Kate Winslet, Andy Samberg and Alexander Skarsgård talk new movie Lee

just leave we don't send women to [Music] [Applause] combat well that's a problem because I'm here were you surprised that nobody had wanted to do this before to tell her story um I was yeah I was surprised and that was one of the reasons why I started to look into how I could get the rights and make contact with Anthony Penrose Lee's son um and that was back in 2015 and so yes it's been quite the journey for me and I just I have so much admiration for her even more after having played her actually what a phenomenal Brave compassionate life force that she was and the things that she had to pull off in order to cut through the red tape as a woman go to war photograph the front line but this wasn't some young female newbie she was a middle-aged woman a flawed middle-aged woman who took herself into a war zone in order to document the truth and I just have so much admiration for her yeah I love that that comes through in the movie do you find ways to connect with her also on a personal level as well I really did yes and actually I was kind of taken by surprise by that because before I came into this film I knew who she was I was familiar with her photographic work but I didn't know anything about her life um and now I feel like I just know everything about her life but Lee was miraculously um compassionate and kind she was a real life liver she was free of malice and I find that really admirable you know she didn't feel any sense of Vengeance in any capacity of her life and she had every reason to she'd had a traumatic thing happened to her when she was a child and I believe that Injustice that she was served was really the thing that motivated her through her life and whether she was even conscious of that or not I don't know but I do think that that was what was driving her um she needed answers for herself um she had been dealt that terrible hand and yeah it makes complete sense that she did what she did and she took herself to some very tricky places in order to reveal the Truth Alexander wanted to start with you you play in this movie real life painter uh Roland P Rose what stood out for you about this character while you were preparing for the role he Roland is was a um bit of a renaissance man he was a art collector and artist himself and a poet and his torian and um and really enjoyed life and when we first meet him in the film uh they in the south of France with his his uh artistic friends and and um that's the first meeting between Lee and Roland and uh it's incredibly passionate they fall madly in love and he is obsessed with her and and so remains for the rest of his uh uh for the rest of his life they they they they stay together till the end um and uh it's a difficult relationship because when the honeymoon phase is over and they're back in London and the war has started um Lee is determined to to go overseas and to kind of enter the theater of war and and um and document it and Roland um is aware of how dangerous that is going to be and knowing Lee he knows that she will not hang back she will get right into The Fray and and and and and and and risk her life to to document what is happening out there um so and that terrifies him so I think that creates an interesting dichotomy in Roland where he wants to support her and let her flourish and do her thing creatively um but at the risk of losing her and you're coming from a comedy background obviously um so this is a change of uh paas for you and also your performance is amazing so congratulations um was there any hesitation for you there any hesitation for you on taking on this role and how did you approach it I there was hesitation for me it was I heard Kate Winslet was interested in me playing a part in a movie she was making so I immediately Alex SC was in it I didn't know yet that you were in it that was what sealed it that sealed it yeah that was the final dunk thank you I just wanted to hear it um but yeah you know she had reached out and I think honestly was like I think you look a lot like the actual guy David German and she had enjoyed some of my work with her kids um and so we read together and because I was a little bit trepidacious as well I didn't want to ruin the movie was my quote um but we worked together she was like you're going to be great I want you to do it they want you to do it so um so I went for it you know I figured when would I ever get a chance again to work with her and on something like this and I thought I was good for the part and I had a lot of admiration for the manand that I was playing and it all kind of fell into place so in the last few years you've got uh a few producing roles along with your acting roles how much of a difference has it made for you to have that dual role in a production it you know being a producer is it is a completely different job being an executive producer and producer is also a completely different job so an executive producer is often a person who might find the project in the first place and hand it on to somebody else it might be somebody who comes on as a part financier it might be somebody who lends um Production Office Space it can have any kind of a form that role but being a producer is a person who sees it right from the beginning the nuts and bolts the details the cash flow the crew the locations the everything right to the end of delivering the film so that is a completely different job and that is what I did on Lee for the first time in my life and um and it has been amazing actually I think having that much creative control involvement um also being responsible for bringing everyone with us in the process and making it enjoyable making it a team effort and and creating the energy every day and an environment in which people can really excel at the jobs that they do that was the most important thing for me and and yeah we we we did that every day on Lee and uh it was an amazing experience yeah it's amazing one of the things that you pushed for is to have a female director uh in this movie why was that important for you it just wouldn't have made sense I think to have a male director you know this is a film made by women about a woman um and to have Ellen direct our film just made sense she was a cinematographer for years so her skill in visually telling stories and conveying a narrative was obviously something she spent her life experiencing and getting incredibly skilled at and when she made the jump between being a cinematographer into directing she had been directing television for a while it just made sense and also I believe in giving women opportunities at whatever stage they're at in their career it turns out she's in her 60s this was her directorial debut and I just thought my God how cool if she could do that and uh and she did and so yeah so those were the reasons why it made sense to have her talking about Kate winlet obviously she's the center of this movie she's amazing in it do you remember in a specific moment during the filming where you know you just looked at her and say wow she's just brilliant in this role I yeah all the time honestly every day yeah she kind of blew me away and just that um the passion that she brought again she she spent eight years trying to get this project made so she knew everything about Lee and all the characters all the the the the characters in that that surrounded Lee uh um and and just that tenacity and the the the the the drive that that Kate had was very infectious and and so exciting to be around her passion for this project was just extraordinary she's so committed and kind and um this is the first thing that we made together so this is how we met and uh you know the world sees things backwards sometimes because things come out before other things and stuff um but from the from the very first moment that she asked me to be part of this I I didn't have there wasn't a a second that I doubted that I wanted to do this she apart from anything else the person FaceTiming me or you know WhatsApp videoing me whatever we were doing the way we were connecting she was so kind and uh real and just I just instantly felt really really comfortable with her and her her work has been so formative in all of our Lives I think you know um so it's very huge very very special moment for me um and I admire her bravery I think more than anything else she manages to do so many things in life um and I don't think anybody else could have played Lee Miller I think she this sto this you know uh with such nuance and beauty and dedication it's it's you know I could go on all day [Music] [Applause] [Music]