Anais Gutierrez
On Wednesday, the ‘I, Tonya’ trailer was premiered delivering a gritty, funny and full of salty language sneak peek. Margot Robbie’s take on the world-class figure skateTonya Harding seems to be deserving of a gold medal.
‘I, Tonya’ is set to hit theaters Dec. 8 bringing a dark comedy surrounding the infamous ice skater and her cold-blooded mother LaVona.
Brace yourselves, Tonya Harding’s back
The trailer of ‘I, Tonya’ hit YouTube on Wednesday, delivering Margot Robbie’s transformation into the ice skater champion in what can only be categorized as bio-pic meeting dark comedy.
The film, directed by Craig Gillespie, will show Tonya Harding’s upbringing with her cold-blooded mother LaVona through the 1994 Olympics. And that’s right where the trailer takes us, back to January 1994, when after a practice session at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Detroit, Hardigan’s rival Nancy Kerrigan was hit in the knee with a police baton by Shane Stant.
Kerrigan was then forced to leave the competition in which Hardigan won gold and became the first American woman in history to complete a triple axel in competition. However, her legacy has since been defined by her association with the Nancy Kerrigan attack, for which she pleaded guilty but avoided jail time.
The trailer gives us a sneak peek of Hardigan’s troubled beginnings and her relationship with her mom. Starring alongside Margot Robbie are Allison Janney, playing Hardigan’s mom, and Sebastian Stan as her ex-husband Jeff Gillooly.
How did Margot channel her inner Tonya
Robbie did extensive research to capture signature moments of Tonya’s performance in the 1994 Olympics, including recreating when Harding pleaded with the Olympic judges when her skate lace broke.
“So I found this Japanese news outlet recording of it. So stuff like that we replicated word for word. I tried to replicate when she’s about to walk out you can hear in the audio she’s like, “It’s not going to hold me!” she said.
“And then she gets on the ice and the hand movements and all that kind of stuff we replicated. Any of those iconic moments that people may have a sense of nostalgia for we tried to replicate as close as possible.”
Robbie explained the structure of the film, which vacillates between several points of view particularly Harding’s and Gillooly’s, with faux documentary interviews inter-spliced with the action.
“The structure of the film was born out of the fact that [screenwriter Steven Rogers] did a six-hour interview with Tonya and felt like there were so many questions left unanswered that he went and did an equally long interview with Jeff,” Robbie says.
“Then he found that both interviews contradicted each other so much that he was like, ‘Oh, wow, that’s the movie.’”
Source: Bustle
