Aisha Dee, Ashley Zukerman, and Sean Keenan Talk Time-Traveling Tequila and the Power of Acceptance In One More Shot
In the Australian time loop comedy One More Shot, Emily Browning plays Minnie who is unhappy with where her life has led her. But her New Year’s Eve might offer her a chance to change everything when she finds a bottle of time-traveling tequila that takes her back to the start of the night. Speaking with Pop Culture Planet’s Kristen Maldonado, One More Shot stars Ashley Zukerman, Sean Keenan, and Aisha Dee open up about the community of Australian actors and the film’s themes. Spoilers ahead.
Minnie is positive that this time-traveling tequila is giving her a second chance at love with her old flame Joe, although he doesn’t quite agree. “We talked about the history between these two and a lot of it was linked to partying and drinking,” said Keenan who plays Joe. “Their past is so chaotic and is built on more lust than love and high adrenaline partying. Obviously, I don't think they ever really had this thing of them being properly knowing what real steady, stable friendship was in a way. It's always been so based around the party and lust.”
“I think Minnie was someone who was just looking for what she couldn't have and Joe had some issues,” he continued. “Then where we find them is he has made some big changes. He's in a really great place of acceptance, but there is a slight… it's not nerves, but he is unsure of how she's going to take it and how this new version of himself or these new discoveries are going to sit with Minnie and the group even.”
Meanwhile, Zukerman and Dee were fresh off of filming Apple Cider Vinegar when they reunited for One More Shot. “I've spent a lot of time in the last 10 years shooting overseas and working away from home that I've missed actually I feel like a whole generation of actors who have come up [that] I haven't had the chance to meet. We've got a very small industry in Australia, so it's very rare to not have met people. Then to come back and actually work with Aisha twice in a six-month period, it was nice to feel like a community,” said Zukerman who plays Rodney. “It was nice to feel like we're in a troupe. [It’s] completely different characters, but the same actors so you build a connection as actors and as people. If it's the right people, that ends up benefiting the work so much to be able to then jump into different worlds. It was really special and Aisha is just so great.”
“Honestly, it was a huge relief to play a character like this. Ash and I had actually just finished filming Apple Cider Vinegar and that one felt so much heavier. I just felt like there was a lightness to this character,” continued Dee about stepping into the role of Jenny after Apple Cider Vinegar. “She wasn't playing into any of the drama. She seemed to be on her own wavelength and it was actually a huge relief to be able to step into that easygoing space. It was just what I needed. I'm not very smart, so I just kind of go with the flow and let life tell me how to do it and just hope for the best.”
It turns our Minnie isn’t the only person who has experience with time-traveling tequila. In a surprising twist, we learn Rodney has used his own bottle to go back and redo life countless times. “It's funny ‘cause his story really starts, what has been for him, like 70 years ago ‘cause he's restarted his life so many times. He's tried to do it perfectly, to deal with things,” Zukerman revealed. “ What he's ended up doing in this reality is […] whenever he's hit a conflict or problem in his life, he's just chosen to restart it. He hasn't actually dealt with it. We get this portrait of this guy who has seemingly achieved some level of success and wisdom in life, but it's actually just a shell of a person. He hasn't actually ever dealt with conflict, which is what makes people special. Someone who's able to actually grow through connection and conflict with others, that's actually what life, if anything, might be about.”
Things change for him after having a child as he fears restarting and losing his young daughter, allowing Zukerman to go on a truly dynamic character study. “It has brought him to a very critical point where he doesn't know how to proceed, so he's just a ball of anxiety and confusion. It has led him to not know how to deal with his wife, his friends. He's just on his own path doing his own thing. I think he stands in opposition to Emily's character who, over the course of the night, is able to learn that acceptance of the past is actually far more important than trying to change it. And maybe Rodney just learns it a fraction. Maybe his ship just turns one or two degrees,” he explained. “But a fascinating person to play and not hard to find that in my own life or in friends’ lives. The wish to just not engage with problems and to just hide from them is a strong one in people, so that was a fun thing to explore.”
One More Shot wrestles with the idea of the life you thought you’d have and accepting that things happen for a real. “I often think about the past. There's things that are really hard that I'm constantly still working through not regretting, but actually trying to see the joy in them. I think it's a beautiful thing to look over the tapestry of your life and think back to little moments and to see how that led to something else,” said Zuckerman. “It's hard because it can only happen in retrospect. I think it's very hard to happen in the moment of it, but there's so many things that I'm glad happened the way that they did.”
“When I was younger, I worked with an older actor. He used to say all the time that, in life, it always feels like you're staring into an abyss. But when you look back you can see the path very clearly and to remember to keep the faith that the path is still in front of you, you just can't see it yet. I think about that often when things don't work out, like relationships,” agreed Dee. “When relationships end and you're devastated, you always end up falling in love again.”
Travel back to Y2K again and again with One More Shot available now on digital and on demand.
