Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans And Pedro Pascal Were ‘So Into Each Other’

On Past Lives, filmmaker Celine Song famously had a specific approach: to tell its story of long-separated characters and distant romantic entanglements, she ensured her actors – Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, and John Magaro – had little contact with each other around the scenes they shot together. The results were quietly explosive, on an emotional level. Now, for her follow-up film Materialists, Song is exploring a different take on romance – with Dakota Johnson’s New York matchmaker Lucy finding herself torn between Chris Evans’ rough-and-ready John, and Pedro Pascal’s high-flying luxurious guy Harry.

Except, on Materialists, there was no keeping Johnson, Evans and Pascal apart. “They’re just so into each other,” Song laughs, speaking to Empire. To evolve the interplay between the three of them, Materialists involved much rehearsal work. “We were trying to be specific about the chemistry between them as characters too,” she adds. “Because it has a different meaning and a different goal for each scene.” If the tone is different to Past Lives, it’s still an exploration of romantic desires, and the possible paths you can choose. “The heart and the head, and then the math and the non-math,” as Song puts it. “Those crash into each other in this film.”

For her second film, Song drew from her own brief experience as a matchmaker in New York – which gave her real admiration for those who used the service. “I learned more about people in those six months than I did in any other part of my life,” she recalls. “People will just tell you what’s in their hearts, and what they’re worried about. They would say something so brave in my eyes, which is: ‘I want to fall in love.’” Get ready to fall in love, cinematically-speaking, all over again.

Read Empire’s full Materialists interview with Celine Song in The Fantastic Four: First Steps issue – on sale Thursday 5 June. Pre-order a copy online here. Materialists comes to UK cinemas on 15 August.