Suicide Squad’s four actresses, Margot Robbie, Viola Davis, Karen Fukuhara and Cara Delevingne, revealed their sources of inspiration to get into their characters’ heads in a recent press conference. Starring a team of unstable and disreputable supervillains coerced into ‘saving the day’, Suicide Squad is unlike any superhero movie we’ve seen yet. The film’s stars, almost all of whom play bad guys with a real capacity for evil, had to go about preparing for their roles in an unusual way.
Last Sunday, the cast and crew of Suicide Squad held a press conference in New York City to promote the film before its premiere night on Monday. As the subject matter went into the actors’ preparations for the film, the actresses shared what they drew on to play their characters.
“[W]e had an amazing resource with the comic books, but there are still little gaps in the backstory and things you need to fill in yourself,” said Margot Robbie, who brings the fan favorite Harley Quinn to life in the film. "Trying to figure out the dynamic between Harley and the Joker and why she was so devoted to this guy that tries to kill her occasionally"”it's a few things, like, that took a while for my head to get around," she adds.
She watched some TED talks on schizophrenia to get a better understanding of Harley. “The TED talks really helped because the women and professors doing the talks were so intelligent, and Harley needed to be wickedly intelligent like them, but also psychotic. I also got recommended to read a play called ‘Fool for Love’, about this dysfunctional relationship, and that helped me unlock her feelings for the Joker.”
Viola Davis plays government operative Amanda Waller, the one responsible for creating Task Force X as a means of dealing with the growing metahuman problem. Co-star Joel Kinnaman, who plays her right-hand man Rick Flag, gave her a gift that helped in portraying her character. “Joel gave me a book called ‘Confessions of a Sociopath,’ and I read that book extensively,” said Davis. “It’s confessions of a woman who’s a sociopath, and one of the things I found out is a lot of CEOs of companies are sociopaths. People who have no guilt, if they cry they’re only crying because they feel like they’re losing control.”
She also revealed how she dug deep into her own childhood. "I tapped into Viola at eight for the role. I couldn't think as Viola at 51. At eight, I could beat somebody's ass. I was just always angry"”people were always teasing me, so I would fight back," said Davis. "I was bullied and I fought."
"That was the first story I told [director] David [Ayer] when I met him. He was like, "˜Viola, tell me about your childhood.' And I said, "˜Well, David, when I was eight, I kicked a lot of ass,'" she adds. "So there was a part of me that had to remember to tap into that because with women, and myself, I'm apologizing"”I'm shy, I'm retreating, and I forget to tap into my power. Amanda Waller is not that. She is unapologetically brutal. I called Joel a pussy a couple of times. I had to tap into that because otherwise I would have retreated, and with this group, I couldn't retreat."
Karen Fukuhara connected with her character Katana by looking at her own family’s history and daily life, as well as reading the comics too. “Coming from a Japanese-American family, we had a lot of those Japanese cultures and values growing up in the household,” said Fukuhara. “It was my first language and we grew up on Japanese traditions and food and TV and all of that. I think when I first read the Katana comics, I immediately fell in love and I immediately felt like there was a part of her inside of me even though our personalities were so completely different. For me, the switch really happened when I put on the mask and the wardrobe. That really helped me tap into the character.”
To bring the incredibly powerful Enchantress to life, Cara Delevingne listened to Ayer’s instructions. “Some of the first things David said to me were looking into things like addiction,” said Delevingne. "There's that horrible feeling of never getting enough, never feeling everything is enough, and needing more of something. I also tried to find the demon inside myself, which is not hard to find. I had to make that as real as possible and understand why someone would do something that evil or why someone would want to hurt that many people and just try to make it real, I guess. That’s what David wanted for this movie."
Directed by David Ayer and also starring Will Smith, Jared Leto and more, Suicide Squad hits cinemas on August 5, 2016.
