Florence Pugh's Horrible DIY Haircut Scene In Zach Braff's New Movie Was 100% Real
Zach Braff's new movie "A Good Person" capitalizes on the proven formula for any good movie: find a topic and let Morgan Freeman narrate about it (at least in the trailer). This time, it's model trains, a topic that hasn't received full cinematic treatment beyond being a background prop.
"A Good Person" stars Freeman and budding superstar Florence Pugh. In the movie, Pugh plays a woman who's struggling with grief after a fatal car accident claims the life of her soon-to-be sister-in-law. Freeman plays Pugh's would-be father-in-law, who reaches out to her in the wake of their shared loss. Part of their shared healing process involves sharing his model trains with her and what they mean to him. Cue the waterworks and, in the best-case scenario, some Oscar nods.
Braff has a knack for this kind of coming-of-age film, having made his filmmaking debut in 2004 when he wrote and directed the indie hit "Garden State." He first teamed with Freeman when he directed the 2017 elder heist film "Going in Style," a modest hit that raked in $85 million on a $25 million budget. Now he's pairing Freeman with Pugh for an exploration of family trauma and recovery.
Pugh's career is rapidly ascending and the actor has already shown incredible range. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role for the 2019 film "Little Women," starred in the complex horror-drama "Midsommar," and plays a kick-ass assassin in Marvel's "Black Widow." Despite Pugh's growing popularity, however, she isn't caught up with the trappings of Hollywood glitz and glamour. To prove it, she insisted on chopping off her own hair in "A Good Person."
Pugh easily related to her character
In "A Good Person," Florence Pugh's character, Allison, lives a life that is in complete shambles. After losing everything to a deadly car accident, she's left trying to pick up the pieces of what she deems an unworthy existence. One of the ways Allison tries to re-invent herself in the film is to chop off her long locks.
According to Total Film, it was Pugh that pushed to be the one to cut her own hair in the scene. For the actor, the actions of her character were all too familiar:
"The lowest I've felt was when I was a teenager in my last year of school. I really didn't know what to do about my lack of energy. [...] I'd buy all these quick fixes, just to make myself feel quickly better. On one of these [YouTube beauty] channels, this girl was chopping her hair, I went online and I bought all these scissors and combs. And of course, I did it, and it didn't work. And I essentially just chopped my hair into a really awful do."
The result? A DIY pixie cut that Pugh called "total s**t." But the hairdo also adds a layer of verisimilitude to a film already packing an emotional punch.
'It's just in her blood, in her soul'
Although Zach Braff was dating Florence Pugh at the time of production on "A Good Person," the director had reservations about Pugh cutting her own hair. Mind you, according to Pugh, his concerns had less to do with the film and more to do with her own personal fulfillment. "I think he was obviously very concerned that maybe I'd regret it, and maybe I wouldn't want it to look s**t for an entire film," Pugh explained.
Pugh's dedication was clear to Braff, who likened Morgan Freeman and Pugh working together to Master Yoda working opposite a "young, exciting" Padawan in an interview with The Guardian. Despite the pair's breakup, he still gushed about Pugh as an actor:
"I was just in awe of her. You can't find an actor from Meryl Streep to someone fresh out of school that doesn't think Florence is a pretty extraordinary talent. There's just something about her, she's got that movie star quality. And it's natural. She's not trained classically in any way. It's just in her blood, in her soul."
"A Good Person" also stars Celeste O'Connor and Molly Shannon. The film is rated R and hits theaters on March 24, 2023.