Exclusive Interview With Marielle Scott | 30 Miles From Nowhere

As a part of our Interview Series with the movie’s cast and crew, Dankanator had an exclusive interview with 30 Miles From Nowhere’s actress Marielle Scott. She is an amazing actress with a captivating personality. Marielle Scott appeared in Lady Bird as Shelly Yuhan and she performed the role of Amber in 30 Miles From Nowhere.

30 Miles From Nowhere, a horror movie tells a tale about a group of college friends reuniting for their friend’s funeral. However, some eerie things await them at the cabin.

Watch the Interview Video Here:

Interview

Dankanator: What was it like working with a senior cast? Being the youngest actor there, how was the experience?

Marielle Scott: I didn’t think about the age difference until we were on set. I watched how technically sound Carrie Preston is. She is really skilled, she is so professional and as a young actress, I’m really looking toward older actresses, as like, what to do, what not to do, what you can ask, what you can’t ask. So, it’s a real class.

And like a master class, working on so many like sets, you’re able to watch and absorb. And I feel really lucky to just be around them and have the experience. Seana really made it so easy, like she is an exceptional person, and made it a really collaborative creative process so I never felt like the odd man out or anything. I really felt part of the experience.

D: Are you interested in doing more roles for horror and thriller movies such as these?

Marielle Scott: Yeah, like for me as an actress and I’m sure you guys feel it too that if it’s a good story, it’s a good story. And it doesn’t matter the genre or the people. It’s just if it is something that resonates with humanity and could maybe help a lot of people, I think that’s something I want to attach to.

You know what Jordan Peele is doing now with Us, Get Out, this new movie called Mom with Octavia Spencer. These are all genre-bending films, and it doesn’t really matter if it’s a horror or not. I’m open to whatever if it’s a great story.

D: Was that the reason you chose 30 Miles from Nowhere, the storyline? Is that what attracted you to do this movie?

Marielle Scott: Seana, it was Seana that attracted me to do the movie. We had the same agent at the time and Greg was so sweet. He said, “Look there is this film, it’s going to be so creatively fulfilling, you are gonna have such a great time. A writer is just an exceptional person.” For me, I just want to work with good people. And so that was really it. I also love the idea of a bunch of friends being stuck in the woods. That’s so fun. The film also has a sense of humor which I really liked. You know, like, there’s some stuff that’s so really shocking and it’s very uncomfortable.

But there’s also some stuff that we had fun with and played with – we didn’t take ourselves too seriously. Which I think sometimes in films, people can take themselves too seriously and it needs to be just a ‘piece of brilliant piece’. You lose the enjoyment, the fun, and the love of it. And Seana was able to combine the two. We had a great time filming it.

I mean, at the end of the day, it’s the process. You know you do it because of the process and not the end result. So if the process is fun, you want to keep doing it. You don’t have this laborious shoot and yeah it was worth it. You’re like no, it’s your life. So, for me, it’s really important to enjoy where I am now.

D: Any Fun BTS Story from 30 Miles From Nowhere you’d like to share with us?

Marielle Scott: Oh gosh, that story when Postell got dragged by the dog in the woods and the way they rushed him out. We were like aaaah, it was just a fun shoot. And you know when you’re in the middle of the woods every night with a group of people you become close. And we could just not get enough of that silly rig……we loved it. Yeah, it was really, really a treasure.

D: Was it creepy to shoot that scene with live cockroaches?

Marielle Scott: It was so miserable; I was freaking out. They were like we are basically going to put 50 cockroaches all over your body and that is like against every human instinct we have. But I don’t know – apparently they’re like actor cockroaches. So they are trained not to move.

Which I didn’t even know that you could train a cockroach. But we needed them to crawl and they weren’t moving. And I’m the kind of person who says ‘let’s just power through. I’m not gonna cause a scene, I’m not gonna be a diva, let’s just lay there and do it’.

Yeah it was not awesome. But it was you know it was good for the movie. Personally, I was flipping out.

D: So compared to all the scenes you had to shoot, was that the most challenging part of it or were there other instances where you were really challenged?

Marielle Scott: I would say actually the most challenging scene for me was falling into the grave. We had a set coordinator on set. It was a real grave, it was 6 feet down. I had to fall down a few times, and the way that I fell into the grave, it was just like definitely the most physically challenging. And just the mental gymnastics of falling into a grave is so counterintuitive. You know it’s like, us humans, we want to protect ourselves so much physically, so to allow yourself to fall into a grave was so challenging. But everyone there was so great.

But I think that was the most challenging. We were in Wisconsin in a cornfield. And the sun was coming down on the cornfield, and it was so orange and so vibrant and beautiful that it was my saving grace. So whenever I was just like ‘oh my god this is so crazy’, I would just look up at the cornfields and it was just the most vibrant orange, I was like just like ‘okay it’ll be fine.’

D: Was there any scene in particular that you loved shooting?

Marielle Scott: Yeah, I mean a lot of the group scenes I loved because we were able to bounce off each other – one scene where we’re all talking and Carrie walks in, we all get startled and she says like “muffins”. That was like so fun because we were like firing at all cylinders and then there’s a break in the scene and she kind of like brings the laughs. So, because everyone was just so nice and everyone was so cool. And that was definitely the best day.

Scott’s Other Projects

D: You have this movie coming up, about an ill woman with a terminal illness, and you’re starring alongside Dakota Johnson, and Gwendoline Christie, could you tell us something about that movie project?

Marielle: Sure, so I filmed a movie earlier this year, starring Casey Affleck, Jason Segal, Gwendoline Christie, Dakota Johnson, and myself. It is about a young couple and the wife gets diagnosed with cancer. And their best friend from college moves in with them who’s Jason Segal. He helps to move in and take care of them and helps the husband and the wife coz the dishes are stacking up.

There’s no food in the fridge and he really steps up. And we really addressed what does it mean to be a friend and what does it mean to be there for somebody. Also, seeing a young beautiful diagnosed with cancer is quite shocking and I really hope that this film will help a lot of people because seeing cancer in older people and its kind of portrayed in a very specific way.

I think this is going to open up the dialogue like ‘No, a lot of people have gone through this and there are different stages of cancer as well’. You know that’s been really eye-opening for me. I didn’t know there were like different stages like there’s the grief of it but there’s the anger and there are things that you might say but it’s not you, it’s the cancer talking. So, we really addressed all these things and I think its important to talk about all the hard pressing issues because a lot of people go through it.

My grandmother passed away from breast cancer, went through a very similar experience, and it opened the dialogue between me and my mom. We’re able to start talking about what she went through and so it’s a really beautiful story, and I’m hoping it will help a lot of people.

D: How was the experience in Lady Bird?

Marielle: Yeah, it was pretty crazy. It was like a little Indie-film and then we filmed it. You know with films you don’t hear anything for like a year. Like you just put it out and you’re just like ‘I hope its good, I don’t know’. And then it just kind of caught fire and it just resonated with a lot of people. It got nominated for a bunch of Academy Awards and all this stuff and Greta Gerwig made history. And it was just this thing of like WOAH. I was just like pinching myself, that was an amazing experience.

D: Season 2 of You is coming out this year and you have worked in the current season. Can you tell us about the role?

Marielle: This season is crazy you guys, oh it’s crazier than the first one. I can’t say anything about the season. I can’t say anything about season 2. All I can is like that it’s pretty wild…Uhm yeah. So, strap in.

Related: Exclusive Interview With 30 Miles From Nowhere’s Carrie Preston