Ethan Coen and screenwriter Tricia Cooke have confirmed that their upcoming darkly comedic road movie “Drive Away Dolls” is the first of a planned trilogy of films.
Clocking in at a short and sharp 83 minutes with credits, the story centers on two women – Jamie (Margaret Qualley), an uninhibited free spirit bemoaning yet another breakup with a girlfriend, and her demure friend Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan), who desperately needs to loosen up.
In search of a fresh start, the two embark on an impromptu road trip to Tallahassee, but things go awry when they cross paths with a group of inept criminals along the way. Beanie Feldstein, Colman Domingo, Bill Camp, Pedro Pascal and Matt Damon also co-star in the film
The Russ Meyer-inspired, 1970s exploitation-esque project marks Coen’s marks his first scripted directorial effort solo following years of working together with his brother Joel Coen.
Speaking with Collider, Cooke says:
“Over the past 20 years, we’ve been writing this lesbian B movie trilogy. Not really a trilogy, but the idea was to write three queer B movies that I always thought would just kind of sit in the drawer and our kids would look at one day when they were old and get some laughs. And now we’ve made one of them.”
Coen then adds that they’ve already done work on at least one of the others:
“And we have another one written. The problem with writing two is then you’re obliged to do a third because nobody does two. You gotta do a trilogy. I don’t even know the word for two corresponding to a trilogy.”
Coen says the film is most comparable to classics like “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” and “The Big Lebowski” whereas Cooke draws a closer comparison to “Raising Arizona”.
Asked if the second film is their next project, Coen responds: “Yeah, that’s definitely it.”
