The Director’s Cut - A DGA Podcast

Nightbitch with Marielle Heller and Ritesh Batra (Ep. 515)

Dec 17, 2024

Director Marielle Heller, known for her work on films like A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, sits down with Ritesh Batra, celebrated for his engaging interviews. They dive into the creative journey behind Nightbitch, tackling the absurdities and pressures of motherhood. Heller shares her innovative casting techniques to capture authentic parent-child dynamics, explores the challenges of adapting personal stories to film, and discusses the emotional complexities of motherhood narratives, all while maintaining a playfully ambiguous tone.

36:39

Creator website

Episode guests

Marielle Heller

Ritesh Batra

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Episode notes

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Quick takeaways

Marielle Heller's filmmaking emphasizes authentic casting techniques to capture genuine parent-child relationships within the narrative of motherhood.

The director's commitment to ambiguity encourages deeper audience engagement and personal interpretation of complex themes surrounding identity and societal expectations.

Deep dives

Exploring Motherhood and Identity

The podcast delves into the central theme of motherhood and identity as portrayed in the film 'Night Bitch.' The story follows a woman who pauses her career to become a stay-at-home mom, grappling with the overwhelming stress of her responsibilities. As her maternal instincts intensify, they manifest in canine form, illustrating her struggle to balance her old self with her new motherhood roles. The director emphasizes that the film reflects her personal experiences and societal observations about the challenges and changes that come with becoming a parent.

Intro

2min

Adapting Personal Stories to Film

16min

Crafting the Perfect Home: City to Suburb Transition

2min

Narrative Innovations in Filmmaking

7min

Crafting Rhythm and Trust in Filmmaking

2min

Authenticity in Parenthood and Storytelling

7min

Director Marielle Heller discusses her new film, Nightbitch, with fellow Director Ritesh Batra in a Q&A at the DGA theater in New York. In the conversation, she discusses her unique approach to casting the child Actors in search of a more authentic onscreen relationship with their parents, finding filming locations that say a lot about her characters without delving into their backgrounds within the film’s story, and how she sought to achieve a deliberate level of ambiguity through her deconstruction of the traditional motherhood myth.

Based on the novel by Rachel Yoder, the film tells the story of a woman who has paused her career to be a stay-at-home mom for her new baby. As she becomes increasingly overburdened with the stress of her new responsibilities, her maternal instincts begin to manifest in canine form.

See photos and a summary of this event below:

https://dga.org/Events/2025/January2025/Nightbitch_QnA_1124