In a new video released by Netflix, ‘Don’t Look Up’ stars including Leonardo DiCaprio, Cate Blanchett and Jennifer Lawrence, along with Adam McKay, explained why they felt pressured to do a comedy about the end of the world.
In the film, the doctorate in astronomy. Candidate Kate Dibiasky (Lawrence) discovers a comet heading for Earth large enough to wipe out the planet – but the world doesn’t seem to care. With a cast of top-notch actors and comedians, the film serves as an allegory about the climate crisis and other apocalyptic events, but leaves room for humor along the way.
“You can’t really make a movie that’s just grim and dark. We wanted the movie to be laugh out loud,” McKay said. “And it was the combination of the two. You could tell all of these actors were craving a cheerful way to treat the pothole-strewn road we’ve been roaming at 100 miles an hour for the past five years.
“At the end of the day, I think ‘Don’t Look Up’ is about the inability to face reality,” Blanchett said. “Which seems to be the real pandemic right now.”
DiCaprio noted that despite the wide range of projects he’s been involved in throughout his career, his “Don’t Look Up” role as a bearded professor who becomes an unlikely hero marked a change of pace for him.
“It was kind of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity in a lot of ways. And it was a very different character than any I’ve ever had the opportunity to play. He also added his admiration for Lawrence: “ I’ve always wanted to work with Jen as an actress, her ability to improvise and be in the moment at all times was amazing to see.
“She just has this wonderful, hilarious anger,” McKay confirmed. “And Kate Dibiasky’s character is driven by that.”
“When I read the script, I thought it was genius. I thought it was such a poignant way to get such an important point across,” Lawrence said of his own attraction to the project.
See the full video, which also features Meryl Streep, Timothee Chalamet, Tyler Perry and Rob Morgan, below.