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00:00Anya Taylor-Joy is the alternative It Girl.

00:03Her star has risen rapidly, but her star power seems to come from how she's different from her contemporaries,

00:09in look, in fashion, and in her career choices.

00:12The thing about jumping from project to project is that you gain skills for that particular project.

00:18In a world where it's easy to feel like you know almost anyone,

00:21Anya intrigues us because it feels like we don't know her.

00:24Where is home for you because you've lived everywhere?

00:28Yeah, I don't really have one.

00:31Her multicultural background makes her hard to pin down,

00:34and she's played a wide range of characters, adding to her sense of mystery.

00:38She began her career at the age of 16 when she was scouted as a model in London.

00:42Take my dog for a walk, and I see this car, and this guy sticks his head out the window and goes,

00:46if you stop, you won't regret it.

00:48But unlike some of her other peers who we've seen grow up on screen,

00:51it feels like Anya started her career suddenly, already fully formed.

00:56This unknowability elevates her work on screen.

00:58It allows her to straddle the line between hero and villain,

01:01strong and vulnerable, glamorous and ordinary.

01:04She gets to play with identity, status, and genre across her body of work.

01:08You should see the places they play in the Soviet Union.

01:10I'm planning on it.

01:12You have to get past me first.

01:14I'm planning on that too.

01:16Here's our take on Anya Taylor-Joy,

01:18and how she commands everyone's attention by keeping us guessing.

01:21Anya is a shapeshifter, and so many of her roles carry with them a sense of transformation.

01:30This is key to her appeal.

01:31We never know what we're going to get when she comes onto the screen.

01:34One of my nicknames is Wendy Tink, because I kind of flip between...

01:37This is particularly true of her most famous role to date,

01:40as chess prodigy Beth Harmon in The Queen's Gambit.

01:43X plus Y is a binomial.

01:45In the novel that the series is based on,

01:47the character is described as the ugliest white girl ever by her only friend, Jolene.

01:52As a successful model, Anya Taylor-Joy certainly wasn't the most obvious choice for Beth Harmon,

01:57but she herself has commented on her unusual features,

02:00saying she thinks she's too weird-looking to be a Hollywood star.

02:04And while we would disagree with that statement,

02:06it is true that she's a break from the standard blonde bombshell in Hollywood.

02:10Her large, wide-set eyes make her seem otherworldly,

02:13and she's been compared to everything from an alien to a porcelain doll.

02:16Both the show and the novel version of The Queen's Gambit follow Beth's progression,

02:21from a scared, nervous orphan to a confident, glamorous chess superstar.

02:25As she comes to believe in her genius, she grows in stature and confidence,

02:29and this is reflected in the reactions of people who have watched her journey.

02:33What happened to that gawky kid who kicked my ass five years ago?

02:39Apparently she grew up.

02:41Although Anya was already starting to make a name for herself in the film world,

02:45her performance in the hit Netflix show was widely considered her breakout role,

02:49and she earned an Emmy nomination for it.

02:51It took her from a relative unknown into a member of Hollywood's freshman class of A-listers.

02:56So good I am.

02:57In Last Night in Soho, Anya's character is introduced as unquestionably beautiful,

03:02but it's a particular kind of beauty.

03:04Oh, you're a gorgeous creature. What's your name?

03:07Sandy.

03:07She's a woman out of time, appearing only in flashbacks seen through the eyes of the more timid and meek Eloise.

03:14We know Eloise is obsessed by the styles and fashions of the 60s,

03:18and so Sandy comes to embody that ideal.

03:20A future star in the making who we get to watch as she's discovered,

03:24drawing parallels to Anya in real life,

03:26before we find out her real, not-so-glamorous fate.

03:29And again, there's a sense of mystery and transformation,

03:32with the perspective flitting back and forth between Sandy and Eloise,

03:36as the connection between them reveals itself.

03:39Downtown, everyone's waiting for you.

03:44This theme of transformation makes it hard to pin down who Anya Taylor-Joy really is.

03:50It plays out in her fashion, too.

03:52Her red carpet looks, which range from contemporary designers to beautiful vintage pieces,

03:56always stand out.

03:57But taken together, it's hard to define her style as any one thing.

04:01Like many other beauty icons before her,

04:04from Marlene Dietrich and Claudia Cardinale,

04:06to more recent examples like Zendaya and Bella Hadid,

04:09she leans into this ambiguity and embraces her multinational identities and experiences.

04:14You know, I was born in Miami.

04:15Raised between Argentina and London,

04:17and my first language is Spanish,

04:19so legally, my ethnicity is Fashion Week.

04:22And because she's so adept at being a shapeshifter,

04:24we're always looking for something more beneath the surface.

04:30The Queen's Gambit may have brought her global stardom,

04:33but Anya first took to the screen as a scream queen,

04:36playing both vulnerable protagonists and more nightmarish villains

04:40in independent and low-budget horrors.

04:43I'll be the witch of the wood.

04:44As Thomason in The Witch, all of the film's fear is filtered through her.

04:49It's in her younger brother's guilty glances at her when she's not looking,

04:52and the narrative ambiguity about what exactly happened to the family's baby in her care.

04:57We know there's some occult presence taking shape,

05:00but we don't know what shape it's going to take, and neither does she.

05:03The fear we feel is her fear,

05:06fear about what's happening to her family,

05:08and what's happening to her.

05:10Black Phillip, see if you are wicked.

05:12I told me to.

05:13Damn you're Black Phillip.

05:15He said you put the devil in Caleb.

05:17That's why he's sick.

05:18The same is true in Morgan.

05:20She plays the titular character,

05:22a replicant-type science experiment

05:24who wrestles with her own sentience

05:26and again comes to fear herself.

