Zoë Kravitz and Naomi Ackie on #MeToo, ‘Get Out,’ Nail Art, and Their Thrilling New Film, ‘Blink Twice’

“Something horrible is about to happen,” a slightly buzzed Frida (Naomi Ackie) tells Slater King (Channing Tatum) in Blink Twice. She is reclining on a towel as her champagne glass is refilled, the gentle glug and swirling fizz echoing eerily between her words. She’s smiling as she delivers the line, but her focused gaze reflects the sharpness of her instinct. Slater looks back at her with genuine confusion before exhaling, vape smoke coursing from his nostrils.

Zoë Kravitz’s directorial debut is an exercise in waiting for the other shoe to drop. Everyone is perpetually a little drunk, a little stoned, developing mysterious bruises, and very unclear on what day of the week it is as they sink into the extravagant luxuries of a tropical private island.

The thriller follows caterwaiter Frida and her best friend, Jess (Alia Shawkat), after they are invited by the famed (and formerly canceled) tech-mogul billionaire Slater King to visit his private island. We never learn what it was, exactly, that Slater did to lose public favor; the more important thing is that he is working on himself. Slater King is the kind of rich guy who seems to mean well: he does yoga, keeps a gratitude journal, and says things like “therapy changed my life.”

Once on the island, the besties join a small cohort of what appear to be friends and confidantes of Slater’s, played by Adria Arjona, Haley Joel Osment, Christian Slater, and Kyle MacLachlan. All agree to the innocuous terms of their stay: they give up their cell phones upon arrival and dress in the all-white wardrobes they are gifted. It’s all a little cult-like, but harmless, right?

Kravitz began writing the script for Blink Twice in early 2017, at the dawn of the #MeToo movement, when ideas about gender and power were top of mind. Growing up in and around the entertainment industry, she had frequented rooms with powerful people from an early age, and come to understand the unspoken rules of being a woman in such spaces. As heinous revelations about powerful men came to light, she completed the script with her writing partner E.T. Feigenbaum.

Despite its real-world influences, Blink Twice is intentionally vague in its world-building: watching it won’t remind you of any particular notorious transgressor, but all of them. The comparisons this film will draw are many: On its face, it belongs to the canon of dramas like Triangle of Sadness, The Menu, Saltburn, and The White Lotus that caricature the uber-rich. But it is also very much a story about oppression, betrayal, and violence, and in several instances it evokes the terrors of Jordan Peele’s Get Out. The eerie sensory overload has a lot to do with that: The colors are saturated to the max, and the all-white outfits sharply contrast with the rubber-duck yellow cocktail umbrellas, the single raspberry plopped into the glass of bubbly, the blindingly green flora. The scrupulous sound design—picking out the rubbing of a cricket’s wings or the slap of a mosquito—also let us know that all is not quite right.

A few days ahead of the film’s wide release, Kravitz and Ackie spoke to Vogue about how the project came together, the current status of the #MeToo movement, and how the cast and crew handled Blink Twice’s more difficult scenes.

Vogue: I wanted to ask you, Zoë, since you directed and co-wrote this film, if you ever considered playing Frida yourself?

Zoë Kravitz: I never really considered it. I think I was putting a lot of my own personality in the early drafts of her, just because I was writing from my perspective. But I think at that point, I wasn’t even really thinking about the movie getting made. That seemed insane. And so by the time we actually got to the place where we were considering making the film, I think I had kind of decided to not, and that I wanted to direct it. And as soon as I really decided to direct it, I knew for sure I didn’t wanna act in it.

And how did you find Naomi for the role of Frida?

ZK: I was speaking to my amazing casting director, Carmen Cuba, who’s just so, so talented. We love her. And after really talking about the qualities I was looking for, I remember having a conversation with her and she went, “Oh, it’s Naomi Ackie.” And I was like, “Oh, okay.” And then I watched a bunch of her work and was like, “Oh, you’re right, it’s Naomi Ackie,” and then we met and the rest is history.

I must agree, it is Naomi Ackie. Naomi, when you first were approached about the role and read the script, what was your reaction? Did you see yourself at all in the character of Frida?

Naomi Ackie: Yeah. When I read it, I was like—how do I describe the feeling?—it was like a rainbow feeling in my heart.

ZK: A rainbow feeling in your heart?

NA: It was! [Laughing.] Oh my God! It was a rainbow. You know, at the time I was really hungry for something like this. It felt like me—Carmen was right. I was like, I get it, this is my experience. I could already see the layers that you had written into the character, let alone the story as a whole. I was like, this is unlike anything I’ve had the opportunity to read, ever. Ever. I can’t wait for you to keep on making stuff so other women can feel like how I feel. Because, like, I got chills right now.

ZK: What was so validating, too, was, you’re writing this thing and it’s kind of out there and you’re like, I don’t know if this makes sense? And then I talk with her and not only does it make sense, but it’s also the joy of not having to explain it to her. It’s just going to be a one-upping of ideas and adding on and creating more layers and more depth. And so it just made it so exciting once I realized that was going to be the process.

Naomi Ackie as Frida in Blink Twice.

I imagine this film is going to be compared to other works about the uber-wealthy, but this is also very much a story exploring gender and racial dynamics. I’m not the first person to say that it evokes Get Out. Is that something you actively referenced or discussed when creating Frida’s character?

