Charlotte Ritchie’s latest genre movie Repeat (read our review here) is tonally completely different to her work on Ghosts, Dead Pixels or even Doctor Who. She plays Emily, whose daughter has gone missing; her husband Ryan (Tom England) is obsessed with a machine that he believes can communicate with the dead and their relationship is falling apart. Ritchie chatted with Paul Simpson about the challenges of the movie and its concept…

Some spoilers for the movie

 

What did you think of Repeat when you first read the script?

I thought it was a very beautiful film. The theme was heavy but the dialogue was lightly and deftly used. What appealed to me the most was it felt very human. It was quite ambitious but also very localised and domestic which I really loved about it because I think that’s a wonderful combination. It didn’t need to go miles and miles away for it to be good.

Which obviously helped in the situation you were in filming it, with Covid. You didn’t need large crowds.

Exactly – and the crew was only four people big. We all did all the jobs all the time; we ate in the house every evening and had breakfast together there. At one point I think I was lying on the floor for about two hours just turning a switch on and off in the background of one of Tom’s scenes and I was in my element. I really loved it, it was so collaborative.

I think especially after lockdown it felt really wonderful to get together with people and make something good.

How did they approach you about it in the first place?

They sent it through to my agent and said, ‘Would Charlotte consider this part and have a look at it?’ I did and I really liked it then I met with Rich [Miller], the director. We had a nice chat and I got on with him really well. He’s a very straightforward person; he was very honest and direct and I really love that. It felt easy to talk to him and I felt like he knew what he wanted to do. He was really passionate about the film and about the process of making it.

That was the thing that really I loved most about it: everyone was taking a lot of their own time to do the film and dedicating a lot for it. That feels really special. Sometimes you do things and people are just doing it for the money and this was obviously the opposite – everyone was doing it just for the passion so that was really great. That’s a really special thing.

I think with independent films there tends to be more of that element to it because you know you’re always fighting budget and time. But that’s the case even on a big series, isn’t it?

Yes always, somehow always. I was just doing a really huge budget film: I was in for about a day the other day and I honestly couldn’t believe that even they were up against it: ‘Oh it’s coming up to six o’clock.’ I was like. ‘You’ve got so much money: how’s this happening?’ I think it’s just an inevitability. It’s like a goldfish grows to the size of its container!

What did you think of the character of Emily? Obviously, without going too deeply into spoiler territory, we learn a lot about her as we go along, not all of which is necessarily positive about her. And what do you think of her having now played her?

I really feel for her. What she’s going through is sort of unimaginable and I think she is also quite removed from not only her husband but also herself. She’s quite lost and adrift. I think that there’s a kind of resoluteness there: she’s at her worst moment for most of the film but desperately trying to somehow have the strength to keep on and keep functioning. I think that takes superhuman strength.

I kind of admire her but I don’t know if it’s just automatic – I love all the characters I play because once you get into the mindset, you understand why they are how they are.

Also, in this, we also have a brief chance to see her and her husband prior to the incident. Were those scenes shot as part of the ongoing routine or did you do those earlier?

We definitely didn’t do it in order…  I think the scenes before school, before anything has happened to them, we did really early on.

We started with the lighter ones but actually that was quite difficult because there’s something about feigning years of intimacy that’s so challenging because you have to get into a rhythm with a person you’ve only met the day before. You take that rhythm for granted when you’re in it with a person but when you’re faking it, it’s a real challenge.

We used those scenes to get a closeness together and then we did some of the more difficult scenes later.

We realise that Emily has perhaps more impact on the situation than you realise earlier on in the film

From my mindset I think that Ryan has created this machine and [their daughter’s disappearance] was going to happen anyway, that the DNA would be checked for her. I think, fully in her mind, it’s his fault. It’s his creation, the relationship’s broken down because of this, it’s all happened because of him. I think she feels an implication anyway from having been dishonest about her daughter not being his. She’s in the mire enough with the guilt of just not knowing. There’s definitely a lot of that.

What was the biggest challenge of playing her?

I think truthfully it was grappling with the concept of losing a child and portraying it in a way that felt in any way close or right, because as much as I can fathom that, it’s not something that unless you’ve experienced you can ever know. I think that was probably the biggest challenge.

Offsetting all of her anger and grief on her husband, and understanding how much that can be expressed – because to me it’s inexpressible as a thing to happen – I think that was probably the challenging thing for me. Understanding that and being able to express that at all, at any kind of level.

Did you research that or was it more a self examination? Some people would just try to put themselves in those shoes and go ‘How would I react?’ Otherwise this is a bit of a Maddie McCann situation.

Yes, I did some research and I read up people’s accounts of having lost a child or having a child go missing, which I think is the specifics of this film. I think what struck me was the sense of her being missing so there’s no ability to resolve one way or the other, to have any kind of conclusion. You’re in a limbo state.

I have lots of young kids in my family, I have nieces and nephews that I adore, and they mean everything to me so I was using that as a framework to imagine how it felt – but it always feels a little perverse to do that, as an actor, I think. You hope you’re doing justice to something but it’s a strange thing to do and to think about.

So yes I did go in to myself but I also did research how people felt but it’s so personal.

And everybody reacts differently. For a lot of people acting is to be able to get into these mindsets that please God, you never have to encounter in real life.

Yes absolutely, for sure.

I always find it hard to talk about acting and what it is really because sometimes it can feel a little pompous. I suppose you have to exercise as much empathy as possible at all times. That’s the job: to try as much as possible to empathise with how something might feel and you hope the writing does that for you as well.

But I think there’s something so specific about this story that’s so otherworldly, in terms of the reasons why and the understanding of it, that it was difficult to ground it in some ways and even begin to fathom how you’d feel about this time travel machine and your husband being implicated in it. I think there’s also a sense that Emily doesn’t really still understand quite what happened.

It’s sometimes easier when it’s straightforward and it’s a Dalek wandering round in Northern England as in your Doctor Who story a few years back (right).

(laughs) Yes.

One of Repeat’s biggest strengths is the fact that it’s the two of you, in a relationship that is totally understandable in this bizarre situation.

Yes, there’s a domesticity to it, isn’t there? There’s a realism that’s cool. I think Richard’s done a really great job with it, I really do, and I think Tom’s brilliant.

Would you be interested in going back and playing her again? There’s so much in terms of consequences that are yet to be played out…

Yes, I would. I think I probably would. It’s always nice to think you could spend a bit more time with a character. I think there’s always something that you wish you had a bit more time to do.

Repeat is out now from Trinity Creative on digital.