#VOX LUX FULL#

The suit has an almost chainmail kind of.

And there was always a sense of armor: Her hair is shellacked. 'The hair, the makeup, and the costumes were all very influential in how I moved,' she says. The costumes project the glossy, curated image of a star, and also helped in transforming the elegant Portman, both externally and internally, into someone who's loudly her aesthetic opposite. 'It was hard to know how far was too far, because there is no such thing as too far.' So, just as Celeste herself isn't based on any one real-life person, and references a swathe of real people and performances in a composite, Celeste's catsuits are 'sort of an amalgamation of other cat suits that have come before it.' 'It's very difficult to justice to the level of plasticity and absurdity that exists in the world of popular music,' Corbet says. The high-glamour, highly specific world of pop music created some challenges for the wardrobe department.

She also laid down real vocal tracks for the songs and performed dance routines designed by her choreographer husband Benjamin Millepied in a long concert sequence that closes the film.Ĭeleste's concert costumes are all sparkle and feathers and skin-tight catsuits-an item that would never share hanger space with the blush tea dress Portman is wearing during our interview. It's in hotels and it's in supermarkets and taxis.' To embody Celeste, Portman listened to a lot of Sia-who wrote Celeste's pop hits-and watched documentaries about musicians. 'It's something which is very present in our 's on the radio everywhere you go. 'The idea was to talk about pop culture via the prism of popular music,' Corbet says. She's both on the receiving end of destruction and also a destroyer herself.' Juxtaposing the glitter of pop stardom and the violence of a broken world, Vox Lu x 'takes a pretty dark view of the effects of fame, for sure,' Portman says. 'She's certainly a party to her own devouring. As a celebrity herself, who's also played a gone-dark ballerina and a first lady, what drew Portman to this particular exploration of fame? 'I like that she's not like a tragic victim,' she says. She seems to have eaten herself and come out the other side a calcified, impenetrable celebrity. Natalie Portman and Brady Corbet at a New York screening of Vox Lux Dimitrios Kambouris // Getty Imagesįlip to her adult life, where Portman steps in as the world-wearied version of the now hyper-successful Celeste. Enter Jude Law as the unnamed manager who shepherds her louchely through the machinations of the music industry there's a flashy-trashy music video, dance training, drugs and sex and betrayal. After surviving a school shooting, Celeste performs an original song at a memorial service and the spotlight immediately engulfs her. The film demands a lot of its central character, whose younger version is played by Raffey Cassidy (Cassidy also plays Celeste's daughter in the second half of the film). 'When you need someone that age to go for broke, there's only a few people that are capable of it,' Corbet tells me one winter afternoon at The Whitby Hotel, where he and Portman are holding a press junket.

#VOX LUX FULL#

Natalie Portman in a spangled catsuit, going full Lady Gaga on stage and also up close on a stadium LED screen.īrady Corbet's recent film, Vox Lux, isn't about Natalie Portman, but the actress' performance as tragic pop star Celeste is absolutely Natalie Portman: all-in, hectic, distractingly high-functioning. Natalie Portman slinging cruel insults at a cowering young woman, who happens to be her sister. Natalie Portman bawling out diner staff for asking for an autograph. Natalie Portman high off her face on cocaine, clinging to a decrepit Jude Law. Natalie Portman dancing in a 36-foot cape.

Vox lux