produced in Spain by The Mediapro Studio. “We have had a fantastic relationship, they have been very respectful of our work and never interfered in our decisions,” says the director, who describes his latest work as a tragicomic study of “human strengths and weaknesses.”
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