Julia Louis-Dreyfus has spent so much time making us laugh, we forget she’s a master of every human. In Daina O. Pusić’s fantasy-drama Tuesday, Louis-Dreyfus makes us laugh and cry in a funny, weird, and deeply heartbreaking exploration of death and coping with grief.
But Tuesday is no ordinary movie about dealing with tragedy, for there’s also the spirit of Death, which literally arrives in the form of a size-changing, talking macaw with a love of Ice Cube lyrics. The film centers on Tuesday, played by Lola Petticrew, a terminally-ill teen who encounters Death when it’s her time to go. But rather than spirit her away, Death forges a bond with the dying girl, and allows her to make peace with her mother, Zora, played by Louis-Dreyfus. Zora isn’t having it, though. She refuses to accept Zora’s fate, and goes into such denial it puts her at odds with Death, to outrageous results.
I was fortunate to spend a few minutes talking with Julia Louis-Dreyfus, writer/director Daina O. Pusić, and Lola Petticrew who is tremendous as Tuesday. We talked about the origins of this surreal but very personal story, grappling with the film’s heavy emotions and imaginative twists, and much more.
Tuesday is open in theaters now.
