Tessa Thompson reveals Taika Waititi’s chaotic filmmaking approach

The latest movie in the Thor universe, Thor: Love and Thunder, sees the return of Tessa Thompson‘s Valkyrie, who has quickly become one of the favorite characters in the MCU.

Thompson once again reunited with Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi in the latest movie, and was afforded a front row seat for his directing style. In an interview with Collider, she recalled how chaotic but fun everything was.

“I think there’s a fair amount of organized chaos, which apparently comedy is the introduction of chaos into an ordered system. So it sort of makes sense that we work the other way around, that we first create the chaos, and then, this is what Taika does I think, is creates the chaos and then after it creates the order. So it’s sort of like you have fair game to go down whatever rabbit hole seems to be the most intriguing, interesting.”

She said Waititi has a way of making everything really imaginative and fun and then paring it down to the necessary story elements to drive forward a narrative.

“It’s like we’re always trying to get ourselves on the precipice of breaking, of it being so funny that we can’t contain ourselves, and that it’s sort of after, figuring out like, “No, actually we need to pare this back because we need to understand story, we need to understand stakes.” But it’s kind of this imaginative space to go there if you were doing it the other way around, and trying to, in a really didactic way, tell a story and then infuse a sense of play and chaos. It’s kind of harder to get there, in a weird way. If that makes sense?”

She also touched on working with Volume technology, which is a step-up from green screen by having live action elements projected onto the set in real time. She said it was “human brain mastery” in action.

“It’s really, really immersive, because for people that don’t understand, it’s essentially like you’re inside of the picture. So the backdrop, instead of it just being a green screen or a blue screen, you’re inside of the actual environment and it’s moving, and it also creates light and shadow and dimension. So it’s fabulous. But the thing that, I mean, all the technology is amazing, the thing that I still feel so wowed by in the context of making these movies is all the practical stuff. Like New Asgard, they built that town in the middle of Australia somewhere, and it’s like you go into all the little bars and nooks and crannies of the town and it feels like you’re in some Norwegian seaside town, and that’s the artistry, that’s human hands. And all the incredible things that people do with the CG world and the digital space is just like human brain mastery, but still, all the stuff that’s made with hands, I’m just a sucker for.”

We’ll get to see exactly what she’s talking about firsthand when Thor: Love and Thunder lands in theaters on July 8.