Jessica Chastain has always been hardworking: around 25 films (including “The Tree of Life”, “The Help”, “Zero Dark Thirty” or “Interstellar”) in the first twelve years of her career alone are more than remarkable.

The 44-year-old Californian, who initially took on theater and small TV roles after studying acting in New York, is currently even more present than usual. She recently played the leading female role in the five-part film "Scenes From a Marriage" (to be seen on Sky) .

For the drama "The Eyes of Tammy Faye" (not seen in Germany so far) she has been nominated for a Golden Globe, among other things.

And now the mother of two works

also as a producer and one of five leading actresses in the action film "The 355", about which we conducted a video interview with her.

Ms. Chastain, the idea for your new film “The 355” did not only come from you, you also implemented it yourself with your own production company and together with the colleagues involved.

How did the project originate?

In 2017 I was a member of the jury at the Cannes Film Festival, where every year production companies advertise their upcoming films with posters.

Many of them are typical action films, often with many celebrity faces, but I noticed that there were always only men to be seen.

I talked to my agent about why no one ever tells such stories with women: Since my secret service research in the context of “Zero Dark Thirty” I have known that women have played an important role in the field of espionage for a very long time.

So it's high time to do something about that.

That's what I thought too.

And I wanted to keep the reins in my hand.

So I made the decision to find a story for various international actresses with whom I would work the project, sell it all over the world and only then shoot it.

I made a list of my preferred colleagues, whom I then phoned and asked about ideas for roles, and I brought a good friend into the team in the form of director Simon Kinberg.

A year after I had the first idea for “The 355”, we were all back in Cannes together and found a lot of international distributors in a very short time.

Not a common practice.

Why was it so important to you to sell the film yourself?

Usually you find a Hollywood studio for such a film and then implement it within their system.

This can work wonderfully, but it is also not straightforward because there are so many people involved.

And it often takes a long time before a film is actually made.

With "The 355", however, it happened very quickly.

Simply because we were just a small group of people who were in charge - and who now own the film.

Because all rights were with us, we were able to decide for ourselves what to do with "The 355" and where.

You were at the top with your company Freckle Films.

How are you in your role as boss?

I'm definitely pretty good at motivating my people: We can do all of this, let's pull together, believe in you - it's my thing to convey something like that.

Making regulations, on the other hand, is not really my forte.

Being strict and tough is the aspect of being boss that I love to leave to my production partner, Kelly Carmichael.

When in doubt, we have a “good cop, bad cop” dynamic that works pretty well for us.

In any case, it was you who chose the ensemble.

Diane Kruger joined them a little later, replacing Marion Cotillard.

Why did you choose her?