05:28Morgan does not understand what she is,

05:30and how she should be.

05:32And much like with Beth Harmon,

05:33Anya is able to lean into her weird-looking features.

05:37Without makeup or glamorous wardrobe,

05:39she uses her large, wide-set eyes to seem almost alien.

05:42Compared to the ordinary characters around her,

05:44she feels distinct,

05:46and it's hard to know whether or not we can trust her.

05:48Open the door and let me help you.

05:50I don't need your help.

05:51I'm starting to feel like myself.

05:53Anya's choices aren't the standard genre fare.

05:56She does something new with well-established tropes.

05:58Eileen Giselle argues that the final image of her in The Witch,

06:02floating naked in the forest with Satan's other captives,

06:04is a liberating subversion of the final girl trope,

06:08in which one female character,

06:09bruised, bloodied, and traumatized,

06:11lives to tell the tale of the horror she endured.

06:14What's thou like to live deliciously?

06:18Her role as Casey in M. Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable trilogy is similar.

06:22While in Split, she is more a traditional final girl,

06:25in Glass, the character returns.

06:27She is not defined by her experience of victimization.

06:30She gets to try to reclaim her story for herself.

06:33What he did to me was...

06:36wrong.

06:39Just like what your mom did to you was wrong.

06:41Our beloved Scream Queen most recently received praise

06:44for her role in yet another Robert Eggers project.

06:47The director of The Witch put his faith in Anya once more

06:50for the action thriller The Northmen,

06:51and she did not disappoint.

06:53Your strength breaks men's bones.

06:57I have the cunning to break their minds.

06:59This time, Anya tapped into her witchy magic

07:02as the scene-stealing sorceress Olga,

07:05where the actress suffered through some seriously intense

07:07shooting conditions to deliver a wily yet sympathetic heroine.

07:11Covered in mud, in the ocean, minus three degrees,

07:14not wearing any shoes, not wearing any clothes, really.

07:18In a genre defined by heroes and villains,

07:20Anya's horror roles often show real empathy

07:23for outcasts and monsters,

07:25characters that are rarely treated complexly in the genre.

07:28In doing so, she subtly shifts our perspective

07:30and helps push these stories forward.

07:36While Anya's horror movie roles let her explore

07:39a more explicit darkness,

07:40she's also found a home playing high-society

07:43period drama characters,

07:45which are much more subtle but still bold.

07:47She often subverts our expectations of these characters,

07:51illuminating something darker about high-society living.

07:54My place is to protect this house and all in it,

07:56including you.

07:58We stand or fall together.

08:01We're currently living through a boom

08:03in historical fiction content

08:04that twists or reimagines the past.

08:07Things like Bridgerton

08:08and the new fleabag-inspired Persuasion.

08:11Even musicals like Six or And Juliet

08:13play with our expectations

08:14and modernize our assumptions about the past.

08:17So on the surface,

08:18Anya's Emma is remarkable

08:20for how down the line it feels in comparison.

08:23However, Anya's take on the character

08:24feels far more critical

08:26than the typical aspirational heroine.

08:28I shall be sure to say three dull things

08:29as soon as I open my mouth.

08:31Ah, mom, but there is the difficulty.

08:33When have you ever stopped at three?

08:35While the setting still feels luxurious and opulent

08:38and the costuming is decadent and glamorous,

08:41Emma herself is spoiled and conceited.

08:43Anya's performance highlights

08:45how this privilege creates a sense of entitlement

08:47and self-absorption in the upper class.

08:50I've been unpartnably vain.

08:53In Peaky Blinders,

08:54she plays a similarly affluent heiress

08:56with nefarious manipulative character traits.

08:59The coldness she brings to the role

09:00illustrates how high society life

09:02is a double-edged sword.

09:04For all the luxury,

09:05it's incredibly unfeeling and artificial.

09:07My husband may do as he's told,

09:09but I don't.

09:11And this theme continues

09:13even when she takes on high society roles

09:15outside of the period piece genre.

09:17As Lily in Thoroughbreds,

09:19her character's extreme wealth and privilege

09:21manifests itself as a kind of nihilism.

09:24While the social strata she's in

09:25may be safe and secure,

09:27it's also devoid of love or nurture.

09:29In fact, her friend Amanda

09:30literally can't feel emotions.

09:32So you basically have to learn

09:34all the automatic, like, processes

09:37that get triggered when you cry

09:38and then sort of manually generate each one.

09:42Feeds back to the brain

09:43and then the tears just come naturally.

09:44And again,

09:45her performance eschews the glamour of wealth

09:48and instead presents the sometimes cold

09:50and unfeeling nature of high society life.

09:53These performances make Anya Taylor-Joy

09:55feel modern and incisive.

09:57Yes, her elegance makes her fit organically

09:59into these period pieces

10:00and embody these privileged characters.

10:02But the way she uses those performances

10:04to show how cruel that world can be

10:06feels like a far more modern take.

10:09The more we see of someone,

10:10the less interesting they tend to become.

10:12But that doesn't seem to have happened

10:14for Anya Taylor-Joy

10:15and she's not going anywhere anytime soon.

10:17She's soon to star in a cinematic tentpole

10:19as Furiosa in the next Mad Max film,

10:22taking on a character that's already

10:23been iconically played by Charlize Theron.

10:26You can get in.

10:27Not without them.

10:30It's hard to pin down

10:31what she might do with that role

10:32or indeed any role,

10:34but that's because even when a character

10:35seems straightforward,

10:37she looks at them in a new way

10:38and maybe understands them

10:39in a way they haven't been understood before.

10:42That's the take.

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Anya Taylor-Joy, How She Keeps Us Guessing | SCREEN ICONS

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