Emma Stone helped guide Jesse Plemons through the process of making movies with director Yorgos Lanthimos.
The La La Land actress has appeared in all of the offbeat director's films since 2018's The Favourite, while Plemons joined his roster of frequent collaborators with 2024's Kinds of Kindness.
As part of a profile on Stone for Vogue magazine, Plemons praised his co-star for being an invaluable guide to him when he was introduced to Lanthimos's filmmaking process, which involves extensive rehearsals and exercises and games to help the cast bond.
"Seeing her throw herself into these exercises and games gives you more confidence to do the same," the Fargo star said. "She takes the work seriously - but not herself too seriously."
Stone and Plemons recently reunited with Lanthimos to make Bugonia, in which she plays a pharmaceutical CEO who is kidnapped by conspiracy theorists, one of whom is portrayed by Plemons.
Since Stone's second collaboration with Lanthimos, 2023's Poor Things, she has been picking more daring roles and eschewing standard Hollywood projects.
Explaining this transition, she told the publication, "The more challenging it gets, the more I like it. If you're not growing or pushing yourself to different places - and I feel it's the same for most people in almost any job - you get stagnant."
The two-time Oscar winner admitted that she was initially "scared" about the reaction to the oddball Poor Things, but she has since let go of caring so much about the response to her work.
"There's nothing you can do," she stated. "Yorgos and I have talked a lot about this. There's no reason to be prescriptive to an audience about what it should like and not like. If you don't like it, that's fine. If it's not for you, that's okay."
Bugonia, her fourth feature-length collaboration with Lanthimos, will premiere at the Venice Film Festival later this month before hitting cinemas in October. Meanwhile, her other 2025 movie, Eddington, is in U.S. cinemas now.
