The very first Terminator was released in October of 1984, in which a time-traveling cyborg is sent back to kill Sarah Connor, but you probably already know all that. Dark Fate is a direct sequel to Terminator 2: Judgement Day and events are set to take place 27 years later. There is a newly modified liquid Terminator from the future sent by the big bad evil Skynet to kill a new target. Linda Hamilton and Arnold Schwarzenegger will be reprising their roles as Sarah Connor and the eponymous Terminator, and will be joined by newcomers Natalia Reyes, Mackenzie Davis, and Gabriel Luna. The franchise was always ahead of its own time in delivering iconic female action heroes. And now, it’s got three of them.
Meet Natalia Reyes, Mackenzie Davis, and the returning Linda Hamilton…
What can you tell us about your characters in Terminator: Dark Fate?
Natalia Reyes (Dani Ramos): “Dani is from Mexico City. She’s a young, happy girl. She’s a hard-worker. She loves her family, her father and her brother and her dog, and she’s a fun-loving person. But, she also gets what she wants. She has what she thought was a simple life, but then she goes off to work and finds out that there is this new Terminator, this horrible machine, after her – and she has no idea why he is chasing her. Suddenly, Grace [Mackenzie Davis], and Sarah [Linda Hamilton] appear, and they have come to help her escape. That is all she knows at first. And that is the journey – three women together, helping each other, escaping from this Terminator.”
Mackenzie Davis (Grace): “Grace is there on a mission – and the mission is to protect Dani Ramos. That’s maybe a bland way of describing someone, but it is Grace’s absolute core. She is fulfilled and driven by that need and by performing that duty. We find out that reason, the things she has gone through to make her the way she is. All the things that I can’t talk about are important, but they will be revealed. The important thing for now is that she’s a woman who is fuelled by that desire to protect, driven by her quest and laser-focused on her duty.”
Linda Hamilton (Sarah Connor): “Well, it’s 28 years [since Sarah Connor was last in a Terminator movie]! That’s a long time and a lot has happened [to her]. It was really up to me to take the constraints of the new story and then fill in those 28 years. It’s not just a question of, ‘Oh, this has happened…’ You want to fill in all the blanks. Sarah is very unchanged in a way, but if you take the trajectory that she was on [by the end of T2] and expound upon that for 28 years, then a lot is also different. She is very much the same passionate, crazy wild thing – because that’s how I look at her; as a wild thing – but the mission has changed. She is a woman without a country.
We left the last [movie] in a hopeful place, her and John hoping that they had changed the disastrous future that was headed our way. But at this point now she is very hopeless. As much as she carries on her mission against technology and machines, there is not a lot of hopefulness, or a love of humankind, in her anymore – because mankind is ultimately responsible for its own demise. So, there’s not a lot of love in Sarah, just a lot of rage and drive and a need for vengeance, which is a new place that we haven’t seen her in before. This is Sarah, but not quite as you know her.”
It’s fascinating to see how the relationship that you three have in the movie plays out. How did you build that on-screen bond between you all?
Davis: “Honestly, to spend the amount of time that Linda and Natalia and I did, under extreme circumstances – every single minute, of every single day – all working so hard, running all the time, it was not an environment where you’d expect it to be the most joyful, uncomplicated way of making a movie that I have ever had the pleasure of being a part of. I think it is genius casting. We were all different and all playing very different characters, working really hard, for the movie and for each other, but it’s just a great piece of chemistry.
I think if you’re looking for a specific reason, maybe it was Linda having history with this franchise. I mean, Linda has kids from this franchise – she was breastfeeding at the start of Terminator 2! It has marked her whole life in this really significant way. So, for us to be entering into it while she returned to it nearly 30 years later, I think there is just a reverence to what this means to somebody’s life. I felt that for a couple of weeks, but then you’re just a bunch of people making a movie together. Once you get into it, you just hope people work like non-assholes, and I have to say I was working with two of the hardest-working non-assholes in the business.”
Reyes: “That relationship between the three if us was one of the key reasons why I wanted to do this movie. That kind of dynamic is too rare a thing, so when you find it you want to grab it! And, really, when it came down to it [on set], I think we were just reacting, because that relationship was real. And that doesn’t happen often. We were always saying how lucky we were. The three of us are all really easy-going. We are all really passionate, but we like having fun, too. So, what you see [on screen] really was real between the three of us. We were all working together, but also spending a lot of time together outside of work. We liked spending time together, having dinner together, talking about the characters. The three of us are all coming from different places and ages, but we became a family. It was really interesting, from the very beginning, to have this really close relationship with Linda. I think that she was a really essential part of the decision, that I was in the movie. She gave her approval and she voted for me. Starting at my audition, she was really supportive. And I really looked up to her as the incredible actress she is. I admire her, I respect her. She was there all the time on set, next to me, giving me her hand, hugging me. I would always ask her for advice because this story is an extension of her story, as Sarah. So, she was like a mother, a friend, a coach. She was everything. She was so important to me.”