ZK: In terms of genre and storytelling, absolutely, I was inspired by Get Out. That movie was obviously a big deal for everybody, and it’s funny that people are like, Are you trying to be this? Are you trying to do that? And I was like, no. Jordan Peele broke something open in an incredible way and he developed a language of how we can talk about real things in a way that is entertaining and enjoyable. And I also think that movie works so well because he was able to shift perspective. He’s talking about one thing, but then he heightened it and made it about something else.

And so that was what was so inspiring to me. I thought, How do I explain and heighten the absurdity of what women are asked to do? And it’s about changing the perspective, story-wise. How insane is it that we were asked to smile through our fear? But we say it all the time. Women say “Don’t tell me to smile,” and no one understands why we’re saying that. And so I thought, Okay, what if I make a story so insane that you’re able to see what it feels like?

NA: Their survival has to be smiling through their fear.

ZK: So, anyway, yes, I was inspired by Get Out. [Laughs.]

A lot of the material in this film deals with trauma. Was is stressful, filming some of the more intense scenes? Were either of you particularly nervous going into them?

NA: I feel like when I read [the scenes], first off, I was like, yes! This has to be seen, has to be talked about. I’m more than happy to put myself in that position so this can be a discussion. And then when I met you [to Kravitz], I was like, it’s also in really safe hands. I was like, we’re going to be so well looked after. On the days that we were doing those harder scenes, there was a definite awareness for everyone that we were stepping into something that was deeply uncomfortable to do, and also going to be deeply uncomfortable to watch. But the amazing thing was that we all had each other. Zoë and the other producers had created a space where we were talking about it constantly, and then afterwards had a grounding exercise to get us back into the fact that we weren’t actually in those situations. And by doing that, like, yes, it was hard, but it wasn’t as hard as it could have been. I think a lot of actors and actresses have experiences where they weren’t looked after on a set for lesser reasons. And it’s so, so important, especially the debrief afterwards. That was a really special bonding moment for me. I felt so held in the space and I think we all did. So it was actually really special.

ZK: And I actually think a lot of people got to work through these emotions. To have an opportunity to exorcize them was also really powerful.

Zoë Kravitz with Channing Tatum, Ackie, and Levon Hawke on the set of Blink Twice.

Zoë, I read that you started writing this film prior to the big #MeToo movement, and then continued working on it throughout that period. Where do you think we are now with those conversations? Are we in a post-#MeToo moment?

ZK: I don’t think we’re in a post-#MeToo moment, but the fact that #MeToo exists, while it’s horrifying that it needs to, it’s incredible that it does. So having the communication and the community of that movement is incredible. It’s the same way that, you know, will racism ever be fixed? No, it’s so much more complicated than that. And so I feel like it’ll continue to evolve and change and feel better sometimes and feel worse sometimes. It’s like power—these things are here to stay, but how are we as a culture dealing with it? Are we looking at it? Are we ignoring it? Where are we at with this right now? Checking in. Are we into it right now? Is it in fashion? What’s the deal?

NA: It’s like taking these big, big ideas and then making them bite-size. What this film is looking at is ultimately power, right? And then we’re taking it and we’re putting it into this smaller section of the larger issue and being like, How can we address this [in a way] that makes it specific enough for people then to look into that—and hopefully evolve that into what the larger picture is in their own lives. [Ackie and Kravitz high-five each other.]

Have either of you had people come to you and want to share their stories or experiences based on relating to the material of the film?

ZK: Yeah. I mean, first of all, my own experience of writing this thing and it being my own fresh rage and trauma and what do I do with this, and then meeting Naomi and her going, “I totally understand this,” and sharing her story—even that in itself was so healing. And then all of the women in the film had that together. We spent a lot of time sharing our own stories and building that into the world and being so clear on why we want to tell this story. It’s been a very short period of time, but I’ve had the pleasure of speaking to a few female journalists, specifically women of color, who have seen this film and shared little bits of why and how it affected them. And it makes me want to cry, having that experience and looking into their eyes and just feeling that connection and holding each other. It’s why we made the movie.

I want to pivot to hear a little bit about the location you filmed in. Watching it, it’s sort of this nondescript tropical island with colonial undertones. How did you find the location, and did the cast and crew spend a lot of time there?

ZK: Well, we lived there. We were in the Yucatan in Mexico, and it was so far away from any real town that we actually did not have the time to travel back and forth every day. So we lived in that location. It was crazy, but also really awesome. And I do think it helped with the bonding experience that we all had— living together, eating meals together, spending all this time together and being so immersed into that world I think really lent itself to the places that we had to go, and so that was really wonderful.

And in terms of finding the location, at first I think everyone was picturing something very modern and stark. He’s a tech guy, he’s rich, like, that’s what it’s gonna look like. And I thought, We’ve seen that before, but it doesn’t necessarily add anything to the story. And I’m so happy to hear you say that you picked up on that backdrop of colonialism, which is exactly what I wanted to look at and to have the presence of. Watching some of my favorite films, like The Shining, you know, the Overlook Hotel is a character in itself, but it’s built on an Indian burial ground. And that adds so much to that story. And so that felt really important to me, to have this backdrop of power, abuse of power, oppression, and violence.

To close it out with a fun question, I’m curious if either of you have any fun nail art on right now.

ZK: I did, I did. I took it off early this morning because it was chipping. I had a smiley face with blood—it was so cool.

NA: What did you have before that? I feel like you had another one before that!

ZK: I had raspberries. But no, today we’re boring, just brown.

NA: It’s not just brown, it’s a lovely brown.

ZK: But I’m super into the nail art of it all.

NA: It’s so fun. And an-nail-mals! [Laughs.]

ZK: I do hope animal nails become a trend based off of this movie.

This interview has been condensed for clarity.