Thelma was released this past summer with great acclaim and a big box office for an indie film. Writer Josh Margolin‘s feature directorial debut boasts the first leading role for 94-year-old legendary actress June Squibb, who had spent decades working in theater and supporting parts leading up to memorable roles in two Alexander Payne films, About Schmidt and Nebraska, which she was nominated for an Academy Award.
Thelma is the story of a grandma who is scammed out of money and aims to get her money back, no matter what.
There is certainly talk of awards this time around as this film has charmed audiences with its wit, humor, and insight into universal themes of being vital in a world that discards people as they age. The heartfelt quality and humanistic themes of Thelma brought to mind some movies from the ’70s that dealt with old age and vitality; Paul Mazursky’s Harry and Tonto and Martin Brest’s Going In Style came to mind. Squibb recently spoke to Immersive via Zoom.
[This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.]
Can you tell me the story about how you got involved with this project?
My friend Beanie Feldstein and I had done Humans together, and she is family friends with Josh Margolin who wrote the script and directed it. Beanie got the script to me. I didn’t know anything about it, but the minute I read the script, I realized I should be doing this, that this is something that I wanted to do.
Was there anything specific in the material that spoke to you?
I think as I’ve gotten older, I realize what age is what it means, and what you can and can’t do. We still live, we still have a life, and there’s still a lot that can be done. I just liked what he was saying about it, about her having the determination and grit to go out and get what was hers.
Tell me a little bit more about working with Josh Margolin. This was his first feature film as a director. It is such an accomplished work.
The script, too. I mean, the script and his direction were both just so good. He’s so good. His grandfather was a well-known filmmaker and I think he sort of lived with it his whole life, but he’s just amazing what he’s able to produce, what he’s able to write, everything. He’s so good.
What was it like working with Richard Roundtree?
He was great and he’s a wonderful actor, so it was so good working with him in front of the camera. He has five kids and I have one. So we talked kids and we talked about our careers, we talked about what we wanted to do, where we lived, everything. It was my birthday during the shooting, and he wasn’t called that day, but he appeared with two dozen red roses for me. That’s just the kind of guy he was so thoughtful. I loved him.
What was it like doing your own stunts?
Some of it was hard. Going up those stairs was not easy. That was one of the harder things. I loved the bed rolls, and that was something that I thought I could do, and they weren’t sure at all that I would be able to do, but I was able to do them. I did those myself and all the scooter work, I did pretty much all that and that they weren’t sure about at all. I had the stunt coordinator running along beside me at the beginning, but afraid I was going to kill myself, I was able to handle it and they soon saw that, so they let me go with it.
Watching the movie, I could tell that it’s you, and I’m like, wow, that’s pretty amazing. You’re unstoppable. You seem to have no signs of slowing down.
I guess I have, I think as you get older, your body begins to tell you, don’t do this, don’t do that. But I’m still working, so I don’t know. I have things coming out I’m not doing. I’m not actively working now, but I have things that will be out.
You have a pretty strong background in theater. Can you talk a little bit about that? Do you do any more theater anymore?
The last theater I did was in 2019. I went into Waitress on Broadway for about eight weeks. They changed the male character to a woman and Jesse Nelson, who had directed me in a film, wrote the script. She said to me one day, if I can get them to change this to a female, will you do it? I said, sure. So it took a long time. It took a few years before I was ready. They weren’t. If they were ready, I wasn’t. We went back and forth and finally, we both met at the right time and it worked.
Excellent, and what about the contrast between doing theater acting and film acting?
Theater acting I think is so much more tiring. I mean, you’re there, you’re doing it. You’re involved for those two and a half hours, you’re theirs, boy. I mean, you don’t do a thing. And I found after doing Waitress, and that was eight weeks, I was tired. I didn’t think, I have not done it since. And I don’t think I could, I think would be a film. I can do that. The in and out of it is fine. I can do that.
What has this whole experience been like? This is your first leading role in a film.
I don’t see much difference between the other roles that I do normally, but I’ve never had such love from people seeing a film. Sundance was just amazing to me. I had never been there before. I’d had films there, but I had never personally been there. And so, that was an experience. Seeing the film that first night with this huge audience and their reaction was just amazing. When Thelma first opened, we saw quite a few that beginning we would go to screenings and they were packed in the afternoon. I was thrilled. I mean, everything about this has been very exciting.
What do you hope that audiences take away from this film?
I think age, our fear of age. I think we do fear it, and I don’t think it’s to be feared. I think you have to deal with it. You can’t ignore it. But I think we are becoming an aging generation. People, our whole population worldwide is aging. I think there’s so much written about it now, and there are documentaries about it. So I think that everybody’s becoming more and more interested in understanding it and living with it.
Thelma is available to stream.
