ROSEBUSH PRUNING — Riley Keough eats the rich (and survives MAD MAX)

Cannes-winning actor/filmmaker Riley Keough (THE GIRLFRIEND EXPERIENCE) is no stranger to the worlds of wealth or fashion, and in the bloody, bawdy new satire ROSEBUSH PRUNING, she inhabits a larger-than-life character who is way too into both. Keough tells Rico what drew her to director Karim Aïnouz's weird-wave black comedy, and about finding love on the infamously intense set of MAD MAX: FURY ROAD. 

ROSEBUSH PRUNING is streaming exclusively on MUBI from August 21 almost globally. 

To stream some of the films we've covered on the podcast, check out the collection Featured on the MUBI Podcast. Availability of films varies depending on your country.

MUBI is a global streaming service, production company and film distributor dedicated to elevating great cinema. MUBI makes, acquires, curates, and champions extraordinary films, connecting them to audiences all over the world. A place to discover ambitious new films and singular voices, from iconic directors to emerging auteurs. Each carefully chosen by MUBI’s curators.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Heads up, this episode includes adult language, sexual themes, and spoilers. This is a movie where I feel like a lot of work went into the details. It really feels textural, I guess. Is there a detail that we should look for when we're watching this movie that maybe is would be lost on somebody at first, but that you really love?

SPEAKER_02 0:22

Oh, that's a good question. Oh, um, maybe that we all have like freckles.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

What?

SPEAKER_02 0:27

We all have like fake moles on our face to make us look sort of related. So we've all got fake moles.

SPEAKER_01 0:35

So that's a little I don't know if you'd call that an Easter egg, but it's a that's the littlest detail you could possibly have come up with for sure. Yeah. That is actor Riley Keogh. And actually, that little detail perfectly symbolizes this new satire she stars in about a wealthy family who are spattered with imperfections. There's a father, three sons, and a daughter played by Riley. They live in a beautiful modernist house in Spain, wear beautiful designer clothes, and spend their days in what's pretty clearly a literally incestuous bubble. Until one night the oldest son, Jack, announces he's bringing home a girlfriend.

SPEAKER_03 1:15

Martha's coming for lunch. To meet you all, for you to meet her. Does Dad know she's coming?

unknown 1:20

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Well, Dad and most of his siblings aren't cool with letting in an outsider, especially one who's not rich or even stylish. And that's when things get real ugly. I'm Rico Galliano. Welcome back to the Movie Podcast. Movie's the global film company that champions great cinema. On this show, we tell you the stories behind Great Cinema. We are hard at work on season 12. Till then, here's a special episode. It's my interview with Riley Keogh about her career and about Rosebush Pruning, the new film from can-winning writer-director Karim Anouz. It's kind of a black comedy, kind of a thriller, and totally nuts. And it starts streaming on Moobie this week on August 21st. Keogh is probably best known as the title character in the Amazon Prime series Daisy Jones and the Six. She got nominated for an Emmy and a Golden Globe for that. She's also appeared in movies like Andrea Arnold's American Honey and in Mad Max Fury Road. You will hear us talk about that later. But she also co-wrote and co-directed the film Warpony, which won the camera d'or at Cannes back in 2022. Basically, she's worked in just about every arm of show business except music, which is interesting considering her family. She is the daughter of Lisa Marie Presley. Her granddad was Elvis. But Riley told me ever since she was a kid, her favorite instrument was a typewriter.

SPEAKER_02 2:42

It wasn't just movies. It was like I wanted to write. I would kind of like write ideas for for plays and and the characters and what the costume should look like. And I remember trying to write a a book when I was, you know, 11 or 12, and just kind of creating worlds, I guess, in in different ways, whether that was a book or a play or or maybe eventually starting to film home videos.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Was there a movie that originally sparked your interest or anyway? Regardless, what's the movie that comes to mind when you think of like early interesting movies?

