She said her pledge was “extreme”, but necessary. (Photo by John Salangsang/Variety via Getty Images)
Kristen Stewart has refused to act in another movie until she can make her directorial debut in The Chronology of Water.
In a recent interview with Variety, the actor said that she won’t be working on another project until she secures the funding for her adaptation of the 2011 queer memoir, written by author Lidia Yuknavitch.
“I’m going to make this movie before I ever work for someone else,” she told the outlet, adding: “Yeah, I will quit the f**king business. I won’t make a-f**king-nother movie until I make this movie. I will tell you that, for sure.
“I think that will get things going.”
She then doubled down on her plea to the industry saying at the Sundance Film Festival in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter that she “really won’t” [appear in another movie].
“I have to do it,” she explained of her dream to bring the memoir to life. She did, however, acknowledge that her pledge in her previous interview was “an extreme thing to say”.
“There’s this sort of essential, vital thing about making marginalized art and being on the sidelines and then coming to a place where you’re like, dude, we do hear you,” she said at the event.
“If I keep working for other people, even if I’m inspired and totally in love with those stories, what am I doing? Of course, I want to make my movie. Yeah, that’s all I want to do.”
The Spencer star initially announced that she would be adapting the memoir at the Cannes Film Festival back in 2018. In 2022, she announced that Imogen Poots would be the star of the film, whilst she would co-write the script with Andy Mingo. However, Variety reports that the movie has run into issues with financial backing.
In the meantime, the 33-year-old is featuring in two films at this year’s film festival, a lesbian crime thriller titled Love Lies Bleeding, and a conceptual sci-fi romance, Love Me.
She’s also taken up a supporting role in the soon-to-be-released road trip comedy, Sacramento, starring alongside Michael Cera, Maya Erskine, and Michael Angarano, who is making his directorial debut with the film.