Chloé Zhao on “Hamnet,” Which Is Nominated for Eight Academy Awards

This is the New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker. This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Ramnick. Chloe Zhao was only the second woman to win an Oscar for best director, and that of course was For Nomad Land, a 2020 film starring Francis McDormand as an itinerant worker living out of a camper and searching for work all over America.

Zhao is up for Best Director yet again, and the film Hamnet on the Surface is very different from her previous work. It takes place in England in the 16th century. where a young William Shakespeare and his wife Anne have to cope with the loss of their son. The film is based on a novel by Maggie O'Farrell, and Hamnet is nominated for Best Picture, along with Best Actress for Jesse Buckley and five other awards. Chloe Zhao talked about Hamlet when the film first came out with staff writer Michael Shulman.

So how did this book and how did this project make its way to you? I was driving through New Mexico to The L Wright Film Festival and then that's when Emblem called me and told me about this project. Amblin meaning Emblem Spielberg's Spielberg's collection company. And when they they said it over the phone, you know, the reception. if you haven't been to the Four Corners, not great.

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