Summary

Sonequa Martin-Green plays Merit in My Dead Friend Zoe, a war vet struggling with PTSD after the death of her battle buddy.

Martin-Green breaks down the intense scenes that left her shaking — and the funny ones that made her spit-take.

Martin-Green discusses the meaningful experience of getting to executive produce this film.

Sonequa Martin-Green has battled a zombie apocalypse in The Walking Dead and taken on intergalactic affairs in Star Trek: Discovery, but her new role might be her most challenging yet. More grounded than many of her other roles but just as engaging, her character, Merit, struggles with PTSD after the death of her battle buddy, Zoe (played by Natalie Morales). To make matters even more complicated, Zoe manifests as an apparition of sorts who follows Merit around and constantly reminds her of her grief and survivor’s guilt.
The film is directed by Kyle Hausmann-Stokes, a real-life army veteran, in his feature debut — and the authenticity shows. While the film’s themes make it a predictably difficult watch at times, there’s a surprising amount of humor and levity as well that serves to make the emotional impact hit even harder. Martin-Green does a phenomenal job grounding the movie alongside legends like Ed Harris as her cranky, fellow veteran grandfather, Morgan Freeman as her grief group leader, and Gloria Reuben as her mother.
Collider got the chance to speak with Martin-Green about what it meant to her to lead a war film as a woman of color, the scene with Harris that left her shaking, her favorite part of executive producing, and more.
Sonequa Martin-Green on Representing Black and Female Soldiers in ‘My Dead Friend Zoe’

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COLLIDER: First of all, congratulations on this movie. It’s such a touching and important one, and it’s unfortunately still all too rare to see two women of color leading a film — especially a film like this that takes place in this military world. What did it mean to you in terms of representation and being a voice for both Black and female soldiers?
MARTIN-GREEN: It meant a great deal. I have to big up Kyle Hausmann-Stokes, our writer and director — he wrote it along with A.J. Bermudez, who is a woman, but a big part of what I think makes My Dead Friend Zoe special is that he wanted to tell his story through women. He wanted women to bring his story to life. And so while I am essentially Kyle in this film, he still opened up, right? He says that he was taught to leave the windows open, and that’s what he did. And so we were able to come in, we were able to bring what we bring, and he welcomed our contribution. There were certain things that were so specific to a friendship between two women of color that we were able to bring in. There were things that there — just ways that we would speak to each other, ways that we would relate to each other — that we were able to communicate and bring forth and contribute to the story, and that was phenomenal. So it means a great deal because this story is specific, but it’s universal. He said, “If I fulfill this mission and tell this story to save lives, I want it to also somehow be everybody’s story.”
I absolutely love watching you and Natalie play off of each other — I think it’s so fun to see your dynamic. I’m curious how you went about developing that chemistry because it feels so lived-in and natural.
MARTIN-GREEN: Oh, thank you so much. That’s such a great thing to hear. Honestly, it was organic. I think it’s Natalie because we just met each other, and we loved each other and we were like, “Okay, let’s go.” We didn’t have to force it; we didn’t have to work for it — it was super natural. The script was so well written that, even as you’re reading it, it jumps off the page. So to bring it to life, we just dove in and created a safe space for each other. She’s utterly brilliant, and it was so much fun to be in those moments with her and to play off of her, and we did. We did play. We just jumped together and dove in, and it was so fun and fulfilling at the same time.
Sonequa Martin-Green Reveals the Funniest and Most Difficult ‘My Dead Friend Zoe’ Scenes

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When I interviewed her, she said she was always sort of trying to break you in your scenes together and make you laugh. Is there one moment that stands out as being the most difficult to keep a straight face during?
MARTIN-GREEN: Oh my goodness. Well, she’s so funny. Man, it’s hard to remember one moment, in particular, where she made me break. We had a lot of fun in the Humvee, which is the opening teaser of the film. There were probably a couple of spit takes in that one — in that sequence. And then in the car driving and dancing and stuff, I’m sure there were a couple of spit takes in that, too.
I love a good car karaoke car dancing scene. I think those are always so fun. Do you have a song that you love to sing in the car? I have to ask.
MARTIN-GREEN: Oh my gosh, do I have a song I like to sing in the car? That’s a good question. Of course, now I’m like on a game show, and my brain just went blank on everything — you know how that goes. I’m also always listening to songs with the kids. Most of the time when I’m in the car, I’m with my kids.
So you’re pumping “Wheels on the Bus”?
MARTIN-GREEN: Yeah, “Baby Shark,” you know what I’m saying? There’s a channel on YouTube called Gracie’s Corner, and they have also released a ton of music — it’s like real good beats to those typical children’s rhymes that you’re used to. We listen to those a lot, too.
You got to spice it up a little bit.
MARTIN-GREEN: You do! You do.
This movie is so much fun — there’s a lot of levity to it — but I will say, it also has a lot of heavy, pretty emotionally intense moments. I’m curious if there was a scene or a day on set you found the most challenging to get through in that respect.
MARTIN-GREEN: You know, when I think about the most challenging moments, I think about the graveyard scene, but I’m actually gonna say something different this time. The cemetery moment was such a release and so cathartic and so necessary, and it felt that way, too. But I struggled a lot with the moment in the parking lot after the date at the bar. I felt like I was in knots that particular night, and I walked away still in knots. It was challenging. I wanted to do the right thing, and I wanted to uplift Kyle. I wanted to uplift all vets. I wanted to uplift even those who have not served who have dealt with this kind of pain. I wanted so desperately to help and to serve and to do everybody justice, and so there were times when it got a bit heavy for me — because perhaps I was being too hard on myself — and that night I remember was one of them.
Well, I think you did a beautiful job.
MARTIN-GREEN: Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you.
Sonequa Martin-Green Discusses Working With Ed Harris on ‘My Dead Friend Zoe’