SPEAKER_02 3:15

I saw m a lot of films, but I had a moment when I was watching Moulin Rouge actually. It's really kind of random and kind of full circle since Baz ended up kind of making a film about my family.

SPEAKER_01 3:28

But um that's right, Elvis.

SPEAKER_02 3:30

Yeah. So it was a full circle moment for me. But I was twelve and I think that age is such a pivotal age. And I was in the cinema with my mother and her husband at the time. And I think it might have been because I was watching it with her husband, who was Nicolas Cage, and that was sort of my first introduction as a small child into sort of like movies, because we like went to visit him on set, and it kind of became a concept of like, oh, this is something that you can do. And then I remember watching that movie simultaneously, probably the same year I visited my first movie set, and thinking like, wow, I want to be in something like this, you know. That was the first time I remember like having that sort of concept.

SPEAKER_01 4:20

It's interesting because that movie, the artifice of that movie and of a lot of Baselorman movies are like worn right on its sleeve. It's not even pretending to recreate reality or something. And it's almost about putting on a show in a lot of ways. It's very self-reflexive. So I can imagine as a young person it would be like you can see the mechanism of creating a world. Totally.

SPEAKER_02 4:40

I think it was the first time I watched a film and had the idea that I could make the movie. It's it's weird. Like my first instincts were n never to be a performer. And that that's not true. I did want to be a performer, but when I think back to being a kid, it was definitely like and I would make movies at home or like put on shows or plays. I wasn't as interested as in in being in them as I was putting them together.

SPEAKER_01 5:05

But then as a teen, actually your first work career-wise was as a fashion model. Do you take anything from that part in your life into your work as an actor and as a director?

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Um I was always sort of hesitant to say I was a model because I wasn't, you know, going around doing castings being a model. I worked with, you know, a couple brands is sort of like an ambassadorship, I suppose. So I wasn't like working hard going around New York and going to castings and making that my life. I it the way that it kind of happened was I had a friend who had an older sister and she was a model for Roxy, like the swimsuit company. And her life was like so exciting to me. She would go to Hawaii and hang out with all these surfers and watch pipeline. And it was like such and I was probably honestly around the same age, like 12 or 13. And I remember kind of going, like, that's what I want to do. I want to like get paid to just like travel around and you know.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

I love that you go from that to this very serious arts career.

SPEAKER_02 6:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:08

But I get it. I like I think my first attraction to journalism was reading Hunter S. Thompson.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:14

And being like, oh, he gets paid to jet around and get involved in craziness and tell people about it. That's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 6:21

100%. I mean, like, that's like half the reason I'm here is like for the adventure. You know, it's like if it wasn't films, it would be like journalism or something that requires an immersive adventure.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

Wh where do you think that came from though? That need for wanting to like join the circus, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 6:38

I don't know. I feel like everybody has that when they're l young and like whether that's travel or have have life experiences. Everyone sort of has that desire, don't you think?

SPEAKER_01 6:47

I d well, yeah, I do think though that theater people are willing to they want it so much that they're willing to put up with a certain amount of uprootedness that regulars don't.

SPEAKER_02 6:57

Yeah, that's very true. It's a it's definitely a lifestyle that requires you know, you don't really have a life and structure, um, which can be really hard, especially as you get older and like have children. And I definitely like desire to have routine structure. But I because I've been doing this so long and like had this sort of life for so long, like I actually find that like when I am in one place for longer than five sort of months, I start to like need to leave and and get out.

SPEAKER_01 7:28

Yeah. We were talking to um uh Joachim Trier and his writer Eskelvote for uh Sentimental Value, which is of course about making movies, and we were talking about this, and it's like they both have families. They're very much family men, they love their families, but there's a part of them that is like, is my am I suffering artistically because I care about my family? And I'm like, like, could I be making more art and better art?

