According to Archie Madekwe, ‘Lurker’ director Alex Russell immediately decided that the character of Oliver should be British.
“A version of this happens with every English actor when they realize you’re British, they go, ‘oh, maybe he can be British.’” Madekwe said.
Alex Russell instantly joins him for a laugh.
At a press junket in Manhattan for MUBI’s new film Lurker, The Knockturnal spoke with Russell and the film’s two leads about the music, characters, and the LA world the story inhabits.
Lurker, which hits theaters on Friday, August 22, follows a twenty-something retail clerk who, after encountering a rising pop star, takes the opportunity to edge his way into the in-crowd. But as the line between friend and fan blurs beyond recognition, access and proximity become a matter of life and death. The film is directed by Alex Russell, whom you may know from directing and writing for Beef and The Bear.
“In such a story that feels so LA,” Madekwe continues, “who is a comparison that feels like he’s embedded in that world? And Rex Orange County was really the first person that jumped out to me as being British, but produced the Tyler [the Creator] album, really is associated with LA.”
He also describes Rex Orange County’s greatest contributions to his performance — and to the movie.
“I asked him a lot of questions around his world, which was very alien to me, and then he gifted us the song, which is crazy ‘cause it feels like it should have always been in there, but he was like ‘I’ve got this song that should have been on my album but maybe it could be in your film’ and gifted us ‘Love and Obsession.’”
The song “Love and Obsession” may have been an unexpected motif in a story so focused on the parasocial bonds some people have with celebrities, but other choices were more intentional.
“The opening of Oliver’s bedroom,” Alex Russell shares, “that’s the place [Matthew] would want to be the most is in the most intimate quarters, I guess. Some of the architecture of [Oliver’s] house was helpful in that kind of framing.”
Small moments were also used throughout the film to communicate Matthew’s (Théodore Pellerin) inner emotions.
“[Theo’s] face is so expressive, and we wanted this character’s small moments to sort of live and die in these social interactions.” Russell details, “You could tell if he wants to say and do the right thing in each moment, or be seen from a certain angle, or not be caught looking at someone else, and I think that’s all in his eyes and in the way that his face is moving around.”
“We obviously did a lot of close-ups, and we had to commit to that. There were times where that was the entire scene, when it’s ending on Matthew’s expression.”
For Pellerin, Matthew was a shapeshifter of sorts — always trying to survive the in-crowd.
“It did feel like the character was changing so much to me. Maybe not what you actually see in the movie feels like that, but he’s just constantly kind of shifting and trying to transform himself to fit to what’s in front of him,” he said. “So I think that that was the most important feeling of a need to survive through constantly being the right thing, or the thing that won’t be rejected or ejected.”
“It’s a constant battle to be in it, to be a part of it,” Pellerin says, perfectly capturing the tension that drives Lurker.
“Lurker” is now playing in select theaters nationwide.
