Lupita Nyong'o and Alex Wolff look back on Us, Hereditary, and making A Quiet Place

Lupita Nyong'o saw the 1982 film Poltergeist, as she says, "way earlier than I should have" around the age of 5. "That traumatized me," the Oscar winner tells Entertainment Weekly, "but it also planted this kind of maniacal seed in me. I really love scaring people. I think it's a powerful thing to be able to do."

Alex Wolff, Nyong'o's costar in A Quiet Place: Day One, agrees. "Movies don't always give you the opportunity to explore the operatic nature of really traumatic things that do exist in real life," he says. "I've always felt like I've had emotions that are large and at times deep and at times upsetting. I think we all have. Horror is a great place to put it. It's a trauma therapy of sorts."

The duo have given the horror genre some of its most impressive performances to date: Nyong'o in the dual roles of Adelaide Wilson and her tragic, terrifying doppelgänger Red for Jordan Peele's Us (2019), and Wolff as Peter Graham, whose family is tormented by a demonic entity in Ari Aster's Hereditary (2018). As they now join forces for another horror venture within the A Quiet Place universe (opening this weekend), the stars revisit their past work in the genre and discuss the state of horror.

On watching each other's movies

ALEX WOLFF: I think her performance in Us is one of the more disturbing performances by anyone in any kind of movie. The reason it's so disturbing is not just because of it being terrifying, which it is, but she did what horror does at its best: She reflected two sides of people, the light and the dark. That is a dangerous road to go down emotionally, and she did it in the most beautiful, elegant way. That is one that stuck with me and made me feel sick to my stomach — and made me terrified of you.

LUPITA NYONG'O: I was thoroughly impressed with his performance in [Hereditary]. It was terrifying. And the fact that it looks...

WOLFF: So handsome in it?

NYONG'O: Yeah, you were handsome and trouble in it.

WOLFF: Trouble, but mostly handsome.

NYONG'O: I think you want to be doing more than handsome. It was more than that. It was a compelling movie. He transforms in every movie he makes, he looks and feels completely different. I saw him in that, I saw him in Pig, and I did not know that was the same person. Then here, in A Quiet Place: Day One, again, he is a very transformative actor.

WOLFF: We love each other. This is our first interview together, so we're very excited.

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On the awards buzz around their horror movies

NYONG'O: It happened pretty early in my career before I could even wish for it [with 12 Years a Slave]. I embraced that moment and continue to embrace it, but I never want to ever be working for the recognition in that way. It's so easy to get disappointed. There is no way to predict when and how it's going to happen. So when that chatter [for Us] started, it's hard to also ignore or avoid. I heard it, but I was trying not to pay attention to it because to want that level of recognition for every role I play is to be deeply disappointed all too often.

WOLFF: Even though it deserves it! I really believe every time I see Lupita in something, I just go, "That's her best work." It feels like you have a real exponential growth in every single performance.

NYONG'O: Thank you. That's the award. The number of times people have said to me, "You should have won an Academy Award for that," that is the award, the fact that it resonates. At the end of the day, I don't think that we hold onto the movies that won the most awards. We hold onto the movies that moved us the most. I feel very, very complimented and happy when people tell me that my work continues to resonate with them. What about you?

WOLFF: There's this bowling trophy that I saw at my local bowling alley that I've had my eye on for six years or something. So I'd really like to get that bowling trophy.

On the Hereditary dinner scene

WOLFF: It just comes down to Ari and the great actors that I was working with [Toni Collette, Gabriel Byrne]. Ari is really one of the great directors ever, just like Michael Sarnoski [of A Quiet Place: Day One and Pig]. But Ari did this cool thing where he would shoot two cameras at the same time. He actually didn't do a lot of rehearsal for the really emotional scenes. He'd do a lot of rehearsal, but for the emotional ones, he trusted us. That's bold as a first-time director. He just put the cameras on us and let it rip. I'll never forget that trust that he gave me. He's an extraordinary human being, extraordinary director. 

On the Us Tethered-Wilsons living room scene

NYONG'O: To be honest, I don't even remember what order we shot because some days I'd be on set as Adelaide and then the next day I'd be on set as Red. Some days I was doing both. For me that movie was like a mathematical equation that I needed to figure out because I was playing these two characters that are intrinsically connected and they're opposite. You think they're one thing and then you find out they're the other thing, so I needed to layer two truths — the lie they're telling and the truth underneath — so that it lent itself to repeat viewing, so that you could see the clues the second time of Red being Adelaide and Adelaide being Red. What I do remember is that I performed very little of Red when we got to that scene. It was going to be the real test whether I could pull off the voice, whether I could be as menacing as I imagined her in my head and as Jordan wanted her to be. I remember walking onto set as Red and the energy shifting around me. It was so intoxicating.

WOLFF: Who do you think you're more like between the two of them?

NYONG'O: Oh, if I say that, I have to hide forever. [Laughs] But I love that I got to play this duality because I do think it exists in all of us.

On John Krasinski wanting the Pig touch for A Quiet Place: Day One

WOLFF: I guess I'm the Pig touch! [Wolff appeared opposite Nicolas Cage in director Michael Sarnoski's 2021 indie film.] He threw me in there.

NYONG'O: You're the through line of his work.

 WOLFF: I said, "So I have to be in your next movie or it's bad luck."

NYONG'O: The Pig touch for me would be that Michael has this way of telling an intense and severe story with tenderness. And there's a purity of spirit at the core of his stories that is compelling and relatable. He also really loves to have animals in his movies and make them do impossible things. And I love that at the heart of both his films, there's a simple mission. In Pig, it's, "Get my pig back!" And in A Quiet Place: Day One, it's, "Get some pizza!"

WOLFF: And he adds a warmth. I feel like it is missing from movies. It's either things are saccharin or things are just cold and removed. It's really special to have someone who makes everything really thrilling and exciting and dark and takes chances, but also really has heart and vulnerability.

A Quiet Place: Day One opens in theaters Friday.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and brevity.