Severance’s Britt Lower Discusses New Mystery Movie Darkest Miriam | Interview
ComingSoon Senior Editor Brandon Schreur spoke to Britt Lower about the new mystery romance movie Darkest Miriam. Lower discussed what drew her to the project, how she got into character for some of the movie’s darker scenes, and more.
“Miriam Gordon lives in a fog of grief while working in a downtown public library branch,” the synopsis reads. “When a burgeoning love affair coincides with her receiving a series of oddly threatening letters, Miriam’s sheltered existence is cracked open.”
Darkest Miriam will be available on Digital and VOD on Tuesday, April 15, 2025.
Brandon Schreur: I really enjoyed watching you become this character in this movie. She’s really complex and that’s a lot to her. When you got the script for the first time, what stood out to you the most about Miriam and what were you most excited to explore with her?
Britt Lower: I loved Naomi Jay’s adaptation of Martha Baillie’s book. I read both pretty quickly after one another. I was drawn, in both of them, to Miriam’s sense of humor, the way that she looks at the world around her, and the way, in particular, she has this very specific relationship with each of the patrons of the library.
Totally. Going off that, one of the things I really liked about Miriam is that she communicates a lot without saying much. I feel like a lot of what she should be saying is just coming through her body language and facial expressions. Was that challenging at all, for you? Just to say so much without actually saying anything?
Well, like I said, Martha Baillie’s book that the movie is adapted from — the book is called The Incident Report. The way that the book is written is really beautiful, it’s almost like journal entries from Miriam’s point of view. But they are these incident reports that librarians fill out when something peculiar happens at the library. Or every day. Basically, the book, itself, is just incident report after incident report. They become increasingly more personal and more journalistic. So, that interior world was really built into the book, and then adapted into the script. So, I had this wonderful insight into the way that Miriam thinks and moves through the world, based on Martha’s book, and the way that Naomi contextualized that into the film.
You mentioned the personal aspect, which is what I was going to ask you about next. It’s kind of a sad movie, the more and more it goes on, with everything that comes up with Miriam’s father. I thought that was all super well done. And then there’s some stuff that happens in the last 20 or 30 minutes that has a big emotional toll. Playing this character, getting into that mindset, was that specifically challenging to go to that place?
You know, for me, whenever I step into the perspective of a character, it’s my job to be their eyes and to see the world through them. For Britt, they are imaginary circumstances, but, for the character, it’s something quite real happening. In this case, it’s something that brings Miriam to her knees. The grief that she hasn’t quite faced from her father’s death, and then another form of grief that enters in.
Then you have this kind of surreal moment where she falls into a hole, into a construction hole, early on in the film. That, I think, in life, we all do kind of fall into holes sometimes, and they crack us open. Then, all of a sudden we’re open, we’re open to the world around us, to the good and to the painful parts of life. So she’s in this kind of raw, cracked-open state, and it was really beautiful to see what the world looked like from her point of view. It was often very tender.
Sure. I loved the scene, too, when Miriam has a romantic encounter and then goes back to lie down in the hole later that night. I thought that was really smart. In regards to the whole relationship with Miriam’s father, I couldn’t help but think of Severance a little bit, just because I’m such a big fan of the show. Obviously, they’re totally different characters, Helena and her father is something totally different than Miriam and her father. But did you notice any similarities between the two, when you were filming Darkest Miriam? Was there anything from Severance that you brought with you to this set?
I do think I keep characters relatively separate, but there’s probably some subconscious bleed-through that happens that I’m not aware of.
You mentioned the supporting characters throughout the library, and that was something else I really loved about this movie. In the first ten minutes, there’s that part where you narrate who comes in on a daily basis and you get like ten or fifteen different people. That was a really great way to establish the cast. What was it like to work with that big of an ensemble cast? I know they’re not all in the movie a ton, but working with that many people, what kind of vibe was the set like?
We had a beautiful cast and crew. Everyone was kind of on board with building this library world together. Yeah, again, the characters that Martha Baillie, who wrote the book and is an actual librarian — a lot of those characters are based on people who she encountered when she was working at the library. So, they’re kind of these echoes of real people who visit these kinds of last public spaces that we have. I thought the rest of the cast embodied those characters so beautifully, with nuance, and they all brought their own thing to each of them that became really inspiring to play opposite.
Totally. This movie, Darkest Miriam, it premiered at Tribeca last year. It’s played at a few other festivals since then. Now, it’s coming out and a whole bunch more people are going to see it. I’m curious, is that exciting for you or does that make you nervous when it’s suddenly going to be out there for the whole world to watch?
Oh, gosh, there are always some butterflies, of course, when you’re sharing a work of art with the world. But I’m excited for people to meet Miriam. I really loved getting to see the world from her point of view. That interior space that she occupies, I think that’s something I really relate to and I hope the fans can kind of tap into her very particular way of looking at things.
This is on me, but I didn’t realize until the end credits that this movie is executive produced by Charlie Kaufman. Didn’t do my homework, I guess, but that came as a surprise. But, looking back at it, I can definitely feel the vibe of some of his movies in here. Was that something that stood out to you about this project? Were you ever working with him one-on-one during any of this?
I’m a huge Charlie Kaufman fan, so the fact that he is the executive producer is a great honor. I think, yeah, there’s some kindredness with his filmmaking and this film. I’m excited to meet him. I haven’t, yet, but I think while this film is coming out, maybe that will happen.
Thanks to Britt Lower for discussing Darkest Miriam.
Source: Comingsoon.net