Mia Threapleton: ‘This is the biggest thing I’ve ever done’

When she was 13, actress Mia Threapleton wrote, in a note, after watching the Wes Anderson film Moonrise Kingdom, that she would love to work with the acclaimed American director.

Fast forward a decade or so and that dream has become a reality.

The 24-year-old, who is the daughter of Titanic star Kate Winslet and director and artist Jim Threapleton, is among the talent starring in Anderson’s latest film, the 1950s-set comedy thriller, The Phoenician Scheme.

Threapleton, whose other credits include starring in Channel 4’s I Am Ruth, alongside her Oscar-winning mother, and Apple TV+ period series The Buccaneers, recalls being overcome by emotion during the Cannes Film Festival recently, where Anderson’s film received a seven-minute-long standing ovation.

“I think it was, this is the biggest thing that I’ve ever done,” she says, seated alongside her co-stars, Traffic and 21 Grams actor Benicio del Toro and Juno actor Michael Cera.

“I never thought that this would ever happen,” Threapleton says. “I’ve said this a few times recently, that a week and a half ago, I was at home going through some old boxes, and I literally found from 2013, little me, aged 13, writing, ‘Watching Moonrise Kingdom again. Bloody love this film, would really love to work with Wes Anderson one day’.”

Her teenage ambitions are no different to those of other big-name talent, as, through the years, A-listers have consistently flocked to work with Anderson, with the roll-call for his films bearing testament to his popularity.

From 2001’s The Royal Tenenbaums, with an ensemble cast including the late Gene Hackman, Ben Stiller, Gwyneth Paltrow, Bill Murray, Owen Wilson and more, to other films, like 2014’s The Grand Budapest Hotel, starring Ralph Fiennes, Adrien Brody, Willem Dafoe, Saoirse Ronan, and Tilda Swinton... the list goes on.

Anderson’s latest project follows suit, with other names among the cast including Benedict Cumberbatch, Tom Hanks, and Scarlett Johansson.

This film marks Superbad actor Cera’s Anderson debut and the 36-year-old explains how he found working on the project.

“I guess what’s surprising is just learning how Wes approaches making a movie,” Cera says.

“He’s got his own rhythm, his own way of doing it, and that he’s really built over time. So, it’s very unique to him, the process, and it’s actually, really wonderful. And you kind of don’t want to work any other way, I didn’t. I mean, I love it’s a little more rigorous.

“It’s a little more demanding as an actor, because you don’t have kind of all this stuff around to sort of, like, lull you in to, like a kind of nap, almost nap-like state.

“Normally, on a set, you have lunch in your warm little trailer, and then you really have a hard time, wait, and then it takes an hour to get your engine going again. With Wes, you never turn it off.”

The Phoenician Scheme stars Del Toro as Zsa-zsa Korda, a titan of commerce, who oversees the “mediation of clandestine trade agreements”.

Jealous rivals wish him outrageous misfortune, resulting in various assassination attempts, including a targeted explosion aboard Korda’s private plane, which forces the magnate to assume command from his pilot (Stephen Park) and crash-land in a cornfield.

Succession planning is vital to implement the Phoenician Scheme, his ambitious, three-part infrastructure vision consisting of a hydroelectric dam, mountainside locomotive tunnel, and inland waterway.

He hopes funding can be divided between wealthy investors and family, including Prince Farouk (Riz Ahmed), basketball-loving tycoons Leland (Hanks) and Reagan (Bryan Cranston), shipping magnate Marty (Jeffrey Wright), second cousin Hilda (Johansson), and half-brother Nubar (Cumberbatch).

Blessed with 10 children from three wives, Korda pins his hopes on his only daughter, Liesl (Threapleton), a novice nun poised to take her vows.

Liesl reluctantly s her father on a globe-trotting expedition to woo investors, accompanied by Norwegian insect specialist Bjorn Lund (Cera), who is hired as a tutor for Liesl’s siblings.

“Well, I think he’s faced with mortality, right?,” muses del Toro of his character.

“So, I think he’s been facing mortality through it, but this moment when the movie starts, he’s there with, I think subconsciously, he wants forgiveness from his daughter, but that’s in the back of his head. So, in a way, he wants a second chance. And I think that that’s one of the things that drives Zsa-zsa in the story that we watch.”

For Anderson, 56, the character of Zsa-zsa Korda had a personal resonance, too, as far as the father/daughter bond in the film goes.

“That theme might have something to do with me having a daughter and I suppose the father/daughter aspects also reflect the father of my wife, Juman, Fouad Malouf, a Lebanese businessman, and her experiences with him, and my experiences, too.

“In a way, he’s the first inspiration for the movie. Something in Zsa-zsa is just totally rooted in Fouad,” Anderson explained previously in press material for the film.

Recalling the Cannes standing ovation, Threapleton adds: “I sort of (was) standing there, and everyone was clapping, and then I was just looking around and thinking, ‘Christ, there’s a lot of people in here. They’re all standing up’.

“And then, suddenly, the camera was on Michael (Cera), and then it was on me.

“And I got a bit shy, and I looked down, and then I looked up and thought, ‘Oh God, all these people are looking at my face and, oh my goodness, that’s me’.

“And then you (Michael) sort of stood next to me, and you said, ‘Just let it out’. And I went, ‘Oh my God. I can’t’. And then I was completely, I was ruined. It was terrible. It was very overwhelming, but really beautiful.”

How did del Toro, who won a best ing actor Oscar in 2001 for Traffic, feel about the poignant Cannes moment?

“It’s rewarding, in a way, because you do a movie, you never know,” he muses.

“You do it for the audience. You do it for the claps, in a way, or for the money. But it’s amazing. I also, I’m a little sceptical, because I hear it and I feel it, but I don’t believe it.

“But it’s amazing, and it’s great for everyone involved in the film, not just Wes Anderson, who put this thing together, but everyone, the crew, a lot of hard work.

“And this movie, you know, Wes Anderson movies, because of the work of everyone involved in it, you can almost, almost touch it.”

“It’s like a pop-up book. It’s a pop-up movie, in a way, it just comes out at you, and there’s a lot of really incredible work from all the departments. And I think that they... that clapping is for them, too.”

The Phoenician Scheme is in cinemas now.