According to Rachel Weisz, “Dead Ringers” was a script

Rachel Weisz had trouble seeing double at first.

The Oscar winner stars as identical twins in the Prime Video series “Dead Ringers,” a reimagining of David Cronenberg’s 1988 body horror psychological thriller of the same name.

“Day one, it was mind-blowing,” Weisz said Porter magazine about playing both roles. “But by the end it was like breathing … I just imagined two people playing them.”

Weisz noted that he would shoot entire scenes as one character opposite a stand-in, then repeat the same scene after transforming into the other twin. Weisz wore headphones to hear his own lines and, in theory, act alongside him.

“The idea that these two women are at the top of their professional lives, but their personal lives are so dysfunctional, so out of the ordinary and so bizarre,” added the “Permanent Gardener” actress. “It’s the contrast—it doesn’t get any better.”

Connected

Connected

Weisz, who suggested that “Dead Ringers” be turned into a TV series instead of a film remake, spent six weeks in the writers’ room with showrunner Alice Birch (“Normal People,” “Succession”) during the early 2020 shutdown.

“It was a series production order (from Prime Video), which is a really big deal, and I was just learning as I went along,” he said. “It’s been a long road for me. It’s not the same as being offered a job with the script – Alice and I came up with the idea together and then she wrote an incredible script.”

Weisz added, “Alice and I were very interested in women being massively successful and just as messed up. The characters are complicated, and not just the good twin/evil twin—yawn, yawn—because people are very, very complicated. We are never just one thing.”

Speaking to Hollywood as a whole, Weisz said “women seeking pleasure” are underrepresented on screen.

“Female desire is very interesting, and I think we don’t do enough with it,” Weisz said. “In the past, I’ve often found female roles too simplistic, and I think that’s changing, which is great. What I’m looking for are complicated characters. Interesting, complex writing.”

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