You Loved Him in Anora: Where did you see Mikey Madison before the Palme d’Or?

At the end of the presentation of Anora at the last Cannes Film Festival, in the competition, the responses were unanimous or almost unanimous: despite many qualities, Sean Baker’s new feature film may not have won the Palme d’Or in power, but it. She had a brilliant asset in the person of Mikey Madison, who quickly became the favorite for the actress prize, along with Zoe Saldana and Carla Sofia Gascon.

A few days later, Emilia Perez’s cast won the category, and Anora won the Grail, making Sean Baker the first American director to win since 2011’s Terrence Malick and The Tree of Life. The prize was awarded to the entire film. , but which owes a lot to its lead actor, who celebrated his 25th anniversary on the day of the awards.

By the end, Mikey Madison will have a memorable first trip to France, more shy in interviews than on the small and big screen: “I often feel like I’m playing characters that are very different from me.”– he told us on the Croisette. “But Anora is the furthest from me among the ones I’ve played. Just physically and sound wise, it’s really very different. “

“Her sensitivity and presentation of herself to the world is unlike anything I’ve ever done. I felt like I was constantly pushing myself out of the comfort zones I might have had before to play this character. Every day I felt like I was kind of challenging myself to be true to the character, but it was also exciting.”

If you’re one of the viewers who discovered him thanks to his overall performance at the 2024 Palme d’Or, here are three other important roles in Mikey Madison’s career. who brought him to Anora.

Better Things (2016 – 2022)

Recently starring alongside Natalie Portman in The Sound of Lake , which airs on Apple TV+ this summer, Mikey Madison made her small screen debut. At the age of 17, in the TV series Better Things, where she played Sam’s eldest daughter, a divorced mother whose daily life consists of juggling a demanding acting job, her three children, whom she is raising alone, and her chaotic love life.

In the show’s 52 episodes spread over 5 seasons, Mikey Madison is certainly less visible than Tornado Pamela Adlon, lead actor, creator, writer and director. But she still manages to play Max, between the end of adolescence and discovering the world of adulthood (when she has to have an abortion in the final season and tells her mother in a heartbreaking exchange).

In addition to her talent as an interpreter, the public can already see elements that we will find in Anora, this intelligent and rebellious character who manages to attack problems with a regularity that inspires admiration. A young woman with fluctuating emotions, whose tenderness towards her sisters is not apparent at first, is revealed. Kudos to Pamela Adlon’s wonderful writing and Mikey Madison’s acting, which offers a memorable twist between the two seasons on the big screen.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019)

Obviously, everyone had eyes only on the trio Leonardo DiCaprio – Brad Pitt – Margot Robbie. Even Al Pacino, Kurt Russell, Michael Madsen or the late Luke Perry. Not to forget the star director Quentin Tarantino, who came to relive his childhood in the feature film. Which, seen today, shows just how much the father of Pulp Fiction has lost none of his casting chops, especially when it comes to Charles Manson’s family.

At the time, Dakota Fanning was almost acting as a star among her co-stars, and The Leftovers made Margaret Cowell famous. But watching the film again today allows us to see that they were surrounded by Sydney Sweeney, Austin Butler and Mike Madison. And the last two have both left their mark on people’s minds because of the suffering they create in the beginning and then the disastrous fate they have in store for the two main characters.

In his own way of rewriting the massacre of Sharon Tate by Charles Manson’s family, giving it a more positive outcome for the woman who was then pregnant with Roman Polanski, Quentin Tarantino offers an ultra-violent finale featuring Susan Atkins (Mike Madison). Disfigured by dog ​​food thrown at point blank range by Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt), then bitten by the latter’s pet, before going through a window and falling into Rick Dalton’s (Leonardo DiCaprio) swimming pool with a flamethrower. A more cinematic death than the real killer, who died of a brain tumor in prison in September 2009.

For those who have discovered her yelling at her mother since her first appearance in Better Things , her yelling in front of Quentin Tarantino’s camera comes as no surprise. For others, Mikey Madison began to establish a place in the viewer’s memory by coining the term. “wonderful” Very literally.

Scream (2022)

If you’ve seen Scream (the fifth, not the first), you know. Otherwise, you only have a few marks left to pass this segment. That’s where you had to go. Or maybe you know that Mikey Madison is one of the killers hiding under the mask of Ghostface in the feature film directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpini and Tyler Gillette: Amber Freeman, whose parents bought Stu Macher’s (Matthew Lillard) old house, an accomplice. Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich) in Wes Craven’s original opus.

Which undoubtedly helped him become a fan stableA horror film saga inspired by the tragedy of Sidney Prescott (Neeve Campbell). For better, and mostly for worse, as his overwhelming frustration with Episode 8 (any resemblance to any other existing franchise, that’s all, that’s all) led him to come up with a new killing spree, with the help of Richie Kirsch (Jack). Quaid), so they serve as the basis for a feature film more in line with his desires as a toxic fan.

Responsible for, among other things, the death of Dewey Riley (David Arquette), he confronts Sidney and Gail Weathers (Courteney Cox) in the kitchen of the house where the finale takes place. First sprayed with hydroalcoholic gel (a detail that will be important), he tries to convince people that he’s not responsible, but is accidentally shot near the flaming plates and catches fire as his face approaches the fire, in a sudden Hollywood remake of the ending of the movie Once Upon a Time.

Where she once again impresses with her screaming and vocalization artistry and further confirms her status as the flamboyant hope of American cinema. Before hitting the nail on the head, the spotlight at the Cannes Film Festival and in almost every frame of the film, thanks to Anora. No death and no fire this time, but she set the screen on fire with a performance that could land her an Oscar nod. Especially if we delve into his filmography until March, when Scream is the film that convinced Sean Baker that he was the actor in his next film.

“He had this youthful energy and this craziness, and because the character had to be a fighter, he had to have that physicality and that little bit of psychopathy.”– the director told us, laughing, before praising… and expressing regret: “He has far exceeded my expectations and I think he has a very good career ahead of him, but I will never be able to work with him because he will be too expensive from now on (laughs).”

Interview comments collected by Maximilien Pierret in Cannes on May 22, 2024