How Lena Dunham Made the 13th Century-Set ‘Catherine Called Birdy’ Feel Current

“If Birdy was alive now, there would be all kinds of tools, like she’d probably be on TikTok exploring questions about gender,” Dunham tells TheWrap

Catherine Called Birdy
Alex Bailey/Amazon

Director Lena Dunham detailed a ten-year process of getting “Catherine Called Birdy,” based on her favorite book since the age of 10, made into a film.

“Before I even understood that there were people whose job it was to make movies, I thought, I wish that was a movie,” Dunham told TheWrap in a recent interview. “Then when I started thinking about movies, I thought, I wish I was the person to make that movie. I was lucky enough that I was able to communicate with the author Karen Cashman and get the rights but I didn’t really know that it could be pulled off until I met Bella, because it all centered around someone embodying Birdy, and it was as if she understood Birdy better than any of us did.”

Birdy (Bella Ramsey) chronicles her comedic thinking and mischievous moments in a diary suggested to her by her brother Edward (Archie Renaux), a monk who has a close bond with his sister and thinks this exercise will help her become more introspective and ready for adulthood. Ramsey describes Birdy’s rambunctious nature as the core of her character.

“It was definitely the wildness and chaos, and we talked a lot about just being weird and what she would be like today and that was sort of a way to relate to her and then that informed what medieval Birdy’s like,” Ramsey said in the same interview, paired with Dunham. “It [was] talks about just how weird she is and then how much they celebrated it, how she doesn’t really fit the mold. She doesn’t really fit the binary system that she’s been placed into.”

When Birdy comes of age to be married, her father Lord Rollo (Andrew Scott) immediately looks into selling his only daughter, partly because his family is growing poor and partly because this was the custom in the year 1290.

“If Birdy was alive now, there would be all kinds of tools, like she’d probably be on TikTok exploring questions about gender and exploring questions about duality and questions about what is permitted and pushing past the boundaries because that’s who she is,” Dunham said. “But because it’s the year 1290, there’s certain things she can’t even envision for herself yet, but I like imagining that it’s young people assigned female at birth pushing that brought us to the moment we’re in today.” 

Without the technology that confuses potential suitors today, Birdy still has plenty of techniques to ward off men looking to marry her. One improvised scene that even made it into the trailer involves she and her friend the goat herd Perkin (Michael Woolfitt) lying to a man from Kent (Russell Brand) and telling him Lady Catherine has a third ear on the back of her neck.

“The comedy in [the film] felt very organic and natural. It never never felt forced,” Ramsey said. “What’s cool about this film compared to other medieval films is that it’s fun, and in those days, people still had a sense of humor. You don’t really see that in the media and obviously it was a dark time but like, today is a dark time too and I I feel like the the humor of that time possibly gets lost in media that we see about it.”

Though much of the humorous moments came from improvisation, the film does also address more serious themes, stemming from the old-fashioned practice of selling daughters to men for marriage.

“When we were making the film, it of course felt as if it was relevant because these issues of having to push past expectations and push to be seen are things that every person who feels in any way marginalized in their life and every person has felt,” Dunham said. “So much of the film is about bodily autonomy, and especially here in the U.S. with Roe being overturned, those issues and those questions of what a society looks like when people take control of other people’s bodies and their destinies, that has never felt, unfortunately, more current.”

Dunham compares the humor of the film balanced with more heartfelt scenes to the human experience of real life.

“It’s always just about grounding it in something that feels real, and comedy always has. I love to mix moments of real heartfelt heart-tugging drama with moments of pretty wild comedy because that’s how I experience life,” she said. “I think when it doesn’t work is when I make a comedic choice that’s not grounded in the world with the characters.”

After naming the improvised “pox” scene as one, Ramsey described combining laughter and heavier emotions in the story with a quote she attributed to co-star Andrew Scott.

“There’s just so many little things that are funny, obviously, within the backdrop of a difficult time, but I think the way that comedy is the leading thing in Birdy, it makes the emotional stuff and most somber moments, you really feel it more,” she said. “Because you just laughed for half an hour and I think when when laughter ducts are open, it helps tear ducts to be more open too.”

“Catherine Called Birdy” is now streaming on Prime Video.

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