Moore plays Elisabeth in “The Substance,” an actress who, at fifty, is abruptly fired from her fitness program because she is too old to be appealing. She takes a miracle medication in an effort to advance her profession, but it has a deadly and harsh cost and promises to create a very literal younger version of herself, played by Margaret Qualley.
Moore told The Guardian, “It was a very hard film, very raw, very vulnerable to make, but at the same time liberating.”
“I had less pressure than Margaret because I didn’t have to look as good,” she went on. I deteriorate throughout [the film], and I was aware coming in that my shot would not be the most gorgeous or have the sharpest edges—quite the reverse. However, there was a liberating quality to that.
Moore and Qualley live together and are supposed to trade roles every seven days, but Qualley’s younger self starts to resist, and Moore’s version physically deteriorates into something that is nearly unrecognizable.
During production, Moore suffered her own particular bodily terror when she stripped down for some full-frontal nude scenes and donned hideous prosthetics.
