Maika Monroe, much more than ‘Scream Queen,’ returns to Cannes

CANNES, France (AP) — Maika Monroe’s career essentially began at the Cannes Film Festival. Her breakthrough role in “It Follows” premiered in Cannes’ Critics Week sidebar in 2014.

“I was a newbie,” recalls Monroe. “I’m pretty sure I spent my 21st birthday here. I was like: ‘Well isn’t that exciting, to turn 21 in a country where I could have drank in for years.’”

“It Follows,” about a sexually transmitted curse, was part of a new wave of probing, atmospheric horror films. But then, it was a small $1.3 million indie movie that had little reason to expect a Cannes launch.

“It was surreal. You never expect going into making a film that this will happen,” Monroe said in an interview on the rooftop of Cannes’ Palais des Festivals. “But especially for that film. It was such a tiny, indie horror film. At that point, there really wasn’t genre at this festival.”

That has changed, though. Horror, science fiction and even slasher films have increasingly shown up in Cannes. This year, that included Jane Schoenbrun’s “Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma,” the Korean monster-sci-fi-mashup “Hope” and the gothic thriller “Victorian Psycho,” starring Monroe as an unhinged governess.

On the surface, “Victorian Psycho,” which premiered Thursday in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section, appears to extend Monroe’s reputation as the preeminent “Scream Queen” of her generation. Along with “It Follows,” she’s been at the center of horror films like 2022’s “Watcher” and 2024’s “Longlegs.”

But Monroe’s range as an actor far exceeds any neat genre identification. She brought Hitchcockian depth to “Watcher” and psychological intensity to “Longlegs.” Bodies get bloody in “Victorian Psycho,” too, but Monroe’s deranged protagonist is archly hysterical. She’s a hoot.

As much as Monroe may be associated with horror, she might be even better at comedy. In the gleefully morbid “Victorian Psycho,” she finally turns the tables. After years spent fleeing serial killers and worse, Monroe is on the offensive.

“I didn’t know if I could pull it off. I decided to take the leap,” Monroe says. “Man, it was just so much fun. There’s so much freedom in this role. It will definitely be the character I’ll miss the most.”

In Zachary Wigon’s “Victorian Psycho,” which Bleecker Street will release Sept. 25 in theaters, Monroe plays Winifred Notty. In the 1850s, she arrives at the Ensor House, the grand manor of the Pounds family, to serve as the eager governess to two children.

It doesn’t take long for the children to realize she has a screw loose. But Winifred is comically chipper, even when deranged and over the top. As distant as the part might be from Monroe — a Santa Barbara, California, native here doing a British accent for the first time — it’s the first role to really capture Monroe’s natural comic energy.

“I’ve never done anything remotely close to a role like this,” Monroe says. “I’m usually more introverted and internal with my roles, and this is very outward.”

Almost always in “Victorian Psycho,” Winifred is grinning. That came from one of Monroe’s heroes.

“One of my favorite actors is Jack Nicholson. I think every project he does he’s fascinating,” Monroe says. “Of course in ‘The Shining,’ he’s pretty much smiling through the whole thing, through all the pain and the anguish. That was a huge influence.”

Monroe is also a professed fan of Olivia Colman’s. And it’s easy to see how wildly mischievous characters, like those often played by Colman or Nicholson, might be even more in Monroe’s wheelhouse than horror. It’s enough to make you wonder: does she ever chafe at the term “Scream Queen?”

“Some of the films I’m most proud of are in this space of genre,” she says. “I can’t be mad at it. I’m so proud of ‘It Follows,’ ‘Longlegs,’ ‘Watcher.’ So, what can you do?”

But if a certain side of Monroe has been rarely seen on screen, “Victorian Psycho” lets it out.

“In the Victorian era, there was suppression. In this industry, I can find that I need to present a certain way or come across a certain way,” Monroe says. “You have to suppress certain things and not say certain things. That’s what was such a joy in this.”