VIDEO EXCLUSIVE: Dianna Agron & Thomas Haden Church On Meaning of Family In ‘Acidman’

Acidman, a beautiful drama that premiered at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival this week, explores the intricacies of family, change and re-connection.

Dianna Agron, who plays Maggie and Thomas Haden Church, who plays Lloyd, recently sat down for an exclusive with uInterview founder Erik Meers to discuss how family dynamics play out in the film.

“There’s an absorption. From [ages] one to eight I think it is. That’s when you’re imprinting everything you learn and observe about the world and family dynamics. Those are things that stay with you whether you alter them or keep them in your tool box,” Argon shared.

“There was so much to love about these characters and that connection they’re searching for,” the actress added. “Also, telling the story out of being in isolation and the experience that we all went through… To me, it was ever the more appealing to mount a project like this. For Maggie, she has to understand this person in front of her, this new version of her father even though he has some of the qualities she remembers. She has to believe in something bigger than herself, because he does. It’s surprising and beautiful where they go in this film.”

When Maggie ventures out of the city to find her reclusive father, it’s revealed that he’s an alien conspiracy theorist.

“He has, for lack of a better descriptive, these fixations,” Church said. “Whether it’s the music or ranting at any presence that he finds unwelcome. It’s a parallel universe and he is certain that they are communicating. When he introduces this to Maggie, she’s skeptical, but because he’s so forceful with his beliefs, and I think there’s an important reflective dynamic in their journey together that there is this kind of retrograde that brings them together. Everything that Maggie has brought along with her and everything that Lloyd has drug along with himself becomes this shared burden or perhaps enlightenment.”

Argon also shared how she was able to relate to the film’s thematic messages pertaining to the cycle of life.

“Depending on what your unique journey is, sometimes you’re privy to that earlier than others. My father has been sick since I was 15 years old and I’ve mourned very many different versions of him and I’ve had to put to bed ones that I remembered as a younger person,” she revealed. “It’s complicated because there is beauty to that as well, because we’ve had to reinvent our relationship as it is. I’m more equipped to help a friend when they experience it probably later than I have. As it relates to our film, watching them in nature as nature changes and their relationship is changing and as you watch you’ll realize that rebirth and growth and exploration is present in this journey and I think there’s a lot to take away from this film as far as reflection for your own unique story in life and that’s one of the things I loved the most about this film.”