Dakota Johnson is not to blame for Madame Web, at least that’s what the film’s star believes.
Johnson held nothing back while promoting the Sony superhero film, and even after it came and went, she’s still candid. Speaking to the Los Angeles Times on her Materialists press tour, she addressed the massive failure of Madame Web in her usual frank manner.
“It wasn’t my fault,” Johnson said about the movie. “There’s this thing that happens now where a lot of creative decisions are made by committee. Or made by people who don’t have a creative bone in their body. And it’s really hard to make art that way. Or to make something entertaining that way. And I think, unfortunately, with ‘Madame Web,’ it started out as something and turned into something else. And I was just sort of along for the ride at that point. But that happens. Bigger-budget movies fail all the time.”
It doesn’t seem like Johnson harbors much negativity: “I don’t have a Band-Aid over it. There’s no part of me that’s like, ‘Oh, I’ll never do that again’ to anything. I’ve done even tiny movies that didn’t do well. Who cares?”
Madame Web brought home $43 million at the domestic box office and earned an 11% on Rotten Tomatoes. It gained a bit of a cult following, but most of the admiration came ironically. Johnson seemingly shared that irony, and that’s seemingly still there.
Johnson is currently promoting Materialists, the new A24 film from Celine Song (Past Lives), in which she stars opposite Pedro Pascal and Chris Evans. Materialists opens in theaters June 10th – watch the trailer here.
