T. Schreiber Studio alum Julia Garner receives rave reviews for her starring role as Jane in the new, powerful film “The Assistant.” The film also features another TSS alum, Jon Orsini, who plays the role of Jane’s co-worker.
From The New York Times:
Written and directed by Kitty Green (whose last film was the 2017 documentary “Casting JonBenet”), “The Assistant” is hushed and gray-toned and glacial. More than a few viewers will find it a grim, even taxing watch; but Julia Garner is so wonderfully cast that she makes the slow draining of Jane’s soul almost visible.
From IndieWire:
In Kitty Green’s urgent real-time thriller, we see hints of his toxic behavior and furtive abuse through the eyes of a lowly assistant, who is always just outside the door or on the other side of the phone. “Ozark” breakout Julia Garner carries the film on her shoulders, in a role that is earning her much praise. The first official trailer for “The Assistant” offers a glimpse of a role that is sure to launch her career even further; she is timid but determined as she pieces together the unimaginable.
From InStyle:
To prepare for the role, Garner shadowed her manager’s assistant and videotaped her every move, including how she picked up the phone. “Every assistant has a certain tone in their voice when they answer a phone call,” she says. “There’s an urgency — like they have five other calls and need an answer right now — but there’s a calmness too.”
From Fast Company:
“It’s more of an internal film than an external film,” says Emmy-winning actor Julia Garner, who stars as the movie’s unlikely heroine. “But it was really important for it to be a quiet film because the subject matter is not quiet at all. It’s actually very loud. So that contrast is really interesting.”
“The movie is not only about sexual assault against women in workplaces—it’s about abuse in general,” Garner says. “The abuser is abusing everyone to the point where if they’re not being abusive or if they’re being kind or fair, they’ll get fired. Everyone was getting abused in the movie and they didn’t even know it.”