Trivia / Past Lives

• Enforced Method Acting:
  • Celine Song and Hae Sung and Arthur's actors, Teo Yoo and John Magaro, decided that the actors wouldn't be allowed to meet until the shooting of the scene where their characters meet. This was reportedly facilitated by the film's crew in ways including having them both blacked out on Skype/Zoom group meetings. Song also aided the process by asking Greta Lee, adult Nora's actor, to tell each actor what it was like to rehearse with the other, which led to both forming their own impressions of each other and Lee being able to form individual chemistries with each of them, which informed their dynamic. According to Song, the first take of the actors meeting was also the one that made the film, so the candid emotion of the moment is in part coming from a real place.
  • When shooting began, Song forbade Teo Yoo and Greta Lee from seeing one another, and eventually from making physical contact while rehearsing scenes; as a result, the scene where Nora and Hae Sung meet after 24 years and she hugs him is the first time the actors touched each other (although the first take of it was not included in the film).
• Voice-Only Cameo: The voiceovers in the opening scene, in context two observers musing about the relationships between Nora, Hae Sung, and Arthur, are done by Chase Sui Wonders and Isaac Powell.