Los Angeles: Filmmaker and actor Olivia Wilde has described the 38 per cent Rotten Tomatoes score of her 2022 film Don’t Worry Darling as “liberating”, saying it influenced her approach to her latest directorial, The Invite.
The Invite, which released on June 26, features Wilde alongside Seth Rogen and Penélope Cruz. It follows an exhausted couple, Joe (Rogen) and Angela (Wilde), who invite their lively upstairs neighbours, Hawk (Edward Norton) and Pina (Cruz), for a dinner party while their young daughter is away.
The film was shot in 21 days in story order and marks Wilde’s third directorial. The entire narrative is set in a single San Francisco apartment, which she said allowed her to rehearse it like a play, according to entertainment outlet Variety.
“Every distributor wanted to take this movie to theatres, and I was adamant that we didn’t go to a streamer… From all the non-streamers, they all wanted to put it in a theatre. That’s a really good sign for everyone,” Wilde told the outlet.
Reflecting on Don’t Worry Darling, Wilde said she embraced the critical response to the film, which grossed USD 87.6 million globally but received negative reviews. “If you go through that, the way ‘Don’t Worry Darling’ did with a 38 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes, there’s liberation,” she said.
The Invite has earned over USD 379,104 in its opening weekend after releasing in just seven theatres in New York and Los Angeles.
The film is produced by FilmNation Entertainment, Annapurna Pictures and Permut Presentations.
