Chloé Zhao Is Lost in Thought |
How could a woman who’s not a mother capture the darkness of losing a child? That was Chloé Zhao’s concern when Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment first called about Hamnet in 2022. Zhao initially turned them down. It appears that in spite of that difference, Zhao was able to capture that emotion—to the extent that critics are saying she may earn an Oscar for the film. Her holistic approach to the Bard birthed a guttural scream of a film that emotionally draws and quarters you, illuminating the difference between director and auteur. “Every decision Chloé makes as a filmmaker comes from her feelings and not her thoughts,” says Spielberg. Zhao sits down with VF’s Michelle Ruiz to talk Hamnet, reviving Buffy, and navigating Hollywood as a “deeply neurodivergent” director.
Elsewhere in HWD, Kase Wickman reports on Wicked: For Good’s New York premiere, where the cast finally reaches the end of the yellow brick road; Derek C. Blasberg provides an oral history of LA nightlife in the early 2000s; VF’s Hollywood Issue cover stars reveal their favorite YouTube videos; and Hadley Hall Meares walks us through all of Dolly Parton’s memoirs. |
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