Interview: Sandra Hüller’s Highwire Act of Pushing the Boundaries of Motherhood in ‘Anatomy of a Fall’ and Balancing Reverence and Collective Guilt in ‘The Zone of Interest’

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Sandra Hüller is already a European household name, but now it’s time for the rest of the world to join in. The German actress’ meteoric rise has been almost 25 years in the making, garnering her 16 national and critics film prizes along the way. Being trilingual is just one of her many talents, transitioning between German, French, and English in many of her films with ease, which range from dark comedies to historical dramas. Serving dry humor, empathy, and rage in back-to-back scenes is commonplace for her because she thrives in showcasing the genuine complexity of the characters she portrays. After belting an impressive and climactic rendition of “The Greatest Love of All” in 2016’s Toni Erdmann, she deservedly became a breakout star, which also became her first work nominated at the Oscars in International Feature.

This year, two of Sandra’s films have received non-stop praise since their premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. Anatomy of a Fall, in which she plays a mother accused of murdering her husband, won the festival’s top prize, the Palme d’Or, while The Zone of Interest, the harrowing A24 adaptation that finds Sandra playing the wife of a commandant at Auschwitz, took home the Grand Prix, the festival’s second highest award. These darkly thematic yet deeply moving films that stand among the year’s best sharply showcase some of Sandra’s best work. The films’ successes rely on her leading and supporting performances, respectively, to guide the audience through these bleak worlds. If nominated for both at the Oscars, Sandra would join a list of 12 current actors that have been up for both acting prizes in the same year. The humble actress might chalk this up as another modest feat in her already spectacular career but it’s clear that her ubiquitous success will only grow from here.

During our conversation, Hüller provides insight to her acting process, explains why trusting a director is critical in framing her character and relating to the audience, shares her favorite moments working with Anatomy co-star Milo Machado Graner, and the historical reverence she learned while filming The Zone of Interest. 

Nick Ruhrkraut: Hi. It’s nice to meet you, Sandra. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Sandra Hüller: Of course, thank you for asking me. Thanks.

NR: Absolutely. You’ve had a very busy year. You starred in Anatomy of a Fall, The Zone of Interest and Sisi & I, which premiered at the Berlin Film Festival. All of which you’ve been nominated for, between the German European and Gotham Film Awards. So, I think just starting off, I need to offer you a big congratulations because all of those awards and nominations are just a testament to your talent as an actor.

SH: Thank you.

NR: I think between these roles and your past ones as well, you demand to remain impartial, especially with Anatomy of a Fall. But how did you do that for each, either similarly or differently?

SH: Part of the story of Anatomy of a Fall is that we don’t know. Justine Triet likes to say, “The more we know about the person, the less we know about this person.” So normally, when you have films, you get to know a character better and better, and at the end you think you figured them out, and she wanted to do the reverse thing. She wanted to add information over information, but still you couldn’t figure out the person, which is somehow very truthful, because in life it’s basically the same.

We have a construction of the other person, we have a lot of projections, and, of course, we have experience with someone, but at the same time, we will never know who they really are, which is painful when you think about it. At the same time, it’s true. So you could just embrace it and just let people be who they are without knowing everything about them, because knowing everything about them also means to control them in a way. I think in a relationship, maybe there’s nothing worse than telling the other person, “I know you,” which means my view on you will be … It defines you and it limits you in a way. You can say it in all sorts of ways, but what I mean is the controlling way of saying it.

NR: You’re able to convey the complexity of her personality, of just the human condition. It’s fun watching because it at times seems like manipulation, but at other times it’s just who she is. So I think your ability to show both of those is what makes this performance in this movie and also in your other performances so compelling to watch.

SH: Thank you.

NR: I think the audience is aware of that too. When you’re acting, are you aware that you are performing a message almost, that the audience is going to interact with this and converse about it so much after they watch it?

SH: Well, it depends. There are subjects where you cannot do that because they’re too obvious and it’s okay. But in this case, when I first read the script, I had this feeling of being pushed from one side to another and I could never decide if I believed her or not. And I had to ask myself, “Why is that? What am I projecting on her with this information that I get now? Why is my feeling towards her changing now?”

And I wanted to keep that because I found that one of the most interesting things about the script itself and about the story and the character. And I found that Justine Triet and Arthur Harari mastered to create such a sense of insecurity about it. At the same time, we feel like we recognize something about our own lives, and so it gets very personal and the more personal I would take it as an actor, the more personal the audience would take it.

Yeah. So I think that’s what we try to do. And I was thinking about this, what you’re asking just recently, that I don’t think I’m always so interested in characters themselves. I think I’m always thinking about the whole thing, also in theater. Maybe this is where it comes from because I cannot go on stage and just play a scene. I have to fit it into the whole construction of everything. So maybe I’m always a bit looking from the outside and looking at the construction and what the director or the writer intended to tell.

NR: That’s interesting because Anatomy of a Fall could at times seem like a stage play. In movies you can shoot out of sequence, so there’s also a big difference in how I think your mind works as an actor between those different methods and in the sequencing of performing and recording.

SH: Yeah, there’s a lot of trust involved in this process and a lot of direct and very honest communication with a director and all the people involved. It doesn’t work when somebody wants to manipulate you into playing something that could look like a thing, but you didn’t mean it.

