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“Mila plays Lily as someone who has exactly what Nina wants. She is much freer, more alive and more
sexual than Nina,” says Aronofsky. “Lily has the freedom to express herself and that becomes the source of
both great allure and intense friction for Nina.”
Kunis was instantly drawn to her wildly uninhibited character and to the intriguing idea of playing a
dancer though the brutal reality knocked her for a serious loop. “I had this idea in the beginning of grandeur, of
feeling graceful and wearing a tutu, but you have no idea how physically demanding it is until you do it,” Kunis
says. “It really takes a toll on your body!”
Nevertheless, she threw herself into training and into exploring the upending effects Lily has on Nina.
“The key to Lily is that she had to be exactly the opposite of Nina, her mirror opposite, in every way,” says
Kunis. “Even their dance styles are opposite. Nina is a very technical, beautiful dancer while Lily is more raw,
free and spontaneous. Nina’s whole life is ballet but Lily eats hamburgers, parties, has sex, does drugs and
explores everything. She’s the complete antithesis of Nina and embodies the Black Swan.”
Taking on Lily as both the ultimate impulsive woman and an apparition was a tightrope act, one Kunis
says she could not have done without Darren Aronofsky providing a safety net. “I wouldn’t have done this
movie if not for Darren,” she confesses. “This character could be very iffy in the wrong hands. There isn’t a
right way to play Lily. I didn’t read the script saying, ‘Oh, I’ve got this character figured out; I know exactly
how to play her,’ because in every scene she’s different. But I trusted that in Darren’s hands it would work. I
don’t know if I would’ve felt like that in the hands of any other director.”
If Lily represents all that Nina wants to access within herself, then the company’s brilliant
choreographer and artistic director, Thomas Leroy, is the man who pushes her without mercy to do just that.
Playing Thomas is Cesar-winning French actor Vincent Cassel, who is lauded in Europe but has also worked in
a range of Hollywood films such as OCEANS TWELVE, SHREK, ELIZABETH and EASTERN PROMISES.
“Vincent is one of my favorite actors on the planet,” says Aronofsky. “I’m a big fan of his work in both
his French and American films. Here he plays a Machiavellian character – the artistic director who is all about
the art, and doesn’t care about the victims he leaves along the way. He was wonderful to work with in the role,
in part because he moves so beautifully.”
Cassel says the role was impossible to resist. “First of all there was Darren, who I always wanted to
work with. Then, there was Natalie, who I’ve admired for years. After that, came the idea of making a thriller
set in the ballet world, which is so attractive. The ingredients were cool. I knew it would be dark but very sexy.
Then, I discovered Mila and soon Winona Ryder got involved, and I was going to be in the middle of all these
women like a circus master. So, honestly, how could I say no?” he laughs.
Yet, Cassel also knew Thomas would not be an easy man to inhabit especially in his willingness to push
the dancers to their limit. “He’s not exactly a womanizer,” he explains. “I don’t think he’s really interested in
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