SPEAKER_02 7:52

Well, it's really it's and it's it's by the way, it's valid. Like there there are ways that my art definitely suffers because of my family. Yeah, you know, like for sure. I I do prioritize my family, but I think that like the way that I approach work is very different after having kids. And I think also as a as a woman, because there's so much weight on you to be like the sort of provider of uh love, essentially, and like security to the family, it's tricky.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

And here you are in a movie about a a family where the matriarch, spoiler alert, like basically abandons them.

SPEAKER_02 8:31

Like dips on the I know, I know, I know.

SPEAKER_01 8:34

Actually, I asked you about the fashion world because it kind of brings me to this movie. Yeah. It's a satire about this entire very messed up family who seem really obsessed with fashion. None of them seem to work in it, but they're obsessed with it.

SPEAKER_00 8:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:47

Your character is literally aghast that her brother would date someone who isn't super fashionable. It's actually one of my favorite lines of the movie. She's just like, oh, those clothes are just so bad.

SPEAKER_03 8:56

I mean, it's it's offensive, it's a slap in the face. And I know that it's only a matter of time before she gets knocked up just to tie him down, and I just can't bear the thought of it. And the clothes she wears are just awful. I mean, you you couldn't imagine how badly she dresses dad.

SPEAKER_01 9:15

And I did wonder who you might have drawn on in the fashion business or a type of person in the fashion audience to portray her.

SPEAKER_02 9:23

I don't think it was so much about the fashion industry as it was about like we've all kind of been around like sort of vapid rich people. Like that was more probably where my head was at, who probably are bored and don't really have meaning and purpose in their life and just sort of care about the wrong things. It wasn't a type of person that I didn't have experience with.

SPEAKER_01 9:47

Yeah. It's interesting when I looked into your biography, you've kind of been on both sides of the wealth.

SPEAKER_02 9:51

Yeah. Well, yeah, I mean, my my mother's side of the family have mu a lot of money, and my father did not and still does not. And the gap was quite large, you know, and that was yeah, it was it was definitely complicated in uh in a lot of moments for my parents, but I think that ultimately it was something I feel grateful to have experienced.

SPEAKER_01 10:14

But this movie is not does not take it easy on its rich characters. Was this an attraction to you to kind of explore that part of your own life?

SPEAKER_02 10:22

I I think that it's definitely a world that I'm in that I've been in that like I can sort of have a sense of humor about. I'm I don't personally surround like the friends I have are not these types of people.

SPEAKER_01 10:35

Um I hope not.

SPEAKER_02 10:37

But I've definitely been in the in rooms with these types of people, you know, and um the plot wasn't really the sort of the reason I did the film. It was honestly Kareem and his work. I'd seen his films and wanted to work with him and and the script was so well written. It was I actually like happened to be writing my film at the same time that I read it, and I have VO in my film, and I read his VO and his voiceover, and was kind of like, oh my god, it's so much better than mine. And like I, you know, it was just so well written and it was so funny and fun and playful and crazy. And but yeah, I was I wasn't I wasn't really like, I'm really desperate to play a valid, rich girl.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

I'm gonna blow up the social scene. Yeah. It this is a really polarizing movie, but I really dug it. And one of the things I dig about it actually is not something I feel like you would see on the page, it's the atmosphere of it, which is hard to describe. It's laid back, but it's kind of like it's sorted and kind of simmering in a way that I can't quite put my finger on, but it's clear that all of the actors are keyed into it. You're all working with the same vibe. And I'm wondering how that atmosphere was described to you so that you could all be on the same page. Like, how was the page described to you so you could get on the same page?

SPEAKER_02 12:02

Well, what's interesting is that like on the page it feels very sort of like I don't know how to describe it, but different to what the final product ended up being. Like the comedy felt a little different. And then once we started rehearsing, I realized like Karim wants this to be much looser than than it is on the page and kind of kind of wild and spontaneous. And I think we all kind of started understanding that.

SPEAKER_01 12:25

I would love to know how he got you there though. Like I could imagine him like throwing a party. I I could imagine you guys getting a little drunk.

