I’m trying to prepare for the awards season by watching as many of the buzzy, Oscar-baity films as possible, as CB and I do most years. From what I’ve seen so far, Conclave and Anora are my two favorites of the year. Unless we’re talking about Dune: Part Two as an Oscar contender, because I absolutely loved that movie too. I saw Anora over the Thanksgiving holiday and I cannot recommend it enough. It’s sexy, funny, sweet, sad and just really enjoyable. It’s a film about a sex worker eloping with the son of a Russian oligarch. Mikey Madison plays the stripper/escort and she is absolutely wonderful. Worthy of all of the Oscar buzz she’s getting. She might even be one of the favorites to win all of the big awards. Mikey recently covered Dazed Digital, and I enjoyed learning more about her. She’s 25, she’s from California, she loves animals and she loves to be super-prepared for everything.

She suffered debilitating shyness as a kid: At school, she would feel ill – “like, physically nauseous” – before class kicked off every morning. “I think socially, I really struggled in that environment. And then in terms of education, the way that the schools were teaching wasn’t the way that I learned.”

She was a horse girl: For a long time in her childhood, she believed she would become an equestrian – she was so dedicated that she switched to homeschooling to spend more hours (all of her hours, really) at the stables. Getting off the horse was a particularly tough sacrifice to make once acting began to take over. “I knew that, if I wanted to be an actress, I needed to focus completely on that. I didn’t think that I could do both. If I do something, it needs to be with all of myself, all of my time.”

Learning Russian for Anora: “I remember my first Russian session, I was like, ‘F–k, there’s no way I’m going to be able to learn Russian for this movie. Like, ‘This is impossible. I can’t believe I didn’t start this six months ago.’” The pole-dancing skills came together after one failed session, a whole lot of procrastination and a renewed dedication through multiple classes a week and a pole her father installed in her home. Two months before the rest of the crew, she arrived in Brighton Beach to familiarise herself with the neighbourhood. “I’ve done all the work, I know this character. I’ve worked on the emotionality of it, the physicality, every possible part of her. But I was very aware that it was on my back.”

She loved collaborating with Sean Baker, which was a new experience: “This experience has completely changed the way that I want to work in the future. It sounds cheesy to say, but it was genuinely life-changing.”

The awards season: “I haven’t thought about the next six months. That just feels like such a long time. I don’t even really know what I’m doing next week! I’m just trying to take things slowly.”

An old soul: Technology is, by her own admission, not one of her strengths. (Her Zoom malfunctions twice over the course of our call.) As for social media, the closest she’s ever been to Instagram is through the daily screen recordings of animal videos that Baker texts her. “I don’t even allow myself a lurk,” she shares. She’s so avoidant of technology, in fact, that she has no idea how AI works. (Specifically: “What the f–k is ChatGPT?”)

She isn’t booked & busy: “I think that I’m being very thoughtful about the next job I choose for many different reasons. I know who I am as an actor and an artist now. I know how I want to feel making a movie. I’ve been lucky to have every job that I’ve had, but I want to feel – even just a little bit – the way I felt making Sean’s movie on my next. So it’s important for me to be in love with the character. It’s an emotional job that I’m doing, and so I’m waiting for something that really speaks to me. That’s what I’ve been thinking about, and right now I’m still waiting for that.”

[From Dazed]

After Anora, I can completely understand why this was a life-changing experience for her and why she wants to see if she can replicate that kind of experience with her next projects. But… I hate to say this, but she’s going to be in for a rude awakening. Directors aren’t going to line up to write screenplays with her in mind, and it will probably be a while before an entire production hinges on her performance. Plus, no one would blame her if she cashes in a little – take a studio film, take a Netflix movie, do whatever you feel like. Anyway, I hope big things happen for her.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, cover courtesy of Dazed.