I don’t like to work that way, like when directors intend to tell something, but they won’t tell you so that you’re just material and you’re just trying. You think you do something, but it means something else because in the editing they will do it differently and they will tell another story or music that tells another story and all these things. That feels abusive. It happens sometimes, but it’s not a good way of working. 

Because trust also involves this part of working, but it also involves the trust in yourself that you will be in the right place at the right time. So of course we shoot scene per scene and I cannot think of the whole development of a character, if there is any. Some people just start a film and they end the film and nothing happens to them, which can also be something that we want to tell that this thing is an illusion, the thing of growth and evolving and I don’t think so [in the case of Anatomy], but it can be. And that I don’t decide what I show, but it’s something else. I’m just there to serve the character, the story, the director, the audience, and the forces that unite in that moment. They’re not really in my hands. I can just try to be there and be as honest as possible.

NR: Having control as an actor or as the character, I like how you differentiate this with Sybil, which you also worked with Justine on. Can you talk about the differences or if you had conversations in differentiating the two characters? Because one is much more emotional and how she shows herself directing and then in Anatomy as Sandra, you are much more pulled back.

SH: I think the big difference is that in Anatomy, there’s a child involved and the mother in the character tries to keep up her dignity or her face, especially for him because I think she’s aware of the fact that it’s really hard for children to see their parents crash. It’s really something, to see your parent lose control is something really damaging and disturbing.

So I think she’s doing it for him but I also think that some of the decisions that I made for Sandra are related to decisions that I made for Mika in Sibyl, because at that time I wanted to show the effect of this unbelievable tense situation that this director is in. And I didn’t want to play it in an elegant way, which I could have done.

The text was there and it could have shown somebody who can deal with the situation, but I chose to show someone or how I would probably have managed it, meaning she can’t manage, she just is all over the place and she’s losing control, which is a very human thing. So we’ve done that. And so I think I chose this time I’m going to do differently.

NR: You talked about Daniel. Did you have any favorite moments working with Milo Machado Graner on set?

SH: Everything. He’s such a wonderful partner and a really inspiring person and actor. And I’m not really sure if he’s going to do this for life because he has so much talent for everything and he’s so intelligent. He could put his mind into everything. He could also be a scientist. I don’t know if acting is really the right place. He has the talent for it and he has the discipline for it and the heart and the humor, everything is there, but still his path is so wide open, he could do anything.

I loved playing the piano with him because this is something that works without language and where they really connect and that he was so much better than me. He never played the piano before and he learned to play the two pieces actually in a few weeks. I can’t even imagine a young brain, how wonderful! Yeah, these things and the walk we had in the mountains where he made me say all these French things that I couldn’t say. The games we played, a lot of things.

NR: With those moments that you struggle with the French pronunciations, is that something that was written down in the script or is some of that improv? Because those moments feel very real and of the moment, especially in the courtroom scene.

SH: There’s nothing improvised in the courtroom scene, I can say, because it was so important to be precise there. And the language problem was a real problem. Of course, I can speak a little French, but not like my fellow actors. All characters are driven by something and this character wants to be understood in a courtroom.

So something matched because I wanted to be understood. I didn’t want to make a mistake. I wanted to understand what my colleagues say, all these things, and I wanted everybody to believe me, of course. So these things came together in that moment. But when we were walking, Milo was making up this– not making up, it’s a French thing to say. Do you say tongue breaker, zungenbrecher we say in Germany?

NR: A tongue twister.

SH: Tongue twister. So yeah, he tested me. (laughs)

NR: You also have a family in The Zone of Interest as Frau Höss. How did you relate to her? Was that part of it- of having children while being in this disturbing setting?

SH: I didn’t think so much about the family really, because I felt for her it’s more like props to stuff up her life into something that would make her be a respectable person. I didn’t feel while I was acting in that piece, in that film, that she would have feelings for them, really, like the things that she owns. And I think her children are also part of the things that she owns are more important to her than the true relation to something because I think she’s simply not capable of feeling that way. That’s what I learned.

NR: Yeah, it’s very dark. Just to end on something light, how did you relieve tension on set? Were there any gags or fun things that you would do as casts?

SH: No, I didn’t want that. Of course, I spent a lot of time with Christian Friedl. Our trailers were next to each other. We played a lot of cards and I was walking the dog and tried to be calm and stay concentrated, but focused. But no, I know there were some parties of course, because there were children on set, so of course we had to be light in some moments. But me, no, there wasn’t any relief.

That’s something that I learned from visiting the memorial of Auschwitz because as a German, you sometimes have this romantic idea of, “Oh, I’ll go there and then I’ll figure it all out and then the catharsis is going to take place and I’m going to be relieved of the burden of history.” And the thing that Auschwitz says is that this is not going to happen. And I got that really early before we started shooting and I respected that.

NR: I think that’s how the movie sees it and ends on such a harrowing note too. Thank you so much Sandra for your time today, and good luck with the rest of the season.

SH: You too. Thank you.

Anatomy of a Fall is now playing in theaters from NEON and The Zone of Interest will be released by A24 on December 15.