SPEAKER_02 12:34

I would not be able to act drunk. I have learned this the hard way. The first day that we rehearsed, he was kind of like, okay, now do the whole scene, like laughing hysterically, like don't stop while you're running it. That was really fun. And and then I started starting understanding like he just wants it to be totally you know, he wants the scenes to feel like scenes you've never seen before.

SPEAKER_01 12:57

I actually the as soon as you started talking about it, I flashed on this one scene I just watched it again before I got on the line with you, where Hannah, your character, is putting her blind father, she's having a conversation with him right before bedtime. And he's like, Okay, help me up. Help me to bed.

unknown 13:16

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 13:17

And you kind of are guiding him towards the bed, you're behind him, and you're doing this almost angry, sarcastic, spastic dance behind him that he can't see or is aware of. Help me into bed. And then he says, Okay, where's the bed? And then you shove him onto it.

SPEAKER_03 13:39

You bitch.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

Was any of that planned?

SPEAKER_02 13:43

Most of most of the things were not planned in this film and were very spontaneous. And that was the fun of it. Like, it's not common you get to totally do whatever you feel like and disregard, you know, not totally disregard camera, but kind of. So yeah, no, it was it was just like a random moment that we then repeated a couple times.

SPEAKER_01 14:05

What do you think is happening in that moment? What is she doing?

SPEAKER_02 14:08

Uh I think that all of them sort of like love and hate their dad a bit. And I feel like it was just a moment of taking it out with her body, I guess. And I don't know, like, or expressing it with her body.

SPEAKER_01 14:20

That leads me to the other question I wanted to talk about, which is the scene where you play Jack a song.

SPEAKER_03 14:25

Will you wait five minutes, Jeff? I wrote you a song and I'd like to sing it for you. How can I wait? I'm really very tired. It's really very short. I've got a guitar. I bought it online and I've been practicing on the internet.

SPEAKER_01 14:39

We've been told throughout the whole film that she's this great guitarist. Her song is one chord.

SPEAKER_00 14:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:58

And lyrics that seem like she's making it up, like off the top of her head. I have to believe that that was not entirely scripted. Did you make that song?

SPEAKER_02 15:06

That was entirely scripted, and the song was written, and I had to learn it. If you can believe it. What? But I I think that I intentionally made it much worse than the original song was. I think that it was actually like two or three, or maybe like four chords, and I just like made it one. Just because I just thought it was funnier if she really was really bad.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

She's like staring straight at him, like I dare you to tell me that this isn't the greatest song ever written. Um is there anything to these characters? I think I feel like the people that don't like this movie. I mentioned earlier that it's polarizing. Totally. I feel like the people that don't like this movie are because I don't want to spend time with these characters. They're all they're all terrible.

SPEAKER_02 15:55

For sure. I mean it's like you're watching like insane, very disturbing like I I like people not wanting to watch it, does it make sense to me? Like I I understand. But it's just it's also like just if you go into it and go, This this is funny and it's entertaining, and it's like just sort of taking the piss out of a certain type of person.

SPEAKER_01 16:17

I also feel like though that you as the crew of you as actors couldn't help but make them a little more relatable than I think people are giving it credit for. Like I do feel bad for some of these characters. You know, all of them have been obviously damaged by their completely perverse father. Like it's not like this comes from nowhere.

SPEAKER_02 16:37

No, it's like deeply warranted and disturbing, you know, and that's hard to watch, I think. It's it's really I mean, there's there are things that happen in the film that are like totally disturbing.

SPEAKER_01 16:50

Uh I want to move to a very different kind of movie, although it's crazy in its own way. It's one of my favorite movies ever, which is why I have to ask you about it. You were in Mad Max Fury Road.

SPEAKER_02 17:00

Fury Road.

SPEAKER_01 17:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:01

I know. It's like I can't believe I was in that movie.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

It's nuts. I can't believe anybody was survived that movie.

SPEAKER_02 17:07

I can't either. You know what's amazing is pretty much every single time I meet anyone, they ask me about Fury Road. And it's so like I really deeply appreciate being a part of something that became so like historical kind of.

