A24’s Latest Is a Beautiful Coming-of-Age Movie From a Pulitzer Winner

The Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright Annie Baker’s first film Janet Planet is a delicate memory piece set in early-1990s hippie Massachusetts, following a sensitive, quirky 11-year-old named Lacy (Zoe Ziegler) and her very close relationship with her mom, Janet (Julianne Nicholson, an Emmy nominee for Mare of Easttown). Janet is the planet Lacy orbits around, and the movie wouldn’t work if it weren’t for the lovely performance by Ziegler, a preteen making her acting debut. When I interviewed Baker and Ziegler, I expected to be speaking with a quiet playwright (befitting her plays, in which the action is often interior) and a jazz-hands show kid. But Ziegler was shy over Zoom, and Baker was a garrulous, eager discusser of her own film, even as she gently helped Ziegler through a slightly overwhelming interview situation.

Janet Planet is a little bit magical, a little bit funny, and a little bit sad—a beautiful evolution of Baker’s playwrighting to the screen. I talked to Baker and Ziegler about Rainer Maria Rilke, lost childhood friends, and how people change between age 10 and now. And I learned all about Zoe Ziegler’s horse, Celine. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Dan Kois: Zoe, it seemed like you had a really good time making the movie. How old are you now?

Zoe Ziegler: Twelve.

But it was a while ago that you made the movie, so how old were you when you were filming with Annie and Julianne?

Ziegler: Ten.

Do you feel like you remember that time well, or is it like it was a million years ago?

Ziegler: No, I remember it.

Annie, how old were you when you were making this movie?

Baker: Oh, great question. I was 10 and now I’m 12! No, I just turned 43, so I guess when I shot it, I had just turned 41.

Zoe, what was the food like on the movie set? Was it good?

Ziegler: Some was good.

Baker: Do you remember you had these trays with those dipping things?

Ziegler: Yeah, those peanut-butter-and-jelly things.

Baker: Yes. Zoe had these peanut-butter-and-jelly dippers that were just for her, but then I was like, “I want them too.”

Annie, when you talked to Zoe about what Lacy, her character, is like, what did you say?

Baker: I don’t think I did.

You didn’t?

Baker: Did I talk to you about what the character was like?

Ziegler: I don’t think so.

Why not?

Baker: Well, first of all, I have never really liked talking about characters in a reductive way. I’m really interested in the idea of character as basically just a series of contradictions anyway. And especially with Zoe, who was a first-time actor who I felt kind of just understood the material, both technically and spiritually, in a way that I can’t totally explain. I feel like, if I had tried to describe the character to her in some reductive way, it would’ve really hurt her performance.

Zoe, did you feel like you understood Lacy and what she was going through?

Ziegler: Yeah.

Yeah. Was there something about Lacy that made you think, Oh, she’s sort of like me in this way?

Ziegler: Well, I like being outdoors and Lacy liked being outdoors too.

There are a lot of scenes in the movie where Lacy curls up with her mom in bed and they’re whispering to each other. Zoe, what was it like doing those scenes with Julianne? Was it cozy to be in there? Was it weird?

Baker: I wouldn’t say it was cozy, because it was so hot, right?

Ziegler: It was really hot.

Baker: Between takes, you would throw the blankets off, right?

Ziegler: Yeah.

There’s a sequence in the movie that really reminded me of my childhood. It’s the one where Lacy meets a girl named Sequoia at the mall and they have an incredibly fun day. They just connect and they have such a good time together, but then who knows? Maybe they’ll never see each other again. My memory is just filled with random kids who, for some reason or another, I met them for a day and we connected and I was like, If I lived in the same city as this person, we would be best friends forever. And we have this perfect, fun day, but it was 1990, so there was no way we were ever going to get in touch with each other again. Annie, did you have kids like that in your childhood?

Baker: There’s this girl—maybe through this article I can find her! There was a girl named Jane. I think her last name was Kramer. We were roommates at overnight camp and I really loved her. And we stayed friends after overnight camp and I visited her in Philadelphia and I don’t know how to find her now. She was amazing.

What camp was it?

Baker: It was called Horizons. She was cooler than me and a year or two older than me, which is a big deal. She was really generous to me and we stayed in touch for a year, but there was no email or cellphones, and now I don’t know how to find her.

I truly hope that Jane from Philadelphia reads this and reaches out.

Baker: Jane, maybe Kramer, who went to Horizons, who grew up in Philadelphia.

When they’re running around the mall that day, they stop in a chain bookstore and they read one of the books from the Clan of the Cave Bear series.

Baker: Thank you for noticing that. I put that excerpt in the first draft of the screenplay, not understanding how hard it is to get the rights to things in movies, even indie movies, and I had to write Jean M. Auel a very passionate letter, and she was awesome and let me use it.

Was your letter all about how formative the book was for you at that exact age?

Baker: Yes.

Zoe, those books are sort of notorious for people our age. Did you read that entire book or only the section that was in the screenplay?

[Annie Baker makes big “No” gestures]

Ziegler: Just the section.

Baker: Her generation doesn’t need to know about it.

Can I ask you, Annie, about Rilke’s Duino Elegies?

Baker: Yeah.

Part of that poem appears at a crucial moment in the movie. I’ve reread it now about 10 million times after seeing it. What do you love about the elegies?

Baker: Wow. I mean, they’re really hard to talk about, and I’ve never really tried to talk about them before, and actually, that’s always what makes me want to put something in a movie or a play, is if it’s something I don’t know how to talk about. Which is not to evade you …

Nevertheless, that’s a perfect evasive answer.

Baker: That said, I think the fourth elegy in particular captures some experience of perception I had at Zoe’s age. Some sort of trinity of watching. Between an object—a theatrical object, which for me as a kid was a toy or a thing I’d made—myself, and the gaze of the parent. And there’s something about the way that trinity of gazing works that I think he captures in that poem, and that I think was a big part of why I wanted to make the movie.

Zoe, you were 10 when you did this. Presumably you’re a totally different person now than you were then. How is 12-year-old Zoe different from 10-year-old Zoe? I assume you’re taller.

Ziegler: Yeah.

Do you have the same interests you did when you were 10, or are you interested in totally different things?

Ziegler: I still ride horses.

Oh, that’s great! Do you do show riding or do you just do trail riding?

Ziegler: Sometimes I do shows.

Do you have a horse that you love the most?

Ziegler: Yeah, I own a horse named Celine.

Celine! What kind is she?

Ziegler: She’s a paint horse, like a quarter horse. After the movie, I leased her and then a little over a year ago I bought her.

Baker: Did you partly buy her with the money you made from the movie?

Ziegler: Mm-hmm.

Baker: I just think that’s a huge accomplishment that you did that. We all worked really hard. And Zoe was like, “I’m going to get my horse at the end of it.” I felt that from you.

I feel like that’s actually an extremely good answer to the question “What is the actor’s motivation in this?”

Baker: Truly, truly. Zoe doesn’t have stage parents. Your parents didn’t push you to do this. You were curious about the experiment, and you wanted to buy your horse.

Ziegler: Yeah.

Baker: I got the movie and Zoe got the horse.

What is Celine like? What’s her personality?

Ziegler: She’s kind of, like, crazy, but in a good way.

What do you love most about riding?

Ziegler: I don’t know. It just makes me feel happier.

Annie, do you feel different now that you’re 43 than you did when you were 10?

Baker: Maybe.