Beginning life as an idea for a stageplay, Daddio would eventually be writer/director Christy Hall’s feature debut. The single-location drama led by Dakota Johnson and Sean Penn played at Telluride and TIFF where early buzz was strong enough that Sony Pictures Classics gave it a prime summer slot when it could be solid counterprogramming against blockbusters.
Shot in just 16 days, Daddio stars Johnson as a Manhattan woman who gets in a cab at JFK airport, and engages in frank conversation with her driver, played by Penn.
No other major characters are featured in the film. This is a true two-hander led by two of the best actors working today.
Here’s the synopsis: “Daddio” celebrates the power found in those rare moments of pure human connection, even with an unlikely person. This highly contained yet kinetic character study—encapsulated in one single cab ride—explores the complexities inherent to the secrets we keep, particularly the ones locked away on our phones. It’s about truth and illusion, how we so effortlessly substitute one for the other out of survival. It’s about the hurtful memories of childhood and how past trauma can manifest itself in the most profound ways. It’s about the dance between the pain and poetry that is the human experience.
Daddio hits theaters on June 28th.
