Sophie Skelton has championed playing strong female characters in new psychological thriller Stalker and Outlander.
In her new film, she plays a young woman named Rose who finds herself in a classic horror film set-up. Returning to her empty, rundown hotel alone on a stormy evening, she finds herself trapped in a broken-down elevator with a creepy stranger and no phone signal.
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However, in this tense and twisty tale directed by Steve Johnson and written by Chris Watt, things aren't what they seem. It quickly becomes clear that both Rose and her companion for this night like no other, Daniel, played BAFTA award-winning actor Stuart Brennan, have more than a few secrets that, if they just keep talking long enough, might accidentally slip out.
In an exclusive chat with HELLO!, she talked about how her Outlander role helped her dig into her character's trauma as well as flipping the narrative on females in horror and what she hopes audiences will take away from the film…
Thanks so much for joining me to talk all about Stalker! To start with can you tell me what attracted you to this role? What did you think of the script when you first read it?
It was just it was one of those scripts that was brought to me that I thought you really don't see the ending - I didn't, anyway. I just loved the way it was written, it just seemed to flow so naturally, and it was one of those jobs where you really know that you're not going to have to sort of fight to make the script work. It's more that the script speaks for itself and you can just waltz in and do your job.
WATCH: Sophie Skelton stars in psychological thriller Stalker
I also just love the fact because it's a two-hander, it was almost like doing a play that we filmed, which was challenging. I knew it'd be a big challenge and I knew that we only had two weeks to shoot it, and it was a lot of dialogue to get through, so I think it was both things - the idea of the script being that two-hander and also the challenge of scheduling. Relying on two of you for an entire hour and a half to make a movie work is quite a big feat. So I guess I was just up for something completely different and something really challenging!
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Without giving too much away, the film really does do something unexpected and flips the script and goes in a direction that audiences won't see coming…
Completely, especially given that you think that the narrative is really going to be quite straightforward because you've got this innocent looking girl called Rose, dressed all innocently, and you think it's going to be a horror story with a quite predictable ending - and one of the things that was beautiful about the film is the way we've changed that.
Rose Hepburn, a young actress, returns to her empty hotel only to get stuck in the elevator
Sometimes when you watch a film where there's such a big twist, you feel like you can't watch it again because it's like, 'Okay, well, the ending is sort of ruined' and you don't really invest yourself in a film again in the same way you did the first time, whereas with this one, it's almost like when get to end of a book and you get to the end and you're like, 'Hang on a minute, let me just reader that back again because I feel like I've totally missed this easter egg or clue!'
There have been some discussions about horror films recently centring around female characters and female experiences but being directed and written by men and the limitations of that might have. As the leading woman of the film, what's your take on that?
In this movie, there was quite a prominent male team in terms of its writer being male, the director being male, the director of photography being male and the producers being male as well, but one thing that in a way was good about that is that, because all these discussions have been brought to light, it gave me a little bit more of a voice.
BAFTA award-winning actor Stuart Brennan plays Daniel
At the risk of sounding too hasty, when you do have an entirely female team, people that rely on just that getting the message through [rather than the content of the movie]. But what was great about this is that the men [working on the film] were conscious of it. It was wonderful to work on this, and me and Stuart really worked hard to make this not fall into the pitfalls of bracketing women into a certain stereotype, that 'damsel in distress' category. I do think I was lucky that it was a really great team - taking the gender aspect of it away - who actually wanted to ensure the right message got out there in the right way.
Because you were one of the only women on set, did you find yourself sharing insights and giving contributions?
Yeah, and with Rose being an actress, there were things that were very close to the bone to me, things that I've been through or had similar situations or encounters that, in a weird way, I wouldn't open up to someone that quickly, but I spoke to Stuart about when going through lines.
Because of that intensity, what was really great is that the cast and crew became close very quickly and especially Stuart and I, just working in that close proximity, we just got to know each other on a very personal level. And I think that we managed to seep those things into the script and just use it to our benefit.
Tensions escalate when Rose discovers the identity of her companion
Did working on Outlander help prepare you for Stalker? Your character Brianna has had some quite harrowing scenes and storylines in the show that almost verges on horror.
It definitely did. Outlander, in a lot of ways, is very intense. We shoot in really tough conditions and we all power through that and I think that the difficult situations we go through [as actors] really add to the richness of the show. And that intensity was one the that I hopefully managed to transcend into Stalker and use for the better.
Those Brianna scenes in season four and season five and what she goes through, I definitely seeped some of that into Rose. I even got into Brianna's mindset and used that for how Rose is feeling. It was really interesting to be able to give the actor's side of it, it was almost like playing Rose, playing Brianna! So what you see is almost Rose's take on Brianna's trauma in a really weird way.
Sophie Skelton stars as Brianna in hit historical drama Outlander
On Outlander, you have so many incredible characters and the story is so rich, and there's so much going on all the time that you don't often get the time to sit with the characters and really listen to how they're feeling, especially Brianna. She's such a strong female character to the point where she just really won't talk about what she's going through, to her own detriment. She tries to protect everyone around her and so keeps her trauma and her pain really, insular and really quiet, and so what was great about this is that the whole movie is just talking!
So playing Rose in Stalker, it just really gave that complete opposite space to Brianna. She gets to explore how she's really feeling with her words in a way that Brianna is never allowed to or never wants to. So it's a really cool way of morphing the two and seeing completely different sides of the experience.
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What do you hope audiences take away from Stalker? And do you expect that the reactions of men and women will be different?
I think that by the end, actually, it won't split men and women in terms of opinion, but it will split people equally in a different way. I think some will see Rose as innocent or the bad guy and vice versa with Daniel. They're both so flawed, they're both good and bad in equal measure.
Stalker is out now on DVD and Digital
Even if one of them's the victim at the end, they still really have done some awful things throughout their life that we learn in the movie. I also think it will cause a lot of people to have a lot of discussions and that's actually the main thing I think I want it to come from it just to kind of shake up the stereotypes and the expectations and the gender boxes.
Are you a horror fan yourself? What's your favourite scary movie to watch around Halloween?
I actually am a big horror fan. I think I'm a bit of an adrenaline junkie, potentially! I love The Conjuring ones. I always love ones that are based on true stories because I think it shakes you up a bit more. But with you mentioning Halloween, though, I actually don't know if I've seen all the Halloween movies so I might have to do a little binge over October...
Stalker, £7.00, Amazon
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I know you're currently filming Outlander season seven but apart from that, do you have any exciting projects in the pipeline we should keep an eye out for?
There are a couple things that, due to lockdown, have been pushed and pushed, so still waiting to see what they are yet. But with Outlander, I think we're going to be on season seven for a little bit longer.
As you know, it's a longer season this year with season six having been cut short, we're giving the fans what they missed and adding to season seven more episodes. So I'm not too sure when we'll be finished here yet, but I think we might be here for a little bit longer, so everything might have to be put on pause for a tiny bit.
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