“I had recently done a job and didn’t enjoy the process so much,” Olivia Colman said at the Indiewire studio on Sundancepresented by Dropbox, when he spoke about the circumstances that led to her new film “Yep“Directed by Sophie Hyde.
“And then my agents said, ‘I think you’re going to love this one.’ I think you will love working with Sophie. ‘ And I thought, ‘I really want to work with Sophie,'” Colman added. “You do such a piece with a filmmaker like this that sustains you for the next few, which won’t be as much fun potentially. Although I often like the work I do. Oh God, I’m now offending everyone. Ask someone else a question! ”
That bit of fun right there shows the relaxed, family-like atmosphere among Colman, Hyde and Colman’s costar Aud Mason-Hyde (who is also the child of Sophie Hyde) when visiting the Indiewire studio.
In fact, the film, about Colman and Mason-Hyde’s characters (they are a parent-child relationship based on Hyde’s and Mason-Hyde’s own relationship) will visit Colman’s character’s father, “Jimpa”, played by John Lithgow, in Amsterdam , drew heavily from Aud and Sophie’s own life.
“It’s great to do something about yourself and not about yourself,” Mason-Hyde said. “It was like on-site therapy every day to not judge my character, even though it was somewhat my younger self.”
The film touches on some generational differences in the LGBTQ community, particularly Jimpa’s lack of understanding of trans and non-binary individuals and the use of pronouns, even though he came out as gay at a time when he faced active hostility in the 1970s.
However, Colman and Hyde do not see the film as presenting conflict.
“Look, someone else said conflict today, but I don’t think there is conflict (between their characters in the film),” Colman said. “I think (my character) felt no doubt that she was loved. Conflict may come from people who have not experienced love. If they were not loved in their younger years, conflict arises. “
Colman, who plays a version of Hyde, is pictured in “Jimpa” pitching a film to producers she says will have no conflict. Her producers shoot back, asking how it can even be a drama then. It “got a huge laugh from the audience” at the Sundance premiere, Colman said.
“We’re pushing back against the idea that all drama is inherently conflict or that conflict is the only thing interesting in drama,” Hyde said.
“I think it’s a very non-binary thing in general,” said Mason-Hyde, who identifies as non-binary herself. “The idea that you can have all these different things that we can call conflicting or call contradictory but that they can all be in one person and there’s no conflict about it because there’s room enough for all of us to coexist.”
Dropbox is proud to partner with Indiewire and the Sundance Film Festival. By 2025, 68% of feature films premiering at the Sundance Film Festival used Dropbox in their film production. Dropbox helps filmmakers and creative teams find, organize, and secure all the files important to any project.
