The actors and filmmaker discuss wrapping William S. Burroughs' life into the hallucinatory dream sequence.
Warning: This article contains spoilers fromQueer.
Lee returns to Mexico City, where the story began.
Daniel Craig as William Lee (L), Drew Starkey as Eugene Allerton in ‘Queer’.A24/YouTube
Allerton had stopped returning Lees letters some time ago, and the sting of their broken relationship lingers.
All of that is there inLuca GuadagninosQueer, the adaptation of the story.
Its as if his past, present, and future collide together.
William Lee (Daniel Craig) peeks inside a miniature apartment building in a dream sequence for ‘Queer’.A24/YouTube
A24/YouTube
Craig interprets that ending slightly differently with each new viewing.
The imagery is crucial for any Burroughs fan; those people will pick up on the meaning.
I sometimes think that the end of the movie is an extension of the ayahuasca trip.
Lee (Daniel Craig) watching himself in the dream sequence to ‘Queer’.A24/YouTube
We never quite leave it.
We wanted to make it clear that we werent making a biopic about Burroughs.
We were making a fictional story aboutQueer, about his book, Kuritzkes explained at the time.
Daniel Craig (L) and Drew Starkey in ‘Queer’.
He shot her in a drunken stupor while at a friends apartment in Mexico City.
He later retracted this account and said the gun accidentally went off.
While out on bail, Burroughs took a cue from his lawyer and fled the country.
A Mexican courtconvicted him in absentiaof manslaughter and gave him a two-year suspended sentence.
So it was irresistible with editing, with the miracle of cinema, to jump into a lifetime.
It goes from that moment to, boom, the future.
Also, I think I said, Why don’t we make him at the end of his life?
And what better way than cinema to present this miracle of life?
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“It’s such a deep feeling that I feel watching at the end,” Craig remarks.
So that’s what he was feeling as he passes at the end."
“Door’s already open.
Can’t close it now,” she says.
“All you could do is look away, but why would you?”
If the door is indeed open, then it was Lee’s hallucinations in the jungle that opened it.
The actors rehearsed the choreography for months before shooting began.
“It was a really great way to stretch ourselves.
Daniel and I were both at the same level.”
They performed the choreography for the camera on top of coffee grounds.
As Starkey puts it, “We were essentially naked.
[Guadagnino] was like, ‘They’re going to get cut up after the first take.
Their skin’s going to be ripped to shreds if it’s just dirt.’
“I guess the coffee can absorb into your skin.
I was up for hours after.”
It’s too much.”
Queeris now playing in theaters.
