In “Causeway,” Lynsey (Jennifer Lawrence) is home from war, having suffered a traumatic brain injury in an IED explosion. Despite her wounds, she’s not only determined to heal, but she’s also desperate to get back overseas. It’s only gradually that we learn that it’s less about an eagerness to work and more about a desire to run from the hidden wounds she’d suffered in her family’s home in New Orleans.
She slowly reveals her hurts to an accidental new friend, James (Brian Tyree Henry), a mechanic who fixes her broken-down truck. But this is no simple metaphor and James is not out repairing lost souls: he has also suffered both a terrible injury — he has lost a leg in a car crash — and an unbearable, unspeakable loss, and he is as determined to repress his emotions as Lynsey.
Brian Tyree Henry and Jennifer Lawrence star in “Causeway.”(Photo credit: Wilson Webb / Courtesy of A24 / Apple TV+)
In her feature film debut, acclaimed theater director Lila Neugebauer calls on stage veterans Jane Houdyshell, Stephen McKinley Henderson and Linda Emond to bring the secondary roles to life, but the movie revolves around Lawrence and Henry. The film, which opened in select theaters Oct. 28, comes to Apple TV+ on Nov. 4.
Henry also has theater chops, having starred in “The Book of Mormon” and earned a Tony nomination for “Lobby Hero.” He has also had crucial supporting roles in notable films like “Crown Heights,” “If Beale Street Could Talk,” “Joker” and “Widows,” but it was Donald Glover’s TV series “Atlanta” that made him a star and earned him an Emmy nomination.
Playing an aspiring, then successful, rapper Alfred “Paper Boi” Miles, Henry showed his range in handling delicate emotional moments and broader humorous ones; as the show relentlessly explored the challenges Black men encounter in a White society uninterested in their success or dignity, he proved he could veer from a mellow stoner to righteous indignation with ease.
Now, with his biggest movie role to date, Henry is taking on a different challenge, playing opposite a major star in a role that is more reserved in almost every way. Henry, 40, spoke recently from Atlanta about Alfred and James; insightful and composed, Henry at one point gave a four-minute answer without pause, repetition or rambling. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Q. You recently finished the final two seasons of “Atlanta.” What will you miss most about Alfred?
I have tons of Alfreds in my life – best friends and cousins who are like Alfred. I never thought in a million years that a Black man like Alfred would make it into people’s living rooms and onto billboards and I loved that I was able to give that to him.
Alfred gave me a place of feeling like I deserve – it was a place of freedom of feeling incredibly protected. I wanted to pay him back for that. What I really wanted was for Alfred to find home and that was the same for me — that’s a throughline with a lot of my characters. I think I finally did get Alfred home and he did the same for me.
Q. “Causeway” is a quiet film with tremendous pain lurking just barely below the surface. Was that part of the appeal for you?
First, it was a no-brainer because I wanted to work with Jennifer Lawrence. She’s a true powerhouse. And there’s no deep conflict or huge climax, no big “What’s going to happen here” – it’s a story of human connection and I was trying to figure out what true connectivity was in my life.
I also wanted to understand more about navigating grief. These two people are disabled and their lives have changed but they are also dealing with such strong grief. I’m challenging myself with this because I sometimes feel that grief is a disability. You have to figure out how to recalibrate your life to move through it in a normal way.
In the past, I have called grief the phantom limb and amputees have that phantom limb feeling. Everything in your body makes you feel like it’s still there but life makes you remember that it’s not and you have to wake up every day and go to sleep every day knowing that it’s not there. These two characters are trying to find a sense of normalcy while also feeling that no one understands them.
But when you find someone who can see through that loss and see you for who you are that’s a connection that is worth exploring. In “Causeway,” you watch them find a little light in each other, laughing, sharing a burger, swimming, finding normalcy. There was something intriguing and incredibly touching in that for me.
Q. I think you spoke more and revealed more emotion in that one answer than James does throughout the movie. You’ve been described in the past as “a geyser of feeling and energy.” Do you like the challenge of playing someone more emotionally reserved, of acting more with just your face and less with your body and your words?
What I love about James is he’s passionate and intuitive, but I don’t think he thought anyone would truly care about his side of anything. He’s a person I’ve experienced in my life who feels like he deserves what he got, and this is where he belongs. Sometimes we make our grief a home and then we feel protected by it.
When I approach characters like this, most of that reservation for a Black man is protection. These men are stoic or quiet and if they reveal their true selves through their expressions instead of words or actions, it’s because sometimes there’s a true risk to say the truth. When I’m expressing things on my face it’s to let people know he feels things and he observes and understands but he’s also protecting himself. There is a true sense of vulnerability with words — once you’ve said them, they’re out there and live forever.
James doesn’t have much to say, but when he does, it’s to Lynsey as somebody who brings out what I feel is who James was before his loss.
Q. You’ve talked about grieving deeply after your mother’s died in a car accident. James also suffered a grievous loss in a car accident. Was that challenging for you or was it a healing experience?
Being an actor is crazy. Let’s just be honest, taking on the emotions and trials and tribulations of a fictional character is just crazy. It is like living with voices in your head. But what I find gratifying about what I do is the healing of it.
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I sign on to a role to challenge my mind and my heart to confront something. I’m always trying to figure out how to navigate life, and this was a true healing experience. I don’t think anyone can fully heal from a loss like mine but this gave my grief a way to get out of stasis because you can become stagnant and stuck. It gave me the option to play what’s on the other side of grief and to feel seen and to have someone want to connect. It gave me the opportunity to not feel captive to that loss anymore and to truly see the horizon.
It’s a lost opportunity holding on to something that no longer serves you. You see these two people wanting to release. I hope people leave with the film having released something inside them.