EXCLUSIVE: Grammy winner, Emmy winner, Golden Globe winner, Oscar nominee – Andra Day has many massive credits to her name.
But it was while starring alongside Bradley Cooper, Laura Dern and Will Arnett in the fourth film of her budding acting career that the 41-year-old had a life-changing experience.
Playing Christina, the straight-talking wife of Cooper’s character and the best friend of Dern’s character in Is This Thing On?, Day had some “honest” realisations about her own life, she tells nine.com.au.
“I fancy myself an honest person, but Christina’s honest to a different degree,” Day says in London.
She says playing the character created by Cooper and Arnett, who co-wrote the movie loosely based on British comedian John Bishop’s life, forced her to really be “more honest with myself”.
“There was the presentation of, ‘I’m grateful’ and ‘those feel like the right things to do and say’ but I’m like, ‘no, there are real places in my life where I’m really dissatisfied and I feel really hurt and broken’,” Day says.
While not speaking about it directly, the “hurt” referenced may have had something to do with court cases playing out in Los Angeles.
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Day sued her longtime manager Jeff Evans last October, accusing him of stealing $US1.6 million ($2.3 million) from her in a lawsuit filed a day after he sued her for withholding payment.
In the court documents, Day accused her manager of 14 years of misappropriating a $US600,000 ($856,000) recording fund and leaving her “facing eviction” after he took an “exploitative” 40 per cent cut, according to trade publication Variety.
“[Evans] siphoned so much money from Day – a quadruple-platinum hitmaker and Golden Globe Best Actress winner – that he left her facing eviction, unable to pay the monthly minimum on her [$300,000-plus] credit card debt and without sufficient funds to tour,” the complaint read, according to the US magazine.
Evans denies the accusations against him as he chases $US850,000 ($1.2 million) in what he claims to be unpaid commission and royalties.
‘I want to vomit’
Day, who won a Golden Globe and scored an Oscar nomination for her first major film role in biopic The United States vs. Billie Holiday, still gets nervous about being on-set.
But she says working on Is This Thing On? really helped her to step into her confidence – despite sickening nerves at the start.
“There’s constant pressure for me … it’s not lost to me that I’m still newer to this,” Day says.
“This is only my fourth movie … I always joke, ‘This is TMI’, but I feel every time I go on set, I want to vomit. I’m like, ‘Oh my god, please.’
“It’s because I really, a) I care about what I’m doing, b) I really admire these people.
“Bradley has said multiple times he loves what I do and he believes in me, and I think you don’t want to let those people down, so I think it added a pressure for me personally.”
Day says being in the hands of multi-hyphenate Cooper – who co-wrote, directed and starred in the movie – gave it “an ease and an intimacy” and labels “the experience itself was actually incredible”.
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“Then, in addition to that, I also want to say watching Will and Bradley bring this baby to life … Bradley’s work ethic is, I don’t even think I’ve seen one like that before, so it just reminded me that it really is possible when you have a vision,” Day says.
“Don’t try to shrink yourself or diminish yourself, really step fully into every role that should be yours or is supposed to be yours.”
Is This Thing On? is out in cinemas across Australia now.
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