Brie Larson didn’t just play Ma in Room—she became her. Larson used a complete method to deliver her Oscar-winning performance as a woman trapped in a tiny shed with her son. How far did she go? She shut herself off from the world for an entire month. “I stayed at home for a month,” Brie said. “I was excited to see what would come up if I tuned out for a while.” No friends, social media, or distractions—just Brie, her thoughts, and the walls around her.
Based on Emma Donoghue’s bestselling novel, Room tells the gut-wrenching story of Ma and her 5-year-old son, Jack, surviving years of captivity. It was intense and heartbreaking. Larson’s performance? Pure gold. Critics couldn’t stop raving, and Oscar buzz followed like a shadow from the moment the film hit festivals.
But Brie didn’t stop in isolation. She dove deep into Ma’s head. She met with psychologists to unpack the trauma of captivity and even wrote three journals as Ma at ages 10, 14, and 17. “I wanted to create this full backstory for her,” Larson explained. She wrote about everything—from crushes to fights with her mom to body image struggles—total dedication. And then? She handed the journals to the production team and didn’t look at them again until it was time to shoot.
Director Lenny Abrahamson didn’t make things any easier. The set of Room was as claustrophobic as it looked. “The camera lens was always inside the room,” he revealed. Sometimes, he had to shoot from the bathtub or under the sink just to get the angles right. Cozy, right?
Then there was Jacob Tremblay, the seven-year-old who played Jack. Finding a kid who could handle such a heavy role wasn’t easy, but Tremblay nailed it. His chemistry with Brie? Unmatched. “We had three weeks to bond – for movie-making, that’s a pretty long rehearsal period,” Larson said. They built the toys seen in Room, improvised scenes, and even played Lego before bedtime to create that believable mother-son connection.
While little Jacob loved the attention on the awards circuit, Larson kept her calm about all the Oscar hype. “It’s like having conversations about your fantasy wedding, but you don’t even have a boyfriend,” she joked. But she knew the weight of it all: “It’s the highest form of recognition you can get in my profession.”
Brie’s month of isolation and all that prep work paid off big time. She didn’t just win an Oscar; she showed the world what a real commitment to a role looks like. Now, that’s next-level dedication.
