Poor Things may not look or sound like your average blockbuster, but actor Ramy Youssef still thinks Yorgos Lanthimos' offbeat and bawdy sci-fi comedy deserves to be seen on the biggest screen possible.
"It's such a film that people should see in theaters – it feels like a theater experience in such a cool way. Like, it kind of demands that," Youssef tells 12DOVE when we sit down to chat in London. "I feel like we're told that's saved for action movies and superhero movies and whatever, but then you watch this and you go, 'Oh man, this is so fun in a room with people.'"
Poor Things is Youssef's first big-screen performance, and he jokes that "on some levels, it's a terrible introduction. Because you're like, 'How are you gonna get to do this again?'" He plays Max McCandles, a student of unconventional scientist Godwin Baxter (Willem Dafoe). Godwin's home is full of bizarre creations, including a dog with a duck's head – and Bella Baxter (Emma Stone), a woman who died by suicide and is reanimated by Godwin using the brain of her unborn child.
He says he's a "big fan" of Lanthimos, "and the call with him just kind of came out of nowhere. He had seen my stand-up and my show and walked me through this idea for this film and said, 'I think you could play this character.' I'm still kind of in shock."
Youssef is a director himself – he's helmed 12 episodes across three seasons of the comedy-drama Ramy, which he also co-created, writes, and stars in, as well as the fourth episode of The Bear season 2, in which pastry chef Marcus (Lionel Boyce) travels to Copenhagen. So, what has Youssef taken from his time on a Lanthimos set that he wants to implement into his own work?
"Obviously, he's this auteur, and I think there's a lot that comes with that word or that perception," Youseff says. "He does have every detail in his head, [but] he is really able to let his actors find different things and let that be. You know he's thought about all of it, but he's still letting it breathe organically, and that's why it's so good. So, watching him balance that, the level of detail versus the level of letting it live, was really inspiring."
Poor Things is out now in the US and arrives in UK cinemas on January 12. For more on the movie, here's what Emma Stone told us about her sex scenes and improvising her character's mannerisms.
