Diego Peralta
Bringing a real life narrative to the screen can be complicated. The team behind Swiped was up for the challenge, and the result was a powerful movie that allowed audiences to connect with Whitney Wolfe Herd (portrayed by Lily James). Rachel Lee Goldenberg directed the Hulu biographical drama, and the artist was also involved with the writing for the film. Awards Radar had the opportunity to interview Goldenberg, who was excited to talk about the process she went trough in order to remind the world of what happened behind the creation of Bumble. The dating app is available for use in almost the entire world. But before this invention could become a massively popular dating resource, Whitney Wolfe Herd had to fight for her right to tell her story.
Before she was brought onboard to direct Swiped, Rachel was not familiar with Whitney’s story. The executive’s journey moved her to the point of knowing exactly what she wanted to do with Swiped: “This idea was brought to me by the producer, Jennifer Gibgot. I didn’t know about Whitney’s story, I was shocked to read about it. It was brought to me in early 2020, and it was a few months after (Whitney) had spoken out against Andrey Adreev (portrayed in the movie by Dan Stevens). It struck as the point of the entire story. I saw the film when I read about that happening.”
Even if the director of Swiped hadn’t heard about this narrative before tackling the project, Rachel immediately found Whitney’s journey relatable and exciting. The filmmaker explained why it was important to depict Whitney as a young woman figuring out her story one step a time: “That’s exactly how I saw her. I agree. I found it inspiring, and cinematic. The way she responded to these big, dramatic moments, and transformed them into her biggest success. The scope of her journey is massive. There were millions of dollars at stake. There was the very public drama that she had to endure. But so much of her story, I really related to. She was woman in a male-dominated feel trying to figure out how to succeed. There were issues about morality and complicity. She was trying to do the right thing while working within a broken system.”
The story of Swiped takes place before the #MeToo movement appeared across several industries, giving women the opportunity to speak out against abusive situations within the workplace and their personal lives. While some things have changed in order to protect women from these dangerous dynamics, Rachel Lee Goldenberg believes that there is still plenty of work to be done: “That was a huge part of it. I think Whitney herself has said that she thinks it would have played out somewhat differently if everything had happened a few years later. 2012 -2014 is the primary timeline in our story. Pre-#MeToo. And it’s not like it’s much better now. Some things have changed, but I think her story is important for us. In a moment when things are so dark. We all need to be asking ourselves: “How can we help? What can we risk? Our reputation and finances? What are we willing to risk to make change?” In the way that Whitney came to do by the end of the film. One of the reasons I was attracted to this story was because it does have sort of a happy ending. Despite the trauma and the difficulties. There’s something to look at towards the end as a positive result.”
Lily James was cast as Whitney Wolfe Herd, before becoming more involved with Swiped as a producer. Rachel made it clear that the team behind the movie had the Mamma Mia!: Here We Go Again star in mind for the role all along, stating: “Lily James did not audition. She was a dream for it. I think maybe Pam & Tommy was the thing that made me lean in and say: “I need to work with this person”. She’s incredible. She has an amazing body of work that she has been building for years. I trusted she would bring everything she had to Whitney and she did. (…) We connected through how much we cared about this story. She is so hard-working in a way that I really related to. The way that I was doing all of my research while creating the film. I was working with all the department heads, and she was doing a super deep dive as an actor. She was researching Whitney. She was watching a lot of interviews with her. She went as deep as she could as an actor and as a producer.”
Working on a screenplay that can become a feature is difficult. And there’s a whole other level of difficulty when it comes to translating events that actually took place for the screen. Rachel was aware of how selective she had to be when it came to the moments that would be depicted on Swiped, and the material that was destined to be left behind on the cutting room floor: “Telling a true story in film format is all about what you leave out and what you choose to leave in. It was really important for me that this didn’t look like a Wikipedia article. I don’t need a biography that goes ABC, this happened and then this happened. It’s really about the emotional story. And for me, the emotional story was Whitney’s journey. She went from benefiting from where she was to working through a process, and standing up against that same structure, the patriarchy, and bad behavior. Everything that we have in the film is there to support that journey. The way in which she transforms.”
Swiped is now available for streaming on Hulu. This interview has been edited for length and clarity purposes.
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