Mama – Production Notes - I Watch Mike

Annabel tries to protect Lilly and Victoria.gone a completely different route. But when I saw her,I understood who she was instantly.”The actor who would play the dual roles of artistLucas Desanges and his twin brother, Wall Streetfinancier Jeffrey, needed to have range to portray afather driven to his breaking point before he drives hisyoung girls out into the wilderness. Dale gives someinsight into the character of Lucas: “The girls’ unclefeels a tremendous responsibility because nobodyknows really what happened on the day that theydisappeared. He wants to unravel the mystery, butultimately, fatherhood is not a role that he’s entirelyready for; there are a lot of things that he doesn’t know.So when he starts that journey, he’s doing it blindly,just out of love.”The director and producers auditioned manyleading men in Hollywood and Europe for the role ofLucas/Jeffrey, but all had very different ideas on whatwas needed in their performer. Del Toro explains:“Andy was interested in going one way, the studio wasinterested in going another, and I was interested in goinga third way. Then all of a sudden, we saw the readingthat Nikolaj Coster-Waldau did, and we converged.He was the guy who could pull it all together.” DelToro credits the Game of Thrones star with “radiatinga sense of being centered and grounded” in makinghim believable as someone who could makeAnnabel consider taking on this madness.Coster-Waldau appreciated that theproject was not remotely what he expectedit would be: “I knew the genre of the story,but I didn’t expect the story to evolve as itdid. It’s like you read one of those horriblestories in the paper about a guy who’s lost itand had a breakdown and killed his wholefamily and himself; that’s how it starts. Thensuddenly, the story becomes somethingvery different. But when I saw Andy andBarbara’s short, I could see clearly thatAndy is unique in how he uses the camera. Iloved how the short is about these kids and Mama, butit’s almost like you can feel them.”As Chastain notes, Coster-Waldau was moved by theterrifying jealousy of the Mama creature. He elaborates:“As long as there’s no emotional connection betweenthe kids and whoever they meet, Mama is fine. But assoon as there’s an emotional threat, she goes in and getsaggressive. Clearly in the beginning, Lucas is the onewho’s connecting with the girls. So he is a threat and shepushes him down the stairs in a very special way.”For the critical roles of the feral girls left in the woodsfor five years, 10-year-old Megan Charpentier was cast asVictoria and eight-year-old Isabelle Nélisse was broughton board as her little sister, Lilly. As both girls are inthe majority of the scenes of the thriller, the filmmakersknew the search to cast them would not be a simple one.Barbara Muschietti admits casting the children washer biggest fear: “We were terrified about finding thesetwo girls because this is heavy material that requires a lotfrom them physically and emotionally, and they’re in justabout every scene of the movie.” Casting sessions acrossCanada uncovered what the producer calls “the twomost precious little girls ever. Megan and Isabelle areamazing. Amazing! They’re both completely dif ferentbut spectacular, and everybody on set was absolutely inlove with them.”– 16 –