SPEAKER_01 17:23

But does that I the thing that I'm trying to figure out you met your husband on the set of that. He's a stunt man on that movie. Tell me about that romance. Because by all accounts, filming that movie was nuts, and especially the stunt sequences.

SPEAKER_02 17:36

I I mean I could I could honestly talk about Fury Road for hours. It was such a such an incredibly insane experience. But like w during the filming of Fury Road, the stunt performers and stunt team were kind of advised like to not speak to the women. Oh, because you had like all of these men, hundreds of men and the war boys who were all stunt performers.

SPEAKER_01 18:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:06

And four women, young women, or sorry, five.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:10

And then and then Charleese, who were kind of like not wearing clothes, and we were young girls, and so so in an effort to sort of like make our lives easier, they were kind of s told like don't talk to the the wives.

SPEAKER_01 18:24

Yeah, yeah. This could get really overly testosterone up really fast.

SPEAKER_02 18:28

Totally. So they were kind of advised to give us space and not really speak to us. You know, that we definitely spoke to them, like, and they were our friends, and but there was definitely like a bit of a fear around coming up to us or talking to us. So I knew his name, but I didn't really know him. And then when we did reshoots in Sydney, which was like a year later, I was basically like, Let's hang out. I was trying to find anyone I I could to kind of hang out with. So it wasn't actually like during the production of Mad Max.

SPEAKER_01 18:59

I know. In my mind, it's it's kind of like he's on like one of those swinging rods in the movie.

SPEAKER_02 19:04

Well, he was on the swinging rod, and he's actually the one who picked Zoe out of the rig.

SPEAKER_01 19:09

That insane sound he he like basically like parachutes in and grabs her and pulls her out of a moving truck.

SPEAKER_02 19:14

And pulls her out of the thing. God, it was so wild. I mean, we arrived and had like weeks of rehearsals that were, you know, like they would bring us into the room with all the war boys who would be sort of chanting at us and and sit like and everyone was sort of in care everyone was kind of in character all the time. Super tribal. It felt it felt very much like we were living in this world. And then we would just basically wake up in Africa at three in the morning and drive through the desert and for hours sometimes to set and sit there with nothing, you know, uh around for months. Like it really felt like we were living in this film because it was just so wild, and it was to me a dream because it felt incredibly immersive and very real.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

You did it. You you wanted to be part of these like crazy worlds, and it's like you got it in spades. Riley Keo, Rosebush Pruning, starts streaming on MUBI nearly globally, Friday, August 21st. Check the show notes of this episode for details. And that's the movie podcast for this week. We are preparing our full season 12 for you as we speak. Not gonna give you too many details, but I'll just say it involves filmmakers getting in trouble with the man in sometimes harrowing, sometimes absurd ways, and sometimes both.

SPEAKER_00 20:35

There's a B movie vibe to everything. Like it has that vibe where it's terrifying, and you know, there's all this trauma. It's really terrible. But it's also like a bad James Bond knockoff.

SPEAKER_01 20:46

Follow us so you don't miss it. Meanwhile, if you love the show, do leave us a five-star review wherever you listen, won't you? Let folks know we're the best damn movie pod ever. Uh, you can follow me on Threads or Instagram at Rico Galliano. That's G-A-G-L-I-A-N-O. Happy to debate you on there about this movie or any other movie, just about. And now let's roll credits. This show is written, hosted, and edited by me, Rico Galliano. Kira Makenough is our producer, along with assistant producer Kat Kowalzik. Myself and Christian Kuhnz edited this episode. Our theme music was composed by Yuri Suzuki. Thanks this week to Jake Rotger, Maya Alkali, and Nita Karnani. This show is executive produced by me along with FHX RL, Daniel Kasman, and Michael Taka. And finally, for the best in cinema, subscribe to Mubi at Mubi.com. Thanks for listening. Go watch some movies, and may all your cinemas be air conditioned.