When Azazel Jacobs was writing His Three Daughters, he only had one actor in mind for the role of Rachel, a seemingly self-isolating stoner who has been the lone witness to her stepfather’s decay as his life begins to end: Natasha Lyonne. In fact, the filmmaker behind The Lovers and French Exit had pictured the exact cast he ended up working with, including Carrie Coon and Elizabeth Olsen as Rachel’s sisters, who she finds herself confronted with after many years of estrangement. 

In His Three Daughters, the women are connected by grief as they reunite in their father’s cramped New York City apartment to care for him in his final days. As Rachel, Lyonne is the only sister who — despite not being blood-related to the ailing patriarch, as he married her mother when she was a child — has already been living with him, a witness to his deterioration and the one navigating his care. Both born and bred New Yorkers, Jacobs and Lyonne tell a story of connection through claustrophobia that’s uniquely metropolitan and universal. Here, Jacobs reflects on their collaboration, Lyonne’s generational gifts, and what it was like watching the actor bring a strong sense of humanity into His Three Daughters.

Azazel Jacobs and Natasha Lyonne behind the scenes.

The first time I remember seeing Natasha Lyonne onscreen was Slums of Beverly Hills. My parents saw it first, told me it was amazing, and wow, were they right. I have revisited it since its release, and it continues to be a miracle of a film. When I think of Natasha’s work in film and TV, sure, I can hear that rockstar voice, but I think of her eyes — they betray things that perhaps the character she is playing doesn’t want to see in the most powerful way. Rachel is the sister who holds things back and won’t speak up for herself. Her boyfriend in the film, Benjy [played by Jovan Adepo], says that “she knows how to handle herself, but not how to stick up for herself.” This is true to a degree, especially with her sisters, but as a performer, Natasha burrows deep into our hearts and fills them with soul.

A friend recently told me that he thought Natasha Lyonne is the best silent actress since 1927 and that was so gratifying to hear. We all know she is beautiful, funny, that her voice is hers alone, but the tenderness, her courage, her sensitivity . . . I felt like that was something not explored as much in past work, and she gave it all to this film. 

I loved writing the character Rachel, but seeing Natasha breathe life into her felt almost mystical to me — it’s what great actors do. The one thing that I think connects most people born and raised in N.Y.C. is the ability to navigate many different types of situations and people. You see that with Rachel — she gets cast out of the apartment by her sister to smoke, a punishment of sorts, but soon makes the outside bench a place of refuge, escape, and a place she wants to be. New Yorkers know how to find pride in getting thrown out of a place. 

Rachel (Natasha Lyonne)

Our collaboration was easy. She liked that I had a specific vision; she could tell that the story came from a true place and that I deeply needed to tell it. She decided to trust it, to trust me, and then it felt like she handed over her heart. She’s a step ahead of me, generally, as a person, so the humor I was aiming for in the film she spotted a ways off. Together we calibrated how much, or not, to lean into it. The heartbreak was just as easy for her to access, but it comes down to trust. I believe she felt in good hands; she was inspired by the other actors and took comfort in the brilliance of the film’s cinematographer, Sam Levy.

Natasha knows how to tell a story, to take a situation and riff on it until it’s beyond absurd, and would make me, and anyone in earshot, laugh to the point of tears. The film is about a tough time, inspired by a very tough time in my own life. To think back to shooting His Three Daughters and remember it with such joy and so much fun is a testament to the incredible fortune it is that I got to work with Natasha Lyonne.