The bloom, doom, and daze of The Bride is dawning upon us! Helmed by Maggie Gyllenhaal, the upcoming Gothic romance film stars Jessie Buckley and Christian Bale in the lead roles of the titular character or Ida, and Frank, respectively. Amid an ongoing Oscar campaign for her role in Hamnet opposite Paul Mescal, the actress is also promoting her character of The Bride, which has reunited her with the director. The two have previously worked together in the 2021 psychological drama The Lost Daughter, which also made them Academy Award favorites.
Now, ahead of the worldwide premiere of her film, Jessie Buckley exclusively shared with us why she decided to join forces again. Calling her one of the most important women in her life, the 36-year-old shared what it was like to become her Ida, “She has woken me up in a way that I didn’t think was possible in a lifetime. She’s an absolute artist at her core. She is fearless, even if she has fear she walks towards it.”
Being a female director has never stopped Maggie Gyllenhaal from dreaming big and rightly so, as the actress added, “She wants the whole story of what it is to be alive. As a woman, to meet a director who is not only wanting that, but is willing to do that in the pieces that she writes and the characters that she writes, it’s been the biggest education and the greatest freedom and privilege I’ve had to work alongside somebody like Maggie.”
Jessie Buckley dishes on what it was like to work with Maggie Gyllenhaal on The Bride
The mother-of-one went on to share why she’s proud of the filmmaker for giving life to the 1818 story, “It’s no joke creating anything. And she’s done it with such uncompromising truth for herself, and uncompromising questions for herself—for all of us as artists when we get on set—that you have no option but to answer them as honestly as you can. I don’t know what my life would be like without Maggie.”
The Chernobyl star wishes to keep collaborating with the 48-year-old director and the reason for why is it has a past connection, “You want to go to the part of the self that’s right down at the bottom of the force in yourself—and also for the people that you work with—that you and they are trying to suppress. And you want to give that thing that hasn’t been given a voice some light, so that it can be part of the growth. Sometimes, that’s really uncomfortable—actually, all the time it is. But my experience of feeling that and working with her in The Lost Daughter was that it was like drinking water. It was like, ‘I need this. I need to actually know that this is in front of me and I have to metabolize it’.”
Sharing how their vision transpired in The Bride, she added, “This was a big sandpit. We were being asked to create a really epic landscape, and so there was so much possibility and so much choice. We had to actively choose how we wanted to create as artists, and not just be passive, but be brave, and be in an absolute unknowability most of the time, but then have complete conviction and a laser beam about where the truth was and go after it.”
The Bride
Based on the 1935 film Bride of Frankenstein, which originally comes from Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein, The Bride tells the story of a loneliness-stricken Frank who goes to Dr. Euphronious (Annette Bening) and demands that he create a companion to ease his worries. The two revive a dead woman, and that’s how The Bride is born, ensuing a lifetime of chaos and unexpected romance.
Peter Sarsgaard, Annette Bening, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Penélope Cruz are also a part of the film releasing worldwide on March 6, 2026.
ALSO READ: EXCLUSIVE: Christian Bale couldn’t forget Maggie Gyllenhaal’s fiery, eccentric The Bride script, ‘Really lingered with me’
#EXCLUSIVE #Jessie #Buckley #creating #Bride #joke #lauds #Maggie #Gyllenhaals #fearless #female #perspective