Melissa Barrera has become a fan favorite in the horror space thanks to her work on Scream franchise and recent cult success Abigailbut his latest entry into the canon is another animal entirely. Your monster is part romantic comedy and part (as expected) monster movie, written and directed by Caroline Lindy as her film debut. Barrera plays Laura Franco, an aspiring actress who finds a monster living in her closet after experiencing a mountain of heartbreak.
After an accident that interrupts her Broadway dreams and a breakup that crushes her spirit, Laura encounters a monster (played by Tommy Dewey) who ironically begins to help her self-esteem recover. While the premise may bear a strong resemblance to Beauty and the beast, Your monster is most accurately described as an exploration of the self that veers into romance, comedy, and horror with aplomb. The film also stars the White LotusMeghann Fahy, Edmund Donovan and Kayla Foster.
TelaRant interviewed Lindy and Foster, who plays Laura’s best friend Mazie while also serving as a producer, about their work to bring Your monster to the big screen. The director shared how her personal experiences influenced the story and why it needed to be a mix of genres, while Foster explained what attracted her to Lindy’s work and the character she played.
Her monster is based on Caroline Lindy’s own internal experience
“As I got to know this side of me, I realized the anger that lived inside me.”
Screen Speech: Your monster It’s so refreshing and original. This film explores themes of inner anger, self-love and empowerment in a creative and brilliant way. Caroline, you wrote and directed this film, which is deeply personal. How did your real-life experience shape the emotional narrative tone of the film?
Caroline Lindy: It was heavily influenced [by] my emotional experience. It’s loosely based on what happened. I was diagnosed with cancer and finished, which I dramatized a little in the film. But it was the first moment in my life – I was raised to be a very good, polite girl and I graduated from college – that back-to-back bad things happened to me.
I was feeling this sense of injustice and anger for the first time in my life and I didn’t know what to do with these feelings. I was so upset, so depressed, and so angry at the world that he was starting to show up for. I was forced to deal with myself in a way that at first felt very uncomfortable and scary. But as I got to know this side of me, I realized the anger that lived inside me.
My monster was actually my defense mechanism. That was what told me that there is something in your life that is not working and that you need to change; that you need to protect yourself against. Then I started to fall in love with that side of me and I thought, “This is a love story.” I had a love story with myself. I fell in love with this part of me that I considered a terrifying, grotesque, horrible monster. [It’s] this wonderful piece of me that will protect me and fill me with strength and power. So, as a lover of romantic comedies and as someone who wants to revive the romantic comedy, I thought, “This could be a really interesting and weird take on a romantic comedy.” That’s where it came from.
Screen Rant: Kayla, you are a part of this film as both a producer and an actor. How did you balance the dual roles and what attracted you to the character Mazie?
Kayla Foster: Caroline sent me the short and told me about the character Mazie, and I just fell in love with the idea of playing this kind of eccentric, crazy best friend character in this great satirical romantic comedy. It was a dream to play that character and the basis of our relationship.
Being so involved with Caroline before we started filming, working on the script with her and just being by her side, I think was the only way I could equip myself to jump in front of the camera while I was making an independent film. It’s just a very intense combination, knowing, “Okay, we have a lot of time to shoot this scene and you have to get it right in two takes.” And then it’s jumping in front of the camera and saying, “You know what? I’m actually so relaxed and I’m not worried about the weather at all. I’m totally fine.” It was a total mind change, constantly navigating.
But I think anyone who makes films faces a challenge because no matter what kind of film you’re making, it’s very difficult. So it was a really unique and crazy challenge, but I couldn’t have done it without Caroline.
“Let’s not fall in love with the idiot with lots of money who treats us like dirt.”
Screen Rant: Speaking of challenges, what was the most challenging aspect of fusing romantic, comedic and horror elements in this film?
Caroline Lindy: Usually these are genres that don’t fit together, but I think what excited me most was the beauty of independent cinema. You can try it. I’ve seen the same movie countless times throughout my life and we got a small budget. Nobody knew who I was, and I said, “You know what? I want to try something different. If we crash and burn, so be it.”
But I think the classic romantic comedy doesn’t work for today’s audiences because women are more powerful after the Me Too movement. We are smarter; we are wiser. Let’s not fall in love with the idiot with lots of money who treats us like trash. We have to give the romantic comedy a new look, and it has to be a story that reflects how women feel. We are angry, we are complicated people, and we are learning to fall in love with ourselves in a new way.
I thought, “Let’s make this loud and weird and big and an experiment,” because I think that reflects who we are in society as women. I tell Kayla all the time that the moment in my life, from which this film was born, was not a one-size-fits-all experience. It’s true what actually happened, so the film couldn’t have been a one-genre film.
More About Your Monster (2024)
Your Monster tells the story of soft-spoken actress Laura Franco (Melissa Barrera), who is abandoned by her longtime boyfriend (Edmund Donovan) while recovering from surgery and retreats to her childhood home to recover. With her future looking bleak, insult is added to injury when Laura discovers her ex is performing in a musical she helped him develop. But out of these harrowing changes in her life comes a monster (Tommy Dewey) with whom she finds a connection, encouraging Laura to follow her dreams, open her heart, and fall in love with her inner rage.
Check out our previous Your monster interviews here:
Source: Screen Rant Plus