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In addition to your chemistry with Natalie, I really enjoyed the relationship between Merit and Dale. It’s such a meaningful and deep connection. Can you talk a little bit about developing that with Ed Harris? Because I feel like the grandpa relationship will hit home for a lot of people — me especially.
MARTIN-GREEN: Oh, that’s wonderful. I know Kyle would be really happy to hear you say that. Dale is based on his grandpa Orville, almost exactly, and the things that Dale says are almost verbatim. With Ed, it was profound to be able to work with this legend — essentially, this actor who I’ve respected almost all my life. Of course, I felt that same way about Morgan Freeman and Gloria Reuben, for that matter, too. I just felt like I was able to get lost in the depths with him. He’s so open and so exposed and so vulnerable — it’s like his arms stretch outward wide, and they are warm and they allow and invite you in. I found it to be a very cozy place, being in those moments with him. The big moment where he’s sort of getting at Merit for messing up the trash system — that moment I’ll never forget. I was physically shaking. I could feel it so deep in my chest and in my stomach and in my heart. It hit me so hard. It was such a joy to be able to do life with him and tell that story with him. I feel the same way about Morgan and Utkarsh Ambudkar and Gloria, and I feel the same way about Natalie, too, to be honest with you. It was just such a joy and a blessing. It was a beautiful, challenging blessing.
I have to say, I interviewed him, and he said just about the exact same thing about you and your openness and things, so there’s like a kindred spirit thing going on there, which is really sweet.
MARTIN-GREEN: Oh, that’s wonderful to hear. Oh, wow.
It really shines through I think as well. You mentioned the trash scene, which also kind of shook me up. I’ve watched the movie a couple of times now, and that picnic scene makes me cry every single time, even without any real dialogue. I feel like that just hits me really hard, so I’m curious if you can talk about the way you approached that and what it was like to film that.
MARTIN-GREEN: The music in the park? Oh man, yeah. That was a touchpoint for all of us because it was something that Kyle talked about quite a bit. This was the reason why he joined — why he wanted to be a soldier — was because of his grandfather. It’s very much what you hear Merit saying, “My grandfather seemed 100-feet-tall to me.” Knowing that we were gonna sort of culminate our story in that moment was huge, and we all knew that moment was coming, and we hoped that it would be super impactful. And goodness, it was. Even to hear Kyle say that moment gets to him still to this day. Oh gosh, it was a moment. It was such a moment, and it was so important for Merit as well because this is one of those things where it didn’t necessarily happen in that way in real life in terms of the resolution between these two characters. If you hear Kyle, he’ll say, “My grandfather and I actually never did quite talk about it.” So there’s a little bit of the hope of healing in the story too. The fact that Merrit has this moment with her grandfather, I was aware of how deep the moment was when we were in the midst of it, and I just wanted to give myself over to it because I knew, “Oh, this moment is gonna really sing.” At least, I hope it does.
Sonequa Martin-Green Discusses Executive Producing Her First Feature With ‘My Dead Friend Zoe’

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I think it absolutely does, and I feel like you’re right — that’s kind of the core climax in a way that is really beautiful. I believe this is your first time executive producing a feature film, if I did my research correctly, so what was that experience like for you?
MARTIN-GREEN: Oh, thank you for asking about that. Me and Natalie and Ed all served as executive producers, in addition, obviously, to being lead actors in the film. I really loved it, I tell you, because I find it fascinating, and I find it inspiring that Kyle was open enough to let other people into his story. That’s huge. I feel like, when you’ve written a film and it’s based on your life, what does somebody else got to say about it, you know what I’m saying? It’s like, this is my life, right? But the fact that he wanted us to come into it and add to it is huge. That’s saying a lot about who he is. It’s saying a lot about the kind of kindness that he leads with. I think it also speaks to his integrity and his honor because he wanted, like I said earlier, this to be a story for everybody. He said, “If I ever get a chance to do it, I’m gonna make sure that I open it up to others in the room.” So we contributed a lot, and we brought a lot to it. There were all kinds of things that we saw and that we posed that he loved and that he took — things that he didn’t see. Things that made us greater than the sum of our parts and made this thing that we were creating special and bigger.
I love it, too, because I was also really heavily involved in the editing process as well, which was my first time doing that. I executive produced the final season of Star Trek: Discovery and produced a couple of seasons before that, but I was a fly on the wall in a lot of those meetings and a lot of that post work. But here, I had a front-row seat, and I was involved.
And there were also things throughout the shoot that we were doing. Something that I have not really mentioned yet is that, when Merit picks up a photo in Dale’s home, that’s my real dad in that photo. He has now gone on to be with the Lord, but that’s a real photo of young me and him, so that’s something that Kyle brought to me. He wanted to know if it was okay if we used a real picture, and so that was huge. That was a big moment for me, to be able to have my dad in there. Honestly, it was really beautiful. I felt that, contributing to this, I did it as respectfully and humbly and softly as I could because, goodness, the nature of this is just so…it’s a lot. It’s a lot. The stakes are high.
My Dead Friend Zoe is now playing in theaters.

My Dead Friend Zoe

Release Date

March 9, 2024

Runtime

98 Minutes

Director

Kyle Hausmann-Stokes

Writers

Kyle Hausmann-Stokes, A.J. Bermudez, Cherish Chen

Producers

Terri Feldman Lubaroff, Travis Kelce, Richard Silverman

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