Millie Bobby Brown is seated in front of a large window which offers a stunning view of Tokyo’s skyline. I get to meet the 15-year-old actor at Ritz-Carlton as she is amidst a taxing schedule of promotional shows for the third season of the hit show, Stranger Things, and her feature film début Godzilla: King of Monsters. I can’t help but recall how The Duffer Brothers, the show’s creators, had described Brown in an earlier interview: “We just let things happen and stay out of her way”. Stranger Things’ release in 2016 instantly catapulted Brown to fame for her strong and arresting portrayal of a complex character. When I ask her about how her role as Eleven, a young girl who is telepathic and psychokinetic, has evolved in the upcoming season, she says, “My acting has pretty much stayed the same. I know my character inside out. There are obviously some challenging moments, and I choose not to talk about my acting process on set.”
Making it real
The show is set in the early 1980s and follows the lives of a motley group of residents in Hawkins, Indiana, as they get entangled in the supernatural happenings in their small town. Excited about the new season, Brown describes her acting as ‘real and happening’ rather than ‘thought about and prepared’. “Sometimes, I get so excited about the show that I can’t breathe. My voice goes into this high-pitched octave,” she says, in a quick imitation of the childlike tone. Unlike fellow co-star, Noah Schnapp (who plays Will Byers), who admitted he’d like the show to end in five seasons, Brown is excited that its timeline has a lot to offer. “The fun thing about setting a show in the ’80s is that we have the ’90s and the 2000s to go through. There’s so much more to accomplish and so many different, unique aspects to cover,” says the actor who will be seen next in the young adult fiction series, Enola Holmes, based on the detective novels by American author Nancy Springer.
In the new season, it is summer in Hawkins and the town has welcomed a new mall. School is out for the young characters and the blossoming romance brings its own set of complications. Snapshots from the trailer show how Eleven and Max (Sadie Sink) listen to music, flip through magazines and chill out at the mall — in sharp contrast to the show’s dark premises so far. “There’s more colour, life and happiness. Sadie and I have some incredible scenes together that are relatable, real and humorous. Finally, teenagers can watch Stranger Things and go ‘Oh my god! I’m going through that’,” says Brown, laughing. What will fans love the most? “Undeniably, the beautiful relationship Eleven — who is now called Jane — creates with Mike and Max. “There’s a certain realness to it, and The Duffer Brothers involving our teenage experiences in the show made it a lot of fun for us.” The actor who appeared in The Late Late Show with James Corden earlier this week, told Corden how, “We’re not kids any more. We’re growing up, and I guess that’s kind of the fight with the show this season”.
Ask her about Gaten Matarazzo, Finn Wolfhard, Caleb Mclaughlin and Noah Schnapp, who play Dustin, Mike, Lucas and Will — the four young, central characters of the show alongside her — and she breaks into a smile. “We are all so different from each other, yet we get along really well. All of us feel like family at this time, and for me, it’s beyond just friendships,” says Brown, adding how the atmosphere on set is one where everyone is equal. Referring to her senior co-actors, Winona Ryder and David Harbour, she says, “At the end of the day, it’s not about how long we’ve been in the business or how old we are. We talk and give each other advice. They are amazing actors and great people to work with.”
At the UN
Several of Eleven’s scenes with the ‘monster’ over the last two seasons involve heavy visual effects. Is this something that fans can expect in the third season? “This season, in particular, has many more scenes,” she says, as I ask her how tough it is to film scenes that need to capture her reactions to visual effects which are only included in the post-production stage. “I wish I can reveal more, but I just want to say there is an incredible scene in episode seven. It really was quite crazy,” says Brown, who is also the youngest person to be appointed a UNICEF goodwill ambassador.
Brown tells me how the opportunity with UNICEF has given her a platform to speak about her personal experiences dealing with cyber bullying. In 2018, a hateful, homophobic meme and a hashtag circulated on Twitter, following which she deactivated her account. In multiple interviews earlier this year, she spoke about how bullying had resulted in her having to change schools.
When asked about strong roles for women on screen, after a pause she replies with conviction that women are getting their voices heard, slowly but surely. “Women are beautiful and powerful, just as well as men. I’m not siding with women but think men are incredible on-screen too. I’m extremely happy as long as we all get treated equally on-screen and off-screen,” says Brown, who is also one of the youngest nominees for an Emmy Award (2018).
Season 3 of Stranger Things will première on July 4 on Netflix
The writer was in Tokyo on the invitation of Netflix