Hamilton: “When Natalia auditioned with me, something just clicked. It wasn’t even a conscious decision, I don’t think. It was something inside of me. Something I felt. I said, ‘Do I get a vote? Because if I do, she’s the one. Bingo!’ [As for the three of us leading the movie together] well, I liked the idea of shaking it up a little bit, of course! But it really depends on the actresses you have playing it, doesn’t it? To really sell it and to make it work. And we lucked out. We absolutely lucked out, I mean, we have the two greatest actresses at my side. And the three of us, we’re not Charlie’s Angels, with a shared goal. There is a lot of conflict and push and pull, but I am matched brilliantly by both. They are my favorite people in the world at the moment. I feel so absolutely blessed that I got them. We each have our strengths and our vulnerabilities; it’s really fleshed out and human. Because between the three of us, we pretty much cover anything you could think of. Anything you could think of that women could do, we do it. And I love it. I just love the power of those two women at my side.”
Why did you want to do this movie?
Hamilton: “The fact that Jim [Cameron] was at the helm, even just as producer. I really acknowledge that Jim was the major creative force in the first two movies and that his leadership, the overall concept of the franchise, is very important. But more than that, it was that so much time had passed and that although in some ways [my] character is the same, the situation has changed. There was new stuff to play. That’s what intrigues me, as an actress: the time that has passed and the potential to explore so much more. I never wanted to keep playing the same thing, with diminished returns. And here it was different. Here it was like, ‘Hmm… This is intriguing. Let’s see what we can do!’”
Davis: “I heard about the material and learned about the relationships [in the story] – and every new piece that I learned sucked me in. And then there was Tim [Miller], who is just so smart and sensitive that I knew he’d do something really unique for the genre. I didn’t imagine the director [of a Terminator movie] to be quite as sensitive as Tim is! And when I finally read the script, under lock and key, I loved it. Then, of course, when I found out I’d got the part, I had a little bit of a panic attack! I thought, ‘I am not the person who should play this part! I’m no good at karate! I can’t do stunts!’ That went on for quite a while… But, in all seriousness, it has been such an honor to do something that is so far out of my comfort zone. Tim, in particular, believed that I could do it.”
Reyes: “I have done movies; I have done television. But I have never done a movie this big! This was a completely different scale. It’s James Cameron! And it’s Tim Miller! And I’m acting with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton! So, you know, it was a challenge in every way. You have to do your best, but, also, every second here is gold. You really have to take advantage of this kind of opportunity. So there was pressure, but it worked out well. I am really proud of this.
And that doesn’t always happen. I always say, ‘It takes as much effort to make a bad movie as it does to make a good movie.’ Sometimes you work so hard and you don’t sleep and you care about the character so much and you try and try, and then, at the very end, you see the movie and you’re like, ‘Oh. That didn’t work out very well.’ But on this one, thanks to the commitment of everyone, this is a really, really good movie. I’m really very proud of what we did.”
You all speak very fondly of Tim Miller. Why?
Reyes: “Tim Miller comes from [a background in] comics and Deadpool and the action world. And he has it, really clearly, in his mind what he wants. He is a creator. He does that. But there is no superhero or action hero like Dani. I think that’s why the casting for this was so hard. Because they didn’t need anything that we had seen before. The pitch was, ‘She’s someone from Mexico, a normal, next-door girl who suddenly finds herself hunted by this terminator.’ So, it was really hard to give references for that. He was actually trying to find that character. She is not a copy of anyone. She’s new.”
Hamilton: “Absolutely! And I adore Tim. He’s a fantastic man, a very quiet leader. He remained steady. And that is something I really appreciate. And he is an action director. We actually had a tough start, in terms of [our] different approaches – a little bit on set where we had to self-correct, him and me. He was a little afraid of my ferocity for a while. But that’s just stuff that two creative people have to work out, you know? Ultimately, I just love him, as does everyone. By the end, at any given moment, there would be two of us [actresses] wrapped around him! And if there’s room for the third, then even better. That is how much we love Tim. He is a real person, with great ideas. I decided years ago that my job is to make the director happy. That’s it. Keep it simple! So, we found our language and I love him to death.”
Davis: “He is a true comic-book and genre lover, but he’s also so passionate about story. He has these enormous backstories to everything and everyone, but he also recognises that fantasy is just sort of a mirage into really small, true stories. And he was so focused on that story. There is so much attendant spectacle in these movies – that he is excellent at, by the way – but I wasn’t expecting such an eye for performance, and for us to be able to enjoy the making of the movie. You know, to not just feel like we were there to link and propel set-piece to set-piece. We were really there to tell a story, and I loved that about it.”
