Annie Murphy: From luckless socialite to scheming siren

Chelsea Van Der Zee (left) and Ruby Gillman

The quickly disintegrating relationship between an awkward kraken named Ruby and a manipulative mermaid called Chelsea are at the center of DreamWorks and Universal Pictures’ currently showing animated feature, “Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken.”

Viewers will see the two friends-turned-enemies, portrayed with catchy and complementary zest by Lana Condor (“To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before”) and Emmy winner Annie Murphy (as down-on-her-luck socialite Alexis Rose in “Schitt’s Creek”), living among humans as they try to pass off as teenage students in a rustic coastal community.

For Annie and director Kirk DeMicco, the task of breathing life into an uncharacteristically nasty creature was as much a challenge as it was bringing DreamWorks’ first female titular lead to the big screen—a tall order for any filmmaker worth his salt.

During Inquirer Entertainment’s exclusive chat with the director last week, he said, “DreamWorks has a long tradition of subverting tropes and challenging expectations by creating characters like an ogre with a heart of gold (in ‘Shrek’) or a giant panda who becomes a kung fu warrior (‘Kung Fu Panda’).

“For ‘Ruby Gillman,’ we were given the opportunity to retell the life of a kraken, often regarded as a monster and has only been portrayed as being evil in Scandinavian mythology, then turn all that on its head.

“It’s a chance to see what it would be like for a girl to understand that she could have this potential power and strength and see her wrestling with that responsibility during the hardest part of her life, which is the high school years.”

“One beautiful thing about this movie is that Ruby starts being like many girls who are insecure and trying to hide amongst her peers, maybe wanting to be a little invisible. But over the course of her journey, she becomes a giant kraken who is nearly impossible to be invisible.

“After all, she is 300-foot tall, she’s strong and she glows bright. So the real journey for Ruby is to accept these challenges and learn that she doesn’t have to hide things just to fit in. That by showing her true self to her friends, she can truly belong.”

Voicing Chelsea also proved to be an exciting and challenging endeavor for Annie because it’s her first-ever voice-over project.

“Yes, this is my first voice gig,” the 36-year-old Canadian told us in a separate interview. “I’m not a singer, so I don’t use the different facets of my voice other than for acting. But this required a lot of big vocal tricks … like big sounds and exaggerated words.

“And so, after my first four-hour session, my voice was completely gone! After that, I signed up for voice lessons because I needed to figure out how not blow out my voice every time I had to record for this.”

Annie Murphy

So much to learn

Asked what she thought young girls all over the world could learn from Ruby and Chelsea, Annie asserted, “First of all, I have to put it out there that I identify with Ruby so much more than I do with Chelsea, my character.

“When I was in Grade 7 and Grade 8 and throughout high school, I didn’t feel comfortable in my skin. I didn’t really know where I fit in, so it was tough and uncomfortable—it was a real struggle. And there were many Chelseas in my high school. I think there are Chelseas everywhere.

“But when I was reading the script, I was like, ‘Oh, maybe their friendship is going to work out because Chelsea does seem to understand Ruby and she’s kind of taking her under her wing. And then of course that twist happens, and we find out that Chelsea is just pure evil and actually had the worst intentions!

‘Things and people arent what they seem’

“And that’s the unfortunate lesson in life: Sometimes, things—and people—aren’t what they seem. Luckily for Ruby, she has a wonderful group of friends and family who are there for her no matter what. So yes, just because one relationship doesn’t work out doesn’t mean that you don’t have wonderful people to fall back on.”

Since Annie said that she identified more with Ruby than Chelsea, we asked the actress how she was able to channel Chelsea’s darker and nastier impulses—because she seemed perfectly cast in her role.

“Thank you for saying that (laughs),” she quipped. “To be completely honest with you, I loved playing an evil character so much! And it came surprisingly easily to me. It was just great to lean into the bad and the nasty because I haven’t played a lot of evil characters before.”

“So, to have the opportunity to go into the voice booth and just be manipulative and cruel was really fun. But then, leaving all that [negativity] behind in the voice booth and walking away was a good thing, too. And it felt good (laughs).

“And I must add that if families are looking for a fun movie to watch together … something that is so beautifully animated and so full of detail and excitement, and with a really positive message, this is the movie to watch!

“I think the key message of this movie is, even if you’re feeling uncomfortable in your own skin right now and don’t feel like you fit in, the parts of you that you might not like so much now often turn out to be your greatest strengths.

“That’s a very important message, especially for kids who are in that phase in life … those who are trying to figure out who they are and what they want to achieve. I went through that myself, so I hope that a lot of kids can see themselves in Ruby.”

Chelsea (voiced by Murphy) becomes the toast of Oceanside High —PHOTOS COURTESY OF UNIVERSAL PICTURES INTERNATIONAL

The rest of our Q&A with Annie:

In terms of creating character in animation and live-action features, which one requires more imagination?

Both require a lot of imagination. The thing that I found to be so much fun about voice work is that you can roll up to work in your sweatpants or pajamas, with no makeup. You can go in and be so over-the-top right out of the gate, make big choices and be ridiculous.

And instead of the director saying, “Oh, we need to turn it down,” the director in animation would usually say, “OK, we need to ratchet that up and be big!” And that is not an experience you get when you’re doing film and TV, so it was really fun to just go in and get crazy.

Do you believe that there could be another end for Chelsea in this movie?

(Laughs) You know what? I wish I could be optimistic about this. But I feel like because she’s been an evil sea monster for such a long time—in her case, for hundreds of years—there’s no turning around for her. I think she only knows one way.

If she had been evil for a shorter amount of time, I’d say there’s hope, but I don’t know. I think what happens to her is the perfect end for her in this movie. While she was fun to play, I genuinely think that this is one of the first characters that I didn’t have a ton of empathy for (laughs).

I admired her confidence, her charisma and her ability to get all eyes on her as soon as she walks into a room, but there really aren’t a ton of redeeming qualities about Chelsea other than “Oh, she’s a confident person!”

Sometimes, an actor doesn’t really need full empathy for a character he or she playing. You can just lean into getting your hands dirty—and that’s what is so much fun about it.

Hollywood has made great strides in creating state-of-the-art special effects for live-action features. So why do you think animation is a better fit for this story?

The script is so funny, charming and thoughtful, so when I read it, it painted a certain picture and look in my head. But when I saw the movie after the animators had gotten their hands and their imagination on the script, it took the story to a whole other level of detail, humor and creativity that I didn’t imagine when I first read the script.

If you’ve seen the movie, you know how detailed everything is. There’s something happening in every frame in every corner of the screen all the time. So, no matter how many times you watch it, you’ll see something new—and that’s something that live action can’t do just yet.

I’m fascinated by your body of work. Even in the field of animation, you turn in such idiosyncratic choices, from “Ruby Gillman” to the upcoming “Praise Petey,” about a New York career woman who takes over her estranged father’s religious cult. Is it a conscious decision on your part to make sure that one role is very distinct from the next?

I really appreciate you making that comment—thank you for saying that. So my answer is … very much! I got into acting because I was so intrigued by it. I believe that we only have this one life to live, but acting allows you to play a whole bunch of different people and lead a whole bunch of different lives.

So it’s kind of cheating, in a way (laughs). And to be able to play as many diverse characters as possible is why I decided to pursue acting in the first place.