Eva Victor Tells Lucy Dacus How Making Sorry, Baby Made Her Whole

It’s not always that a first-time filmmaker makes a splash at Sundance, but when Eva Victor premiered Sorry, Baby at the festival last winter, it sparked a bidding war (A24 won). Victor, who wrote and stars in the movie, unpacks the complexities of life after sexual assault, delivering a healthy dose of levity with the twee, deadpan humor she honed as a comedian on the internet. But it’s in the quieter moments where her directorial voice shines most, when a simple image or glance provides a window into her characters’ souls. At its center, Sorry, Baby is a story about the aftermath of institutional violence, but it’s also a tale of healing–one that Victor’s friend, the musician Lucy Dacus, is extremely grateful for.

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SUNDAY 2 P.M. MAY 4, 2025 CHICAGO

EVA VICTOR: Thank you for doing this.

LUCY DACUS: I’m so glad we could do this in person in Chicago, at the Ritz-Carlton of all places.

VICTOR: Boom. This is where we go to hang. Me and Lucy come here every year.

DACUS: Since we were children.

VICTOR: That would be so cute and super fucking weird.

DACUS: That was a lie.

VICTOR: We’ve never come here.

DACUS: It’s fake news.

VICTOR: So Lucy, you’re on tour.

DACUS: That’s true. And you’re kind of on tour.

VICTOR: In a different way.

DACUS: Do you get to go home between cities?

VICTOR: For a little bit. I go to L.A. on Tuesday.

DACUS: I’m so jealous.

VICTOR: I’m so sorry. What’s your schedule?

DACUS: I’m going to Minneapolis tonight on my little bus.

VICTOR: How long is that drive?

DACUS: We sleep through it. Have you ever been on a tour bus?

VICTOR: No. I’ve seen videos, though.

DACUS: There’s 12 beds stacked three stories high.

VICTOR: Do you go to the bathroom on the bus?

DACUS: You can pee, you cannot shit.

VICTOR: How did you learn that?

DACUS: They tell you first thing because it actually totals the bus.

VICTOR: What?

DACUS: Basically it goes into a tube that’s unreachable except by a special machine. It’s like someone shat on the floor, but no one can physically get to it.

VICTOR: Are you fucking serious?

DACUS: I’m serious. Everyone who’s ever been on a bus tour deals with this. [Laughs] Are we meant to speak on why we know each other?

VICTOR: I don’t know if we’re meant to do anything.

DACUS: Except hang out.

VICTOR: The only thing we weren’t supposed to do was talk about shitting on the bus.

DACUS: [Laughs] And there we went.

VICTOR: How we met is actually an amazing story for me.

DACUS: Tell it.

VICTOR: So I spent two summers ago shadowing Jane Schoenbrun on the set of I Saw The TV Glow. Then, they were directing your music video “Night Shift,” and Jane was like, “Do you want to come?” And I was like, “I’m six hours away, but I’m going to drive through the night to get there”

DACUS: I didn’t know that.

VICTOR: I didn’t know you. I was so nervous, but was I thrilled.

DACUS: [Laughs] You had DM’d me something nice.

VICTOR: That’s embarrassing.

DACUS: No it’s not.

VICTOR: And then we went to the Pocono Palace.

DACUS: It was like a sex hotel.

VICTOR: And then it got torn down.

DACUS: We really immortalized it.

VICTOR: Those memories are burned into my brain in the best way possible. You were, of course, immediately charismatic and stunning to me.

DACUS: Oh my god.

VICTOR: I came in and it was all happening and I met the most hot, amazing gay people.

DACUS: I loved it. You walked in and a bunch of people were coming up to me being like, “This is big for me, meeting Eva.”

VICTOR: That’s news to me. Well, you know the tea.

DACUS: What’s the tea?

VICTOR: I was supposed to play someone else and make out with E.R. [Fightmaster].

DACUS: No, you were going to make out with Phoebe [Bridgers].

VICTOR: Oh really? Me and E.R. have a story about being like, “We can make out because we look exactly the same, except a little different.”

DACUS: And then you cast E.R. in your move.

VICTOR: Yeah. To be my mirror. [Laughs]

DACUS: Not to be actually interviewing you, but was it intentional? Did that character need to be you 2.0?

VICTOR: Yes. I wanted Agnes [Victor’s character] looking at a more evolved, grounded, knowing version of themself, the most triggering possible person for their best friend to be with forever. 

DACUS: Because it’s like, if I admitted who I was, I could be with you.

VICTOR: Yes, in a way. Fran, which is the name of E.R.’s character, is just so protective of their partner Lydie. Fran and Agnes do not vibe, which I thought was true and fun. But they only don’t vibe because they see when mirror serves each other. There’s one moment when they’re together alone and they have nothing to say to each other.

