1:30 PM 4/16/2021
by
Kirsten Chuba and Emily Hilton
Glenn Close, Leslie Odom Jr., Gary Oldman and Amanda Seyfried also talk about how they used external elements — costumes, wigs, makeup and cigarettes — to capture the essence of their roles.
Takashi Seida/Paramount Pictures; NICO TAVERNISE/NETFLIX; Lacey Terrell/Netflix; Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images; Jack Manning/New York Times Co./Getty Images; Vance Family Photos/Courtesy of Netflix
Andra Day, 'The United States of Billie Holiday'
Day was introduced to Billie Holiday's music by a musical theater instructor when she was a child and has been obsessed with the star ever since. "I think that's why, when they approached me for this movie, I didn't want to do it because my opinion of her was so high," Day says. After landing the role, the singer and actress dove into the vast archives on Holiday, listening to all of her interviews and studio recordings as well as researching the FBI, the war on drugs and heroin addiction. To really get into the icon's mind-set, Day began wearing Twi perfume and purchased lingerie from vintage brands that Holiday had loved, as well as smoking for the first time in her life. "I don't have a personal frame of reference for what myself, Andra Day, is like on cigarettes," she says of the immersion. "If I were to pick up a cigarette right now and smoke it, the headspace that it drops me in … I literally do feel like I become her."