“There’s so much freedom”: This is what Amanda Seyfried had to say about her lead role in The Testament of Ann Lee

Amanda Seyfried goes full surrender in Mona Fastvold’s The Testament of Ann Lee, stepping into the messy, ecstatic life of Ann Lee, the 18th-century founder of the Shakers. The film premiered in competition at the Venice Film Festival and plays less like a conventional biopic and more like a ritualized, music-driven fable using Shaker hymns and intense physical performance for storytelling.

Seyfried spoke to The Hollywood Reporter about her role in the film and how she exercised her freedom as an actress. She said:

“This did feel like an opportunity where there were just no tethers to anything. Basically, I follow Mona into the light and anything goes because there’s so much freedom, and the only threat is to not use that freedom to your advantage as an artist to go as far deep as you can go to make the craziest sounds. I’ve never been let loose in this way.”

In another interview with Vanity Fair, Seyfried herself calls the shoot liberating, saying it involved “so much screaming and doing weird takes” and that she found “crazy moments of complete freedom,” which pushed her into vocal textures and physical territory she hadn’t explored on screen before.

The film is co-written by Fastvold and her The Brutalist collaborator, Brady Corbet, with music by Oscar-winner Daniel Blumberg, also of The Brutalist. Alongside Seyfried, the ensemble includes Christopher Abbott, Lewis Pullman, Thomasin McKenzie, Stacy Martin, Tim Blake Nelson, Matthew Beard, Scott Handy, Jamie Bogyo, Viola Prettejohn, and David Cale.

More details about The Testament of Ann Lee

Mona Fastvold’s The Testament of Ann Lee arrives as one of the boldest entries at Venice’s 82nd International Film Festival, where it premiered in competition on September 1, 2025, contending for the Golden Lion. A historical drama musical shot on 70mm in Budapest reimagines the extraordinary and turbulent life of Ann Lee, the 18th-century founder of the Shakers.

Amanda Seyfried takes the lead as Lee, a poor and illiterate Manchester woman who rose from obscurity, her father a blacksmith by day and a tailor by night, to launch a radical religious sect. Lee immigrated to New York in 1774 with only six followers, among them her brother William, played by Lewis Pullman, and her husband, Abraham Christopher Abbott.

By the time Ann Lee died a decade later, she had built one of the largest utopian societies in American history. Described as a speculative retelling, The Testament of Ann Lee dives into the Shakers’ ecstatic worship practices, trembling, dancing, and speaking in tongues, while exploring Lee’s conviction that she was the female incarnation of Christ.

For Fastvold, who first encountered a Shaker hymn while wrapping The World To Come in 2020, the film is a technically rigorous passion project, exploring utopia, belief, and the complicated dream of communal perfection.

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