DACUS: It’s so awkward. I saw Sorry, Baby for the first time with E.R.

VICTOR: That’s cool. Did they like it?

DACUS: They did. They had to have told you.

VICTOR: Yes, but I just wanted to check–did they really like it?

DACUS: Also, after filming with you, they were like, “Eva, clearly a gorgeous person, but the way they were inhabiting directing and starring was just perverse.” So people liked working with you, from what I could tell.

VICTOR: That’s really nice. I loved working with you. I wanted the night to last forever.

DACUS: I so appreciate the switchiness of your gender representation.

VICTOR: Thank you so much. Oh our food is here.

DACUS: Right on time.

VICTOR: I’ll tell you what we ordered at the bar at the Ritz-Carlton: a trio of sliders-those are getting set down right now. I ordered a mushroom truffle pizza, which I think is the most deranged order on the table. And then we got a little Caesar salad situation.

DACUS: That looks good. A trio of sliders–what is it, the Super Bowl?

VICTOR: How dare you make fun of them.

DACUS: [Laughs] Okay, so now what? Do you watch the movie at all the screenings or do you leave?

VICTOR: I leave. Me and my editor were trying to do the math on how many times we’ve seen it. I think the number is in the ’70s or ’80s, so I really enjoy not watching it. The hack is, I introduce the movie, I go to dinner, and I come back and I’m like, “Hey, y’all.”

DACUS: Yeah.

VICTOR: I know it in a way that’s really intense. When we were working on the trailer, the whole time, I was like, “Can we make the scene what the scene is in the movie?” And everyone’s like, “That’s the movie, and you already did that.”

DACUS: I watched your trailer. I feel like it’s just enough to let people know if they would appreciate the tone.

VICTOR: I hope so.

DACUS: It’s coming across as funny. It’s coming across as heartfelt. And it’s coming across as maybe lowkey harrowing.

VICTOR: Right, there’s some sad fucking shit. You have to give people pieces of something before the whole, but there’s a reason it wants to be the whole thing. Do you have that feeling with singles, too?

DACUS: I’ve historically put out the first song first because I tend to sequence albums like movies.

VICTOR: Yes. I knew what the first shot had to be for five years, since I first started writing it. There’s a very, very clear reason why we start there. I think it’s a parallel thing to be like, “The single is the first song.”

DACUS: Can I tell you what I think of your first shot?

VICTOR: Yes, please.

DACUS: If you don’t like what I say, I’m sorry.

VICTOR: I’ll punch you.

DACUS: [Laughs] It’s like this still shot of the house at dusk, and then the car comes up. At that moment I was like, is this supposed to be a scary cabin in the woods or is it supposed to be a comforting family holiday home? There was a feeling that it could project fear and isolation or comfort and homeliness, which continues through the mov­ie. You’re attached to it. You can’t really leave it. And it’s keeping the character close to this traumatic experience.

VICTOR: Yes, Lucy. Genius. The house is a cabin in the woods in New England and is able to lean rom­-com, cozy nest with her best friend, and then horrific when she’s alone and hearing noises. My editor said this thing that really stuck with me. He was like, “The first shot is everything about your film in one shot.” It’s an image of a lonely, iso­lated thing surrounded by nothing, just stuck somewhere. And it’s dark and blue, and the only thing that can penetrate it are these two bright lights coming up to the house. And that is Agnes’ experience of Lydie arriving.

DACUS: Like savior-ish.

VICTOR: Yeah. She’s the only one that can make it into Agnes’ heart. Opening shots are so beautiful and important. As you know, you’re an amazing filmmaker and writer. Am I allowed to talk about that?

DACUS: Only that much.

VICTOR: Great.

DACUS: Has making the movie changed how you watch movies in a good way, a bad way, or a neutral way?

VICTOR: By the time you put a movie out, every single thing in the film is a choice, whether it’s an inspired reason or it’s just, “This works bet­ter than this.” You have to make a choice about how to make it the most effective it can be. It’s given me a lot more empathy in watching movies. A real swing lands for me so much better than it used to.

DACUS: I feel that with your movie. I’m your friend, but I was like, “Wow, they did this for us and they didn’t even have to.”

VICTOR: Aw, that’s nice. I’m going to cry into my fucking pizza.

DACUS: Maybe you had to for you, but the “for us” part feels like you didn’t have to.

VICTOR: Yeah, I’m like, “Who’s going to see it?”

DACUS: That’s a great place to make art from. You’re like, “I just have to do it.”

VICTOR: That’s true.

DACUS: That’s how I feel about music.

VICTOR: It’s a great gift. There was something I wanted to say but I forgot.

DACUS: You know what I want? Aioli for these fries.

VICTOR: You need aioli for these fries.

DACUS: Oh, look, it’s raining. I really like that.

