The last time writer-director Emerald Fennell released a movie, 2020’s Promising Young Woman, it was the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. The film premiered in person at Sundance earlier that year, but she missed out on any other opportunities to experience the project in a proper theater. With her follow-up film, Saltburn, now in theaters, she’s not missing out. “Every conversation is different; every room is different—that’s what’s been so exciting,” Fennell tells Little Gold Men. “In some rooms, it’s like total pin-drop silence. In other rooms, it’s super rowdy.”
It’s no surprise that the reactions have varied. As with Promising Young Woman, Fennell is pushing her audiences into an uncomfortable space with her follow-up, a visceral, sex-drenched exploration of wealth and privilege set at a picturesque English manor. Saltburn stars Barry Keoghan as Oliver, an Oxford student who finds himself obsessed with his well-off and popular classmate Felix (Jacob Elordi). When Felix invites Oliver to his fancy estate for the summer, Oliver becomes entwined with a complicated cast of characters played by Rosamund Pike, Richard E. Grant, Alison Oliver, Archie Madekwe, and Carey Mulligan.
An unexpected result of the film? Despite the movie’s dark and twisted turns, Fennell says she’s gotten a lot of “anecdotal evidence of quite a lot of sexy behavior that happens after people watch the movie.” Fennell, who won the original-screenplay Oscar for Promising Young Woman, spoke to Little Gold Men about her clandestine writing process, how she casts her lead roles, and what story she plans to tell next.
Vanity Fair: After Promising Young Woman was such a success, I assume there were lots of different opportunities that were coming your way. How did you decide that Saltburn would be next for you?
Emerald Fennell: It was an extraordinary time. I was getting lots of incredible offers, just unbelievable things with people I’ve wanted to work with my whole life. So many things that could have been just so fun and amazing. But what I realized about myself is that I can only do one thing at a time, and I can only do it in secret. I don’t even show my husband. I don’t show anyone until something’s completely finished. And so I said quite early on to my lovely managers and agents [about the offers], “Don’t tell me, don’t show me, because it’s too tempting.” It’s not at all that I’m turning my back in a sort of haughty way—it’s more that I know that there are things I just couldn’t bear to turn down.
I realized, especially when you’ve got young kids, you can only do so much and you need to choose the thing that you want to do next. And I’ve been thinking about Saltburn for years and years. It was always the next thing I wanted to make.
How did this process of writing Saltburn differ from Promising Young Woman for you?
Sophie Anderson, a UK-based writer, is your guide to the latest trends, viral sensations, and internet phenomena. With a finger on the pulse of digital culture, she explores what’s trending across social media and pop culture, keeping readers in the know about the latest online sensations.
