Throughout the first jiffy of “Bottoms,” the raucous teen comedy from “Shiva Baby” team Emma Seligman and Rachel Sennott, it’s clear this ain’t your common highschool film. The films follows a pair of queer highschool BFFs (performed by Sennott and “The Bear” breakout Ayo Edebiri) who begin a struggle membership in school with a purpose to choose up chicks. It’s a simple premise, executed flawlessly, for a delightfully over-the-top queer teen comedy. With a late August launch date in hand (simply in time for again to highschool!), “Bottoms” might be the large hit of the late summer time.
Sennott and Seligman wrote the script collectively, with Seligman directing and Sennott starring. Though they had been a sizzling artistic staff using on the success of runaway indie hit “Shiva Baby,” the duo mentioned throughout a latest panel that they confronted loads of pushback for the violence, motion, and hilariously imply characters in “Bottoms.”
“They had been like, ‘floor it, floor it,’” Sennott mentioned of early notes they acquired. “Generally in films from ladies or queer folks, [the characters] have to be so good, and we needed them to be nasty little shits. And so they nonetheless are buddies, so we needed to essentially strike that stability, however we felt like we acquired good notes and had been in a position to tow the road.”
Sennott and Seligman had been readily available to talk to a thrilled viewers after a raucous screening on the Provincetown Worldwide Film Pageant this weekend, the place Jordan Firstman opened his questioning with: “What motivates you extra, blood or pussy?”
Blood ended up being a pivotal a part of the film’s shock comedy, with an epic remaining struggle scene leaving an array of lifeless our bodies throughout a wild twist on the basic “massive sport” highschool trope. The scene performed like gangbusters within the packed theater, eliciting surprised cries and mouth-covering laughter.
“It’s cool to see how folks reply to the combating. ‘Scott Pilgrim’ was a reference on the motion aspect,” Sennott mentioned. “Once we first introduced the film we had been like: It’s a struggle membership film. And so they put it in quotations, like, and the women begin a ‘struggle membership’ the place they ‘struggle.’ And we had been like, no, it’s precise combating. So it’s good, women should beat one another up. I simply love listening to everybody have interaction within the motion.”
Seligman added that, as soon as on set, there have been nonetheless some doubters who didn’t totally grasp the depth of the violence within the film. “Even once we had been capturing it, a few of the crew members and a few key folks on the staff had been like: ‘Wait, do we actually want a stunt coordinator although?’ We‘d written within the script: ‘Hazel punches him, he throws her to the bottom,’” she mentioned.
However fortunately, they discovered producers who not solely understood the humor, however inspired them to take it additional. Orion Photos govt Alana Mayo was instrumental in supporting the duo to remain true to their nasty, disruptive imaginative and prescient.
“Nobody else needed it however Orion, which has been round for awhile however has not too long ago been revitalized with this superb group of younger ladies who fully understood it,” mentioned Seligman. “Alana Mayo, if something she pushed us to go additional with the campiness and the absurdity. However I feel there was lots of hesitancy from the general trade when it comes to who the script was being despatched out to.”
“I bear in mind getting some notes that had been like, so the women shouldn’t be imply, and we had been like that’s the entire level,” mentioned Sennott. “Lots of people had been scared for the Gen Z viewers, they’re like: ‘We don’t discover it offensive, however the youthful technology is so delicate.’ We expect we should giggle and have enjoyable like this, and everybody deserves to have a personality that’s shitty and unhealthy however humorous and no matter.”
MGM will launch “Bottoms” in theaters on Friday, August 25.