VICTOR: So let me explain what Lucy is looking at. There’s a ceiling at the Ritz-Carlton made of glass and the rain is sliding down it in a beautiful fashion. You have a very, very artistic eye. You see things others would not see.

DACUS: [Laughs] I think other people can see that it’s raining outside.

VICTOR: You have romance in your heart.

DACUS: Wait, so we got onto and hopped off the gender-range thing.

VICTOR: Oh, that was a cool moment when you said that about me and I feel the same way about you.

DACUS: Yeah.

VICTOR: Being around you is very euphoric for me because you see me as I am, and you, as a person, have a true expansiveness when it comes to gender that feels very joyful to be around.

DACUS: That makes me so happy. If you’re not playing around, what are you doing? Being miserable?

VICTOR: You’re not thinking enough about what’s going on, and you’re not having a good enough time.

DACUS: I’ve always felt this way since youth—the skirt-over-pants of it all—but then to get older and have words for it and then stop talking about it, that’s the secret next best part. You can stop talking about it and just live it.

VICTOR: Does this apply to everything?

DACUS: It might apply to lots of things. I feel that way about sexuality as well. You figure it out, and then words aren’t as important as the embodying of it.

VICTOR: Totally. And it’s interesting because people are legit hungry for you to talk about it all the time, and it’s like, “I’m actually just vibing.”

DACUS: Also, the friends I can’t keep up with delight me—my friends who are always changing pronouns, always changing names. Well, they delight me if they’re delightful people.

VICTOR: You can be gay and evil.

DACUS: [Laughs]

VICTOR: And you can be gay and amazing and you can be—

DACUS: Were you going to say straight and evil or straight and amazing?

VICTOR: Yeah. I think you actually can be straight and amazing.

DACUS: I think so too. This is big of us. We’re nodding solemnly. [Laughs]

VICTOR: I mean it. Can you think about that? An amazing straight person?

DACUS: One hundred percent. I feel like this accidentally happened post-boygenius, where people were like, “Oh, that’s for gay people, so it’s not for me.” And I’m like, “Wrong, wrong, wrong. It’s for people interested in love, and it’s actually homophobic to think that just because my love is known to be about a woman.”

VICTOR: Yes.

DACUS: If you think that you can’t relate to that, you have a very sad version of love in your heart. Imagine you’re a movie and people are like, “Oh, that’s not really for me because I didn’t have that experience.”

VICTOR: Seriously. I’m like, that’s legit so sad because the reason to find a home in someone else’s work is to experience empathy. Someone’s giving you a road map of how they want you to feel. It’s a real honor to be able to take people on that journey, and it’s such a gift when people really allow themselves to drop into it.

DACUS: Go there, but keep in mind that what people have to say about your movie has to do with what they ate that day.

VICTOR: Say more.

DACUS: If they had food before, if they slept well that night, if they talked to their mom and it didn’t go well. It doesn’t actually have to do with the movie. You don’t have control over anyone’s mood the day that they see it.

VICTOR: True. There’s been so many moments of this process where I’ve felt completely alive and euphoric, like, “This is what I’m here to do.” And then in other moments, you have to die a thousand deaths. It’s a really solitary experience.

DACUS: Well, yours specifically is, because you occupy so many of the roles. You wrote, you directed, you starred, you’re promoting it.

VICTOR: Right. I’m in a particular place with the journey where it’s like, you spend time privately in the work of it, and now I feel exposed.

DACUS: What you’re doing sounds like a nightmare to me, where all of the creative stuff already happened and now it’s only promo. I get to do shows, so it’s like I have this other creative thing.

VICTOR: But then when you have to perform a song that you wrote however long ago, do you become resentful?

DACUS: I don’t feel resentful about any of the songs. They exist forever, but I don’t have to play them. Your movie will exist forever, but you don’t have to interact with it if you don’t feel like it. I haven’t played “Thumbs” in a really long time, which is about wanting to kill my friend’s abusive dad. I think it’s a good song, but it’s just like, “Oof.”

VICTOR: When do you decide what you’re going to play that night?

DACUS: At soundcheck, usually.

VICTOR: Wow. Do you know I saw boygenius like 8,000 times in 1,000 countries? You onstage is one of the most moving things. I don’t understand how you continue to stay present and so loving towards your audience.

DACUS: I do something weird. I look them in the eyes.

VICTOR: One time I thought you were looking me in the eyes.

DACUS: I probably was.

VICTOR: Yay.

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Hair: Lauren Palmer-Smith using Oribe at Forward Artists.

Makeup: Zaheer Sukhnandan using MAC Cosmetics.

Nails: Karen Jiménez using Money for Nails.

Set Design: Jeremy Reimnitz.

Photography Assistant: Lili Peper.

Fashion Assistant: Zaira Galindo.

Post-Production: Kelsey Hale.

Location: Farago Studios.