CraveOnline: Did you read with a number of different actors?
Saoirse Ronan: I read with about 10 so I didn’t really read with that many.
That sounds like a lot to me.
No, for The Host we read with so many, so, so many. I think we read with about maybe 10 boys for How I Live Now so it wasn’t that many.
How many did you read with for The Host?
Oh, loads and loads. I mean, we read with people in London and people in L.A. I don’t know how many there were in each. There was quite a few. Andrew [Niccol] saw loads of people for it so this wasn’t bad but it just kind of all made sense when George [MacKay] came in. I knew that that’s who I would want for Eddie straightaway and our chemistry was so good straightaway. I think the guys kind of got that too.
Is that nerve-wracking as an actor, even in an audition to form these relationships with potential actors and not really know who you’re going to go on this journey with?
I think it’s nerve-wracking when it’s not the person who you wanted it to be, or maybe you had better chemistry with someone else. I think it’d be more nerve-wracking if you were the person coming in for the audition I think. I was lucky that at that stage I had the job and I was able to kind of relax a little bit and it was just about finding the right guy, which we would have done and we did. But no, it’s quite exciting, when that person comes in and you know that they’re the right person for the job, you get quite excited about the chance of working with them.
Do you think about what you would do and where you would do in this kind of situation?
I haven’t really thought about it, no. I don’t know what I’d be like to be honest.
I have this fantasy that I would just hole up in my house and watch DVDs.
That’s a great idea, but what if you’re taken away to fight in the war though? What are you going to do then? Because the guys went to war, remember? “Don’t take me and my DVDs!”
I think I could make a pretty good case for being useless to their army.
[Laughs] “I have so much ‘Homeland’ to watch still.”
Right, I could finally watch “The Wire.”
Well, that’ll teach you good, all that kind of stuff I’m sure. I don’t know what I’d do.
Are you playing Mary, Queen of Scots?
Hopefully next year, yeah, hopefully. It’s funny because I think it only came out recently that I was attached to it but I’ve actually been attached to it since last year. I thought it came out that I was doing it, so suddenly everyone was coming up to me saying, “Are you doing Mary, Queen of Scots?” I thought, “Yeah, I said that like ages ago.” But yeah, hopefully it’ll happen next year. It’s Working Title that’s doing it and Susanne Bier is directing it.
Were you aware of the TV series “Reign?”
No, “Reign?” Is that what it’s called?
The CW is doing Mary Queen of Scots with rock music and modern language and different fashion. It’s very CW.
Okay, it’d be interesting to see that. Ours won’t be like that.
You’re almost 20. Do you think about how the roles you’re going to be able to play are going to change?
Oh yeah, I have to think about that now. It’s actually really hard to find the right role. Whether it’s you finding the right role for you if they’re there or whether it’s you convincing people that you can do the role that you really want, because around 18 and 19, I remember an actor saying it to me before when I was younger, that around this time you’re not a young woman technically yet. You’re not 22, 23 where you can basically have any role you want, and yet you’re not 15 where you can do the whole coming of age thing. I mean, I can’t really do that, I don’t think, anymore. Or I’m kind of getting to the stage where I can’t do that anymore, so it is quite difficult actually to find a role that suits you and for people to understand what you can do now.
There is precedent for actors playing teenagers until they’re 30.
Yeah, I don’t know if I want to do that though.
I did see Violet & Daisy at Toronto two years ago, and this year I finally got to talk to Geoffrey Fletcher about it. Were you hoping for a bigger release for that?
Violet & Daisy is very much an arthouse film. It was always going to be for a very specific kind of audience I think, and only certain types of people would see that film. So it’s fine. I don’t know who’s going to go and see it but it’ll do what it’ll do.
Was the last time you saw James Gandolfini working on that film? Did you see him before he passed?
No, the last time I saw him was on that. I was going to try and meet up with him in L.A. last year. He was doing a play there and we had the same agent, so I didn’t get to see him which was very sad. He was great. It’s really weird. It’s very strange.
I’m sorry to end on that but I wanted to talk about Violet & Daisy.
No, it’s all right. He’s so brilliant in it as well, so good in it so I’m very honored that I got to work with him before he passed away.
Fred Topel is a staff writer at CraveOnline and the man behind Best Episode Ever and Shelf Space Weekly. Follow him on Twitter at @FredTopel.
