Break-Up Artist

I’M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS I Jesse Plemons and Jessie Buckley meet the parents in Charlie Kaufman’s new film…

- Jesse Plemons and Jessie Buckley

It’s been four years since idiosyncratic writer/director Charlie Kaufman melted brains with Anomalisa, or a dozen if you don’t count films populated entirely by sex-starved puppets. After far too long away from screens Kaufman is back with I’m Thinking Of Ending Things, an existential break-up movie that puts him firmly back in Eternal Sunshine territory.

Adapted from Iain Reid’s 2016 bestseller, it stars Jessie Buckley and Jesse Plemons as a couple en route to dinner at his parents’ (Toni Collette and David Thewlis). She’s thinking of ending things, but separation is never that simple in Charlie Kaufman World. Here the two Jess(i)es tell Teasers about working with one of cinema’s most singular voices.

How did you get involved?

Jessie Buckley: It was a pretty quick series of surreal events. I got an email with the script, and I had 24 hours to read it, learn this big poem, and put myself on tape. About two weeks later I remember going to test in-person, and the only note Charlie gave me was that this character was “molecular”, which is one of the best notes I’ve ever gotten. I needed to Google exactly what “molecular” meant, and then think, ‘What the fuck do I do with that?’ [laughs]