What was the pressure like, coming into the Terminator universe?
Reyes: “It was fun… [Laughs] I was, and I am still, really grateful. But it was also a little terrifying! It was a lot of pressure. But that pressure actually comes from yourself, not from anyone else. I was outside my country, I was shooting in English, which is not my native language…”
Davis: “[It was] nerve-wracking, for sure. But exciting too! I watched those first two movies because I wanted to fit in that world. I made sure I was very aware of the world I was going to occupy – this world and tone. I love thinking about the tone of the thing you’re making. It’s not universal, you know, it’s very specific to this particular thing that you’re trying to make. For me, trying to elevate my performance to operate on this operatic level felt really important. I’m always mindful of the universe that I occupy, but you can’t really do that unless you’re free. You’re playing everything at such a heightened level – literally life and death. The form dictates the style. It would be bizarre to be in this world and play it mumblecore-y, really quiet and casual [laughs]. This world dictates a bigger performance. And there’s something quite magical that happens, being in this world where everything is possible, and anything can happen.”
Hamilton: “On a general wellness level, I had moved myself away. I live in New Orleans now. I don’t live the Hollywood life. I never really did, but I got out of [Los Angeles] about seven years ago. I got myself a farm in Virginia – a very bleak, real, farm. There was no air-conditioning and it was never warm enough in the winter. I lived very authentically, until my parents died, and then I wanted to try New Orleans, because I wanted to try a new thing and knew I’d never go back to LA – I never go backwards, only somewhere new. So, when it came to this decision, I didn’t know if I wanted to invite all of that back into my world. I loved my neighbors and my neighborhood. I was living happily ever after, in a way that just felt so authentic. And there is a part of me that feels that what took me out of Los Angeles was a rejection of Hollywood and all the grandiosity and the inflated egos, inflated boobs and inflated lips. The inflated self-worth. If you could have seen my bleak farm, you’d be like, ‘Wow, she really went the other way!’ [Laughs] And in New Orleans I’d found a really nice balance. And I wasn’t sure if I was willing to trade that for another 15 minutes of fame. But it just felt like there was something new for me to say.”
What was the reunion of Linda and Arnold like, behind the scenes?
Reyes: “It was really exciting. Really exciting. Seeing them work together was just incredible, but it was also great to see them together off-screen for the first time too. They hadn’t seen each other for a long time, so seeing them meet again and watching Linda hug Arnold so hard, it was beautiful. She was like, ‘I love you so much!’ After all these years, they had done different things. He became Governor [of California] and she moved away, so to see them back together again was really great. To be there and to feel that and to see how close they are and how much they love and respect each other, that was really cool to watch.”
Davis: “It’s funny. I actually first saw those movies [T1 and T2] about six months before I got the part in this [movie], completely unrelated to it. I was just told to see them by someone as it was a massive gap in my knowledge! They are such iconic movies that I knew of them from having grown up in the ‘90s. But I’d never actually seen the movies. So, watching them was both completely thrilling and familiar. But when you’re making the movie, it’s not like, ‘All of a sudden, these two icons walk out on set…’ It’s a lot less dramatic than that! But I was there when they first saw each other at the trailers. I was with Arnold and I saw Linda come in and it was really lovely seeing these two people whose whole lives had been marked by this enormous franchise that they did 28 years ago come back together again. To watch them to see each other again, hugging and kissing and really seeming like friends who loved each other – that felt like such an amazing moment. It felt like now we were part of this amazing family, too. It was so nice to work with two people who still love each other so much.”
Hamilton: “I’ve always felt an affection for Arnold, and know he’s an amazing, almost uncannily loyal friend. I was there for his inauguration [when he was sworn in as Governor of California] and was very happy to stand up there and bear witness to that. But, you know, our lives have taken us in different directions. He travels in his circles and I really don’t have any famous friends. That’s just not how life worked out. So, it had been years – since his inauguration, actually – since I’d seen him. And I was shocked at how much affection I felt for him. I think we’re closer now than ever. There’s a lot of love between us. And it was just us. You know, one doesn’t look at oneself and go, ‘Wow! The two icons of the film are back!’ You just don’t look at your life that way. I mean, some people might, but I certainly don’t! [Laughs] To others, we might be the two iconic characters in these films, but to me, it was just Arnold. He is so game and still so strong. We did a lot of physical stuff together, and he had just had his heart operated on… And I’m, like, landing on his chest and pushing off! We had fun. More fun than ever, in terms of what we got to do together.”
Terminator: Dark Fate is being released in Kuwait and the GCC on October 31. This interview is exclusive to bazaar publishing in Kuwait and text and images are courtesy of 20th Century Fox Middle East, @20CenturyFoxMe on Instagram.
