Sometimes putting a blended family together does not go so smoothly. That is particularly true if one of those involved, particularly the ex-wife, is not necessarily of the soundest of minds. That is just the tip of the iceberg of the premise of Unforgettable, the new thriller starring Katherine Heigl and Rosario Dawson.
Heigl is Tessa, the ex-wife of Geoff Stults’ David, who has just had his fiancé Julia (Dawson) move in with him in Los Angeles, moving from her native San Francisco. Tessa and David have a young daughter Lily (Isabella Kai Rice), who they are raising together in what so far has been a quite smooth adjustment. When Tessa engrains herself in this broken family’s life — that is when things start to go south.
We caught up Heigl and Dawson at the recent Unforgettable press day and there was much to discuss as this is a thriller that bucks stereotypes and all those involved were eager to dive in and tell this story that breaks stereotypes on many levels.
First of all, Tessa is a walking and talking version of someone seeking perfection. Heigl found that difficult physically because she took her character’s desire to be “just right” literally to how she even carried herself.
“It did cause a lot of back pain though after a while. I was like ‘Uhh, uhh,’ at the end of the day. Yeah, she held herself very stiffly. I think a lot of that happens when you are trying to contain yourself. Everything tends to tighten up. And that was Tessa. And she was just so wired and so tight,” Heigl said.
The pair not only had the pleasure of each other’s talents, they basked on the glow of two other massive gifts, the supremely talented man who stars as the man in the middle, David (Stults) and the gifted beyond her years actress who plays Tessa and David’s daughter Lily (Rice). Dawson for one could not have been more thrilled to see each on the set every single day.
“He wooed everyone on set,” Dawson said of the film’s lone male star.
But the one who truly blew her way was the set’s youngest performer. “One of the amazing actresses who’s not here with us right now is Isabella Kai Rice, who plays our daughter to an extent. She is just remarkable and [she and Geoff] became best friends — literally best friends. They just had breakfast together yesterday, hang out all the time. I think that was a really key part of it as well, that relationship with the daughter being as beautiful and loving as it was and also as precarious and desperate as it was. It couldn’t have worked without her and to see the beautiful relationship the two of you had, you could see why everything else built on top of it.”
Heigl adored working with Rice, but there was one scene that truly pushed it for her. Tessa is our villain yes, and as such Heigl’s job is to find compassion for her and why she does what she does. One particular scene involving her being somewhat evil involves bringing a little girl to tears.
“The hardest thing I had to do was make that little girl cry. And it just, even now, it feels so terrible,” Heigl said and laughed. “It’s the hardest thing I had to do. And that’s when I started to lose a little bit of my compassion for Tessa.”
Heigl had to dig deep and remind herself why her character was doing what she was doing. “I had to find a way to understand why she was doing this. And to do it from a place of again she truly believed she’s right. She truly believed she’s doing the right thing for her child. She’s teaching her a very valuable lesson. You only have one mother, and don’t alienate me,” she said.
When the two leads finally have had enough and go at each other’s throats, there is a lot of pent up anger and frustration there, but onscreen, it appears as if the actresses are having a ball. Turns out, they were. “You were seeing as well when we were shooting it. Cheyenne, who is Katie’s stunt woman, she’s been working with her for years. I’ve been working with Asia for years, she’s been on all the Marvel Netflix show’s with me. And it was like, I’d fight with you, Katie, then Asia would fight with you. Then I’d fight with Cheyenne and then Cheyenne would fight Asia. We’d all take turns tussling with each other,” Dawson said.
Unforgettable also deals with an issue that has made headlines for years, and recently landed on the news because of Congress’s vote to make it legal for internet providers to release subscribers’ information to anyone who asks for it… internet privacy. Dawson clearly has an opinion on the issue. Lord knows we see the damage it can do in Unforgettable!
“I found it very fascinating and I think this is a whole movie about people trying to have secrets and protecting themselves and not sharing a lot about themselves… being very thoughtful and pointed about what they do because of that and the walls they put up, the opportunities are missed for these people to be able to relate to each other,” Dawson said.
“So they are forced into this situation where they are by themselves alone, going through stuff. ‘Let’s look at Tessa’s school records,’ rather than directly asking that person. You’re trying to find that information out, and we use that information against each other. Again, that’s showing that misstep.”
Dawson worries about internet privacy and believes that it is all too easy to invade someone’ life. “There’s a serious conversation we have to have around privacy and boundaries and also about honesty and what we are willing to share. Right now we’ve got Congress signing and saying corporations can go a look at our browsing history or anything without our consent,” Dawson said.
“Big Brother is doing that on a regular basis and for the greater good, being able to see our spending habits and all of this kind of supposed stuff. There are some definite benefits to augmented reality and things that come from that, but also, what are we giving up? We don’t really know because we haven’t seen this landscape before. So I think the opportunity constantly being missed is being about relate to each other and find commonality and not use this information against each other. We want to have trust and safety. And this definitely shows you the different ways we could have explored it. And the tools we could be using as tools rather than crutches or weapons.”