In some ways, filmmaker Sofia Coppola and painter Lisa Yuskavage are an odd match. Yuskavage proudly hails from a working-class family in a hardscrabble Philadelphia neighborhood, while Coppola is… a Coppola. But what they have in common (in addition to Irish and Italian ancestry) is an abiding interest in feminine jouissance—audience expectations be damned. (When Yuskavage debuted her candy-colored paintings of perky-breasted women in the 1990s, a critic described them as “visual stink bombs.”)
It’s not surprising, then, that both artists quickly understood what the other was up to. The two have been friends for decades, constantly circling one another in New York’s creative scenes. They have both spent their careers making art inflected by girlhood, a preoccupation that some have mistaken for superficiality. Both work in media—film and painting—that have historically been dominated by the male gaze. But over the past 30 years, their refusal to conform to a palatable style and subject matter has given them staying power in a culture more inclined to gobble up female artists and discard them.
This fall, Coppola revisits Marie Antoinette, one of her unevenly-reviewed-turned-fan-favorite films, on its 20th anniversary. An exhibition at the Petit Trianon at the Château de Versailles (on view through January 2027) brings together collages, costumes, and other elements of the creative process, while a documentary chronicling the shoot, directed by her late mother, Eleanor Coppola, was picked up by Mubi. For her Cult of Personality issue cover story, the director sat down with Yuskavage to discuss making art that people love to hate—until they can’t help but fall in love.
Lisa Yuskavage: We both have had our share of people taking great offense to what we’ve done for various reasons. As you get older… How old are you now?
Sofia Coppola: I’m 55.
Yuskavage: I’m almost 10 years older. The younger generation—thank God for them.
Coppola: They are less threatening.
Yuskavage: What do you mean? Are you less affected by negative reviews?
Coppola: I feel like people are less hostile.
Yuskavage: I’m famous for bad reviews. One of my claims to fame is that there was a period of time when every review started off by recalling all my other bad reviews. I will admit I felt a little spun out by it. I was in my 30s. Thankfully, my therapist was a really smart woman. When it started to come at me, I was much more capable of asking myself, What’s this about? Why is this happening? What do I do about it?
Coppola: When Marie Antoinette came out, The New York Times hated it. I recently found this box of all these terrible Marie Antoinette reviews. The headlines are so funny to me.
Yuskavage: People say, “It’s stupid to read bad reviews.” I think it’s stupid not to read them. I skim them. I remember one by Lane Relyea that was so smart. This was in 1994 or ’95. It was a show I had in Los Angeles at this gallery, Christopher Grimes. It was a show of big, classic paintings of mine, the basis of my career. I recognized that [the negative review] was a smart person taking it seriously. I wasn’t offended. Any attention from a smart person felt like an affirmation.
“People say, ‘It’s stupid to read bad reviews.’ I think it’s stupid not to read them.” —Lisa Yuskavage
Coppola: Or if they don’t get it.
Yuskavage: In the art world, men were really worried about being bad feminists. People have just thought I was evil at times. Historically, there aren’t as many women in art. We’re basically coming on a tidal wave of women making good art and films.
Coppola: But we didn’t grow up with that.
Yuskavage: Because of my background—being from a tough place where people were pretty aggro and tense—I was perfectly positioned not to collapse under criticism. It doesn’t mean that it was easy. Maybe because you’re a Coppola, it made it easier for you. But I can see easily how that would be a challenge. It’s not nice in terms of what can happen when you come from a famous family.
Coppola: The kids of Hollywood filmmakers were usually losers in rehab and stuff. It’s unusual that they’re successful. When you talk about men talking about women, I totally relate.
Yuskavage: You told me once how much you loved your team on Marie Antoinette—but that only the costumer was a woman and the rest of the team were guys. While you were shooting a costume ball scene, the guys said, “Let’s cut to what Louis is seeing. We need the other point of view.” And you very gently say, “No, we don’t need it.” They keep pushing until you say, “This isn’t about his point of view. It’s about hers.” I think that’s radical.
Coppola: I was told as a young person wanting to make The Virgin Suicides that you can’t make a movie where the main character is a girl because girls will go see stories with lead boys, but boys won’t go see stories with lead girls.
Yuskavage: Did you ever doubt your voice?
Coppola: No, but I got criticized a lot. As an artistic person, you have an idea in your head, and you have to get it out. It doesn’t matter if no one else gets it. With Lost in Translation, I was like, I don’t know what this is. It’s totally indulgent, but I have to get it out of my head. It hurts my feelings when people don’t like what I make. It does. That’s why I don’t read reviews. You can read a hundred great things and one bitchy thing; that’s the one that sticks. Attitudes and behaviors toward women were so harsh [in earlier decades]. It’s crazy when we look back at it now.
Yuskavage: I think it’s still that way.
Coppola: I grew up very suspicious of people because I couldn’t tell when people wanted something. It made me very aware of people’s agendas.
Yuskavage: That’s an important observation. You can watch how people treat someone when they learn that person is actually somebody. I just love the salt-of-the-earth people.
Coppola: All the same, I think it’s important that a creative person does not get self-conscious. If you’re too aware of what people are thinking, then you can’t just go there. One of my most satisfying creative experiences was after I made my movie Somewhere. It had a really dismal release. Nobody got it. I was screening it for artist friends like Rachel Feinstein and you. You were so into it. I felt really understood.
“The kids of Hollywood filmmakers were usually losers in rehab and stuff. It’s unusual that they’re successful.” —Sofia Coppola
Yuskavage: Somewhere in particular had all the elements that a painting has. Then there are the bigger ones like Marie Antoinette.
Coppola: The 20th anniversary is coming up [in October]. I remember it being a hard shoot, but it was really fun. It was incredible that Versailles opened its doors and let us film there. Every Monday when the museum was closed, they would let us film. We had all these lit candles. Looking back, I’m like, Oh my God, imagine if we lit the curtains on fire.
The director of the museum at that time was a fan. He liked Lost in Translation. They had never let anyone shoot there before. It was a $40 million budget, which is probably like $80 million now. It was a really big budget, but still it was a scrappy shoot because all our money went into the costumes and sets. Our schedule was so short that we were scrambling every day to get our shots done. It wasn’t luxurious. I got bronchitis and my mom, still being my mom, made me soup stock.
Yuskavage: Also, it’s cast so perfectly, in particular Kirsten [Dunst]. You tend to have amazing relationships with the actors, and that really shows. Picking actors is really like picking paint. They’re material. They come with their own moods and peccadilloes and histories.
Coppola: I think of it like colors. There are certain colors you go back to.
Yuskavage: I don’t know if actors like to be called that. There’s that story about how you went after Bill Murray for Lost in Translation, hinging an entire film on a guy who didn’t sign a contract. Who does that?
Coppola: I saw [my father] take risks and be bold. He would always say, “You just start, and everyone will come and follow.” So that’s always been my attitude.
Order the Cult of Personality issue here.
Photography by Craig McDean
Creative Direction and Styling by Studio&
Hair by Esther Langham
Makeup by Dick Page
Project Management and Styling by Chloe Kerins
Set Design by Montana Pugh
Digi Tech by Geoffrey Leung
Photography Assistance by Shri Paremshwaran, Logan Khidekel, and Tony Jarum
Styling Assistance by Nick Dimitriades and Chiara Giangola
Hair Assistance by Claire Beaton
Makeup Assistance by Madrona Redhawk
Set Assistance by Anna Katherine Harman and Bayard Morse
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Pro Skater-Turned-Photographer Jerry Hsu Takes Us Inside His Breakup in a New Photobook
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