Hunter Schafer Celebrates First Lead Role in Berlin Horror Film ‘Cuckoo’: ‘The Training Wheels Are Off, Babe’

variety.com:

Ellise Shafer After making her acting debut as trans teen Jules in HBO’s hit series “Euphoria” in 2019, Hunter Schafer found herself in high demand.

But as she flipped through scripts, only one gave the 25-year-old what she calls “the sparkly feeling”: Tilman Singer’s horror film “Cuckoo.” Schafer auditioned and was cast as Gretchen, an angsty and isolated 17-year-old who is forced to move with her father, stepmother and young stepsister to a resort in Germany, where she soon learns that things are not as they seem.

Wrapping production in July 2022, “Cuckoo” marked Schafer’s first acting job after “Euphoria” and first leading film role. Now, nearly two years later, “Cuckoo” is set to world premiere at Berlin Film Festival on Friday. “Any and all acting experience I had, I attributed to being on the set of ‘Euphoria’ and being around those people who I had gotten really comfortable with — particularly [creator] Sam Levinson, who was sort of my acting teacher,” Schafer tells Variety. “And this is like, ‘OK, the training wheels are off, babe, and you gotta bring it.’ That was so scary.” Also scary is the film, which sees Schafer face off against a mysterious bird-like monster with a scream-like call who seeks to impregnate women with her evil spawn.

The story, written by Singer, is based off the lore of the cuckoo bird, some of which are brood parasites, meaning they lay their eggs in the nests of other species. “It’s really a freaky thing that that’s just in nature and birds are just out here being complete dicks to other birds and giving them their own babies to raise,” Schafer says.