Alison Stewart: This is All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. The movie Bugonia from my next guest, Yorgos Lanthimos, gives new meaning to the idea of Karl Marx's theory of alienation, which says people in capitalist societies lack fulfillment and control over their work, so workers become alienated from the very products they make, their life and labor, their own humanity, and the rest of society, all of which takes place in this movie, which stars my other guest, Jesse Plemons, as Teddy, who works at a packaging facility and has fallen down every Internet conspiracy rabbit hole imaginable. He now believes that the CEO of his company is an actual alien, so he kidnaps her with a purpose.

Why is Teddy so sure she's an alien? Let's listen to a clip from Bugonia, where the CO is passed out on a cot in his basement and Teddy is explaining to his cousin how he knows.

Teddy: Incredible.

Don: What is?

Teddy: Just the detail. The best I've seen.

Don: How can you tell she's an alien?

Teddy: Well, the signs are obvious. They did a hell of a job on it, but the tells are there. Narrow feet, then cuticles, slight overbite, semi-obtruding earlobes. See? High hair density. You won't notice unless you know what you're looking for.

Don: Yes, I can see it.

Teddy: It's like if you don't cook steaks a lot, you won't know when it's cooked medium rare, but if you cook steaks all the time, you just know. You don't even have to cut into it. You just know.

Alison Stewart: In the film, Teddy is trying to get his captive to confess before the lunar eclipse in four days, when he believes she'll be able to make contact with her mothership and convince them to save humanity. Since this is a Yorgos Lanthimos movie, you know the woman has something up her sleeve. Bugonia opens in theaters this Friday. I will not give any spoilers. With me now are Jesse Plemons, hi, Jesse-

Jesse Plemons: Hello.

Alison Stewart: -and Yorgos Lanthimos. Nice to talk to you again, Yorgos.

Yorgos Lanthimos: Hi.

Alison Stewart: Jesse, what was the first thing you noticed in the script about Teddy when you read it that made him feel less like a conspiracy theorist trope?

Jesse Plemons: First off, I just want to say that was a wonderful introduction. I wish we had you on our press tour. That was great. Thank you for that. What was the first thing that made him feel less like a conspiracy theorist trope? For one, it was very hard to argue some of his points. Some of his points I agreed strongly with, and then some others not so much. I think that was the brilliant thing that Will Tracy, our screenwriter, did was he gave both Teddy and Michelle very compelling, very objectively true statements, dialogue.

Alison Stewart: Yorgos, this is your fourth film with Emma, your second with Jesse. You've worked with composer Jerskin Fendrix. He scored your last two films. Why do you like to bring people back into your projects? What do you like about working with these collaborators?

Yorgos Lanthimos: I think it's a special thing finding someone that you understand, that you can get along and see certain things in a similar way, and you build trust. On top of that, when you work together again, you can go further and explore different directions because there's, as I said, trust there, and there's no fear in making a fool of yourself because you know everybody has your back.

When that includes both the crew and the actors, that becomes even a more safe environment because, also, the actors feel more comfortable with the crew that they know, and everybody is there for the other and they're all having the same goal. I think that's very important to be in tune while making something so complicated that is a film.

Alison Stewart: He kidnaps the CEO early in the film, Jesse. I'm not giving anything away. What does Teddy believe he's saving the world from?

Jesse Plemons: It's sort of multifaceted, but these forces, these powers, figures at the top, which it's a little confusing in Teddy's case. On the one hand, there's a very real world enemy to him, which are these capitalistic, inhuman humans. In this particular case, he feels like Michelle is both that and on the real-world side of things, but also believes that she is an alien that is seeking to destroy the planet and the world.

Alison Stewart: Emma's playing this hard-charging CEO, Yorgos, and we don't know a lot about her backstory in the beginning, but she has certain behavior to tell us that she's in control. What characteristics or mannerisms did you and Emma choose to tell us, the audience, to show us that she's in control?

Yorgos Lanthimos: The introduction of the film kind of tries to establish those characters. We treat them initially almost as archetypes. They're very recognizable, both Teddy and Don in their world, and then Michelle in her world. Just from her house and her daily routine, how she wakes up, and what are the first things she does, to seeing her at work and the way she speaks, and the assurance on her gait and her speech, and just the environment in itself and the way she dresses, I think just reinforce the initial idea that you have about her and Teddy and Don very similarly.

I think the point of the film and the way it's structured is to, afterwards, challenge those ideas that you have about these people and start revealing layers and layers of these characters' personalities and traits and beliefs and actions. It's important to start that way and then progress into a more profound exploration of these characters and their situation.

