By CHARLOTTE O'SULLIVAN
In her London hotel, Maggie Gyllenhaal has just been asked what she would like to eat. "I'm fantasising about scones," she purrs. Naturally, I fear the worst. In her film, Secretary, she plays a timid young typist, Lee Holloway, who, thanks to her handsome older boss, Edward Grey,
discovers the joys of S&M.
It's more complicated than that but, with a poster that shows a prone, miniskirted bum above long, high-heeled legs, this black comedy definitely has its nudge-nudge aspect.
Hitherto, the 25-year-old Gyllenhaal was best known for being sister to the hairier Jake (the two acted together in the acclaimed Donnie Darko).
Since Secretary, she has been anointed the extreme queen of indieland. I imagine the stream of male journalists eager to talk about the spanking, and the crawling on all fours, and the full-frontal nudity ...
Maybe, vis-a-vis the scones, she is testing her powers of suggestiveness. If anyone can make British teatime sound kinky, it's Maggie. But, I've got it all wrong. Exhausted (she flew in overnight) and hungry (she couldn't eat a thing at lunch), it would be more accurate to say she is hallucinating about scones.
And now I look more closely at her outfit - stripy summer dress and flat sandals - she isn't remotely slinky. The look is more ingenue, circa 1955. Luckily, that's a feint, too.
Gyllenhaal, with her saucer-shaped, light-blue eyes, may be perky (and this is when she's tired), but what she isn't, is winsome or coy. She's not out to seduce. She's not out to beguile.
Bouncing on to the sofa on which I'm already perched, she starts to describe the Secretary shoot. Key to this involved tale is her relationship with James Spader, the blond, weakly pretty star of sex, lies, and videotape and Crash.
The way she tells it, the behind-the-scenes antics were as charged and gamey as anything that goes on between Lee and Grey.
When Lee goes to work for Grey (Spader), she's drowning. Fresh out of a psychiatric hospital, she cuts and burns herself when she's miserable which, given her father's drinking problem, is all the time.
Grey takes a paternal interest and insists she stop "the cutting", then starts punishing her himself. Lee, being a masochist, adores this, and when his attention strays, grabs it back.
She had never seen Crash or any of his teen movies. All she knew was that he often did "intense ... and sexual stuff". In person, however, he made a big impression: "When I met him, I was immediately in love with him!"
Apparently, he has a formal way of talking. "After we'd done our first reading together, he said, with, like, ellipses between each word, 'Steve [Shainberg, the director], I think you've hired the - most - wonderful - actress!' So you know, he really endeared himself to me."
She rolls her eyes. "I remember him saying, right before we started shooting, 'I always have one ally on a movie set. And this time, it's you'!"
She became his new best friend. "He'd just dote on me. He would do things like get a PA to come to my door - we shared a split trailer - and she'd say, 'James wants you'."
She pulls a wry face. "And I'd, like, walk the two steps over to James' and knock on his door and he'd say [she drops her voice and stares into my eyes], 'Would you like a chocolate'?"
"Sometimes, he'd come on set and say [she throws out her arm and puts on a ludicrously grand voice], 'Who can I talk to about getting a very expensive box of chocolates in my room?'
'Chocolates,' I say, 'to tempt little girls with?' 'Exactly!' In fact, he used them that way and I let him! I was like, 'OK, this feels good ... ' Just as easily, his mood could change.
"Other times," she says, "he would not give me the time of day, and it was really devastating, you know. I'd be [she adopts a soft, bewildered voice], 'what is wrong with James today? He's not paying me any mind'." She snorts. "And he'd be doting over the makeup artist."
It all sounds confusing. She nods. "It was re-enacting what was going on in the film. I don't think it was conscious for me, but I think it was for him. He'd thought it through."
She smooths the cushions some more. "And he did this other thing, which was kind of extraordinary. He really kept his private life away from me. So I didn't have his phone number. I didn't know his kids' names and it actually made it safer for me.
"The boundaries were so clear, they were, like, brick walls. So that intimacy we had on set, I didn't feel it was going to bleed into my life."
What is striking, though, is how much real feeling did bleed into the mix, and is still there. She remembers holding his hand during a scene when he was having trouble remembering his lines.
Her eyes sparkle: "He was really struggling, he wasn't with me, and all I wanted was for him to be with me, so I held his hand. And it was really cool, because I felt him be moved by me, by my doing that."
She also admits to being hurt by an interview they did, once the film was out. "He said, 'The only person I was interested in on that set was Lee Holloway'." She gulps at the memory. "I was like, 'What the [expletive] does that mean?' I felt sort of dismissed by that."
A big sigh. "But then I said to myself, well, that was me. In his mind, in some ways, there's no distinction. And in my mind, too."
I wonder aloud how all these psycho-dynamics affected the rest of the crew. She says Shainberg was thrilled. "I mean, we had our own little club, too - we used to go off in a corner and make fun of James!"
Gyllenhaal talks about a running joke between herself and Shainberg, which had her as "the perfect indie actress who was like, just, gonna be so bad ass and do everything".
In fact, she was more than willing to challenge his authority. She and Shainberg wrangled over everything, including the poster (she lost that battle, she thinks it's dumb and sexist); the nudity (apart from one bath scene, she feels she wasn't taken advantage of); the lines (on the whole, she won).
There's a knock at the door; it's the scones. Gyllenhaal falls on the plate, piles on the cream and jam, then, with long, delicate fingers, wolfs them down. "It's okay," she says, "I'll keep talking."
The movie has changed everything for Gyllenhaal. She was raised in LA - her father is a director (Paris Trout), her mother a writer (Oscar-nominated for Running on Empty).
After finishing a degree in literature at Columbia University, she landed a few small parts. Then came Secretary which pushed her, if not into the A-league, then certainly the B+ (she's just shot two films, one with John Sayles, the other with Julia Roberts).
She admits, however, that life post-Secretary has its downside. She was appalled by a journalist who told her he had watched a tape of Secretary with a male friend, who said: "Let's fast-forward to the sexy parts." She shivers. "He was talking to me, and I felt all of a sudden, this person has seen me naked
"At the time, I just went, okay and let the interview continue. Now, if somebody said that to me, I think I'd confront them." . .
At this point, her very New Yorky agent bustles into the room. Gyllenhaal goes on to say how useful her parents have been - especially her mum Naomi, who has advised her to do less press. A dry aside from the agent: "Thanks, Naomi!"
"This stuff is scaring me," continues Gyllenhaal. "But I have some control, I should use it."
Who: Maggie Gyllenhaal
What: Secretary
When: Screening now
Where: Rialto cinemas
- INDEPENDENT
By CHARLOTTE O'SULLIVAN
In her London hotel, Maggie Gyllenhaal has just been asked what she would like to eat. "I'm fantasising about scones," she purrs. Naturally, I fear the worst. In her film, Secretary, she plays a timid young typist, Lee Holloway, who, thanks to her handsome older boss, Edward Grey,
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