Robert Kojder chats with Causeway director Lila Neugebauer about authenticity, vulnerability, Brian Tyree Henry, New Orleans, soundscape, deaf character implications, and more…
With a background in theatre, Lila Neugebauer crafted her first feature-length film, Causeway, which was picked up by Apple TV+ and played at North American festivals. Immersively authentic, the film follows Afghanistan veteran Lynsey (Jennifer Lawrence) back home in New Orleans, managing family baggage and coping with PTSD. Along the way, she meets a mechanic named James (a phenomenal performance from Byron Tyree Henry), who also has his fair share of trauma, striking up a sweet friendship born from loneliness and understanding one another. It’s a film stripped-down to essential character beats and an all-around realistically moving work that announces Neugebauer as a filmmaker to watch. She also flew in for the Chicago International Film Festival, where I interviewed her about the film in person. Please enjoy our conversation below:
First off, I want to say I love this movie. As far as I know, it’s not based on a true story, which is surprising because it feels so personal, and the characters feel so real. So I’m curious what the inspiration was for you and the writers behind making Causeway.
Thank you so much for your timers on the film! I love what you just described. The original screenplay for this film was written by a woman named Elizabeth Sanders. It was an adaptation of a short story she had written called Red, White, and Water. It is set in New Orleans, where she’s from, and this story was very personal for her. We then benefited from remarkable contributions from the writers Ottessa Moshfegh and Luke Goebel, who contributed beautifully to the script’s development. No one involved in writing this script happens to be a veteran or service member, nor am I. But about what you said, I had the opportunity while developing the script and then in prep while shooting and into post-production of consulting very extensively with the US Department of Veteran Affairs, medical experts in the field of traumatic brain injury, and veterans and service members. Those conversations were revelatory and hugely informative to the development of this script. The film wouldn’t exist without them. So it’s possible that some of what you are identifying may also be a testament to their contributions, which were foundational and essential.
Jennifer Lawrence is fantastic in this, but Brian Tyree Henry is also extraordinary. His acting is so natural. How did each of them get involved with this movie, and what made you think they were a perfect fit for the characters?
So about six weeks after I first read the original screenplay for this film and attached myself to it, I heard that Jennifer Lawrence had read it and, like me, had responded to it very passionately. And I was asked if I would like to have dinner with her. I said yes. We had dinner, and the connection between us was, I would say, instantaneous and easy. We immediately connected our relationships to what we had read and were aligned creatively and aesthetically. She signed on that night. Brian Tyree Henry, I’ve known since I was 19.
Wow, that’s awesome.
So he is an old friend. And after first reading the script, I felt that no one else should play the role of James Oakland. So I was intensely gratified that Brian wanted to be a part of my first film. In terms of the second part of your question, what they bring to it, I continue to be kind of astonished by Jen’s ability to convey such raw depth of emotion in such an understated and restrained register. That requires tremendous discipline. And Brian, as I told you, I’ve known him a long time. So I’ve been aware for some time that he’s an actor of, I think, singular range, depth magnetism, humanity, empathetic imagination. And I think all of that is alive on screen in this film.
As a physically disabled person, I also love the scene where James is shy about joining Lynsey in the swimming pool, partially because of its insecurity about the missing leg. Every little subtle acting choice playing the scene he makes is delicate and beautiful there. So can you talk about shooting that scene?
Yes, and I’m so gratified to hear that that scene resonated with you, more than I can say. I think of James Oakland as someone who, to his neighbors or the regulars at the bar he goes to or his co-workers, as someone, they probably know survived a very significant trauma. But I imagine him as someone who seems like he’s really come back from that, is easy to talk to, and knows how to make easy conversation with people from all different walks of life, but in his soul. and I know this is a very circuitous way to get to the answer to your question, I will come back to it. I’m just excited to talk about James Oakland and Brian. Vulnerability is where I’m headed. He’s in grief for his life and his nephew’s death.
So he’s a very vulnerable person. And knowing that Brian is a person of tremendous sensitivity and, as I think I said, empathetic imagination, it was very important to both of us to just handle James with the greatest possible care in that scene in terms of honoring every different aspect of vulnerability that was involved, physical and emotional at each step. I would say that the overall scene, particularly when things get heated between the two of them, was one of the hardest scenes to shoot in the film because the stakes of getting it right were so high. The stakes of getting everything right feel very high when you’re on set. It’s exploratory, and hopefully, there’s no feeling that there’s a wrong or right choice. But the stakes of crafting that scene, we all knew how high the stakes were, every aspect of it. I feel very grateful that I had in both Brian and Jen such dedicated, tenacious, detail-oriented collaborators who wanted to handle their characters with a total lack of sentimentality but with care and sensitivity.
And I love his reaction when she says she pities him.
Good, I’m glad!
The score by Alex Somers is really moving. It’s always at the right emotional tempo. So what was that collaborative process like?
I’m so glad that you enjoy the score. I’m deeply enamored by Alex Somers and had been a fan of his work for some time before working on this film with him. I had mostly known his work from his collaborations with Jonsi and Sigur Ros. He is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, musician, and music producer who has produced some really astonishing artists. So I knew his work, and then I encountered this two-album compilation that he made called Siblings. And I lost my mind when I listened to this music. The depth of feeling in the sonic landscape of that project was overwhelmingly moving for me. And I also felt that I was listening to the movie’s soul.
I reached out to him. He was the first to see a rough, incomplete cut. We spoke, and it was like Lynsey’s skin was translucent. He could see inside her and was so connected to her inner life. So I hired him. New Orleans is a very sonically rich place with incredible musical tradition, and we talked about that but ultimately felt that our protagonist does not feel at home in her home. So we wanted the film’s score to express her soul, which we tried to do.
Lynsey’s brother is deaf and communicates with ASL. So what prompted you to make that choice for the character?
That scene was not in the original screenplay that I read. That character existed. His absence was very potent, but we never met him. And in the course of developing the script, it became apparent to all of us that having that encounter could be very useful in Lynsey’s trajectory for her. When that scene was first written, it was not written for a deaf actor. I wanted to cast Russell Harvard, whose work I knew from his stage work in New York. I knew every member of the supporting cast in this film from my New York theater community from plays off-Broadway and on Broadway. I was thrilled that he wanted to do it. I will acknowledge that I, of course, wanted to think carefully about the implications of embedding a deaf character in that family’s story from all three perspectives. Upon thinking about it and talking to Russell about it, he and I both came to the feeling that that story, we could imagine with great rigor and robustness, the implications of that for that family in a way that made sense to us.
Thank you so much for your time!
Thank you, it was a pleasure!
Many thanks to Lila Neugebauer for taking the time for this interview.
SEE ALSO: Read our ★★★★ review of Causeway here
Robert Kojder is a member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and the Critics Choice Association. He is also the Flickering Myth Reviews Editor. Check here for new reviews, follow my Twitter or Letterboxd, or email me at MetalGearSolid719@gmail.com