Alison Stewart: I'm speaking to director Yorgos Lanthimos and actor Jesse Plemons about their new movie, Bugonia. It hits theaters this Friday. It's so interesting, when she's captured, Michelle keeps saying phrases like, "Let's have a dialogue," to Teddy. First of all, that sounds like almost, it could be human or it could be alien. It can go either way, that way she talks to him. How is she talking to him, Yorgos? Is it patronizing? Is it maternal when she's saying, "Let's have a dialogue"?

Yorgos Lanthimos: I think she's trying to find different ways to approach it as a good, well-educated, experienced CEO would. She's trying one way. In the beginning, she's very assertive and tries to intimidate them. Then she realizes that Teddy might be not so stupid as she thought initially, and is well-researched and educated, and has gone through a lot and it's just not some crazy person or, yes, crazy, but with a lot of tools.

She tries a different way, and that keeps happening. Teddy kind of does the same. They're always trying to measure each other and their reactions and try to achieve the goal that they have in mind, which, at least seemingly, is a different goal that they have. They try to find different ways to achieve that.

Alison Stewart: Jesse, Michelle asked to have a dialogue with Teddy. He said, "This isn't Death of a Salesman." Why was that important for us to know that he knows who Arthur Miller is? How would you describe the depth of Teddy's character?

Jesse Plemons: Again, there were certain lines that resonated with me. I have a similar feeling with this sort of superficial corporate speak, which--

Alison Stewart: Let's unpack that, all those kind of things. [laughs]

Jesse Plemons: Yes. Let me talk about my feelings. No. [laughs] I don't know. I just find it disingenuous. I guess that's the main part of it is I think there's a fear I probably had myself of getting to the heart of the matter. There's a lot of beating around the bush, a lot of words without any meaning, which was extremely, increasingly maddening for Teddy, who just wants Michelle to say it outright and plain. He never got that. What was the second part of that?

Alison Stewart: No, that was a good answer.

Jesse Plemons: Okay.

Alison Stewart: That was a good answer. It reminds me, I think it was Elie Wiesel said, "Don't say income inequality, just say a hungry child." Because that's what you really mean.

Jesse Plemons: Wow. Yes.

Alison Stewart: This is based on a Korean movie, Save the Green Planet!, Yorgos. Now, the CEO in that is a man who's captured, yes?

Yorgos Lanthimos: Yes, that's true.

Alison Stewart: What does making the captive, a woman, versus a man, do to the story?

Yorgos Lanthimos: To be honest, I wasn't that involved because it was an early decision that Will Tracy made with Ari Aster and Lars Knudsen that they developed the screenplay together based on that film. I've heard Will talk about it a little bit, but he also can't be very specific how that happened and remember why that happened. To me, it was just like a great opportunity to work with Emma again. As soon as I read it and I was very excited, it was like, "Oh, that's a great part for her. Here we go."

One thing you can very easily say is it's not very common to see women in those kind of-- I mean, in film and depending on the culture, in reality as well, I guess it becomes a little bit more frequent in Western culture. I honestly don't have anything really important to say around it. It was just like a decision that was made and kind of changed the dynamic to be maybe more intellectual in a way, and more cerebral. I'm just now thinking out loud. Maybe the clash of two men seems to be more about machismo, maybe. I don't know. I think it adds another interesting layer, the fact that there's that aspect of it that has to be fought on a more intellectual level.

Alison Stewart: Less testosterone-filled, in a way.

Yorgos Lanthimos: Yes. In the end, violence, I guess, is not avoided.

Alison Stewart: [laughs] What makes aliens interesting to you, Jesse, as you were thinking about this role? Because you do have to believe that she's an alien.

Jesse Plemons: Yes. Well, many things. In my private musings, as I was obsessing over the script and the part and the themes and all, I thought so often about their perspective of us and what they must think of us and how silly and strange we must seem to them, the games we play to pass time, and all of that. There are many things.

Alison Stewart: Yorgos, did you think of it much, how aliens would view the world?

Yorgos Lanthimos: Not really. To be honest, I didn't even go too much into it while making the film. I go into it afterwards, like-

Alison Stewart: Really?

Yorgos Lanthimos: -after we made the film. Yes. I didn't want to get too tangled up in what's the current, like whatever trend around it, and what people say or believe. I felt that there was a very strong script and material, and I wanted to focus on bringing that to life in the most impactful way. I just wanted to stay away from it all. Then I started listening to all these podcasts, reading all these-

Alison Stewart: Oh, you went down a rabbit hole. [laughs]

Yorgos Lanthimos: -[unintelligible 00:15:44] and theories and rabbit holes and watching documentaries about the actual evidence that we might have. It's interesting, to say the least.

Alison Stewart: The name of the film is Bugonia. It'll hit theaters this Friday. I've been speaking to director Yorgos Lanthimos and actor Jesse Plemons. Thanks for being with us.

Yorgos Lanthimos: Thank you.

Jesse Plemons: Thanks for having us.