“It hasn’t had a big movie profile, has it?”
Watch: Andrew Garfield & Florence Pugh on We Live in Time
will make you cry, make you laugh and make you realise just how good Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh are.
But this is all to be expected. What you might not expect is that the romantic comedy-drama also features Weetabix.
Garfield’s character Tobias works as a representative for Weetabix, leading to him getting the nickname Mr Weetabix by Almut (Pugh) and giving the breakfast favourite the big-screen moment it deserves.
“It hasn’t had a big movie profile, has it? And I think that’s the point,” director John Crowley told Digital Spy when asked about the Weetabix reference.
“I directed a play by Nick [Payne] at the Donmar Warehouse nine years ago, so I love that quality that he has in his writing, which is this sort of everyday poetry, and he has a great eye for comedy without ever breaking the fabric of a character’s relationship to it.
“I thought the personality of Mr Weetabix and the kind of London that was suggested in the script that we worked very hard then to try and capture, which felt distinct to other film Londons should we say, was also a huge thing.
“It just felt quite real and contemporary to me in a way that was exciting.”
Aside from the Weetabix reference, the other thing you’ll take away from We Live in Time is that pairing Garfield and Pugh was a masterstroke.
Their chemistry was something that Crowley was confident on from early on in rehearsals where, even though they were aiming to be “very low-key with the material”, he could see the pair get emotional regardless.
“It’s a bit like studying the map rather than climbing the mountain. They were totally up for that because they’re both very experienced and they wouldn’t want to expend anything that should be spent when you’re on set in front of a camera,” he recalled.
“But there were a couple of moments on day two [of rehearsals] where they became more comfortable with each other, where the scenes began to just almost naturally pull them into an emotional place.
“You would see that they were like a pair of racehorses kicking at the stalls wanting to run. There were flashes of the odd line between the two of them where it was sparking to life in a way that was thrilling.”
At least UK audiences don’t have too much longer to wait to witness that chemistry on the big screen when We Live in Time finally hits cinemas on New Year’s Day.
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