When Hannah (Olivia Colman) visits her father Jim (John Lithgow) in Amsterdam, she learns that her nonbinary child Frances (Aud Mason-Hyde) hopes to live with their grandfather (affectionately known as “Jimpa”) for their junior year of high school. Though their hometown of Adelaide, Australia has always been home for Hannah, Frances has begun to feel alienated by classmates as their gender idenтιтy takes shape. Jimpa is writer-director Sophie Hyde’s brainchild, based partially on her own family life, and casting her literal child as the star lends the movie even more of a familial, lived-in feel.

Mason-Hyde gives a luminescent performance, as Frances explores their growing desires and grapples with their longing to belong. Though they find themselves between their loving and supportive but sometimes overbearing parents and their free-spirited but increasingly scatterbrained grandfather, Jimpa is not so much about conflict as it is about kindness as one moves through disagreement — or so Hannah insists when working on the film she’s writing Jim’s marriage to her mother, and how he abandoned his family when she was but 13. Nevertheless, Hyde treats each character with compᴀssion and infuses joy into even the most somber moments.

Jimpa was one of Sundance 2025’s most highly-anticipated premieres, and it has generated a great deal of conversation since January 23. ScreenRant participated in that conversation on the press line, interviewing Hyde and the cast about the importance of the story in today’s climate, as well as the metacommentary

John Lithgow Praises Sophie Hyde’s Personal Approach To Jimpa

Lithgow also offers advice to the next Trinity Killer in the upcoming Dexter prequel.

ScreenRant: We’re celebrating three generations of a very unique family dynamic and LGBTQ+ communities. What was it that spoke to you about this film?

John Lithgow: Sophie Hyde. It’s entirely her film. It’s her intensely personal experience. I had the great responsibility of playing her father, who was a gigantic figure in her life, as Olivia Colman had the responsibility of playing her. Aud got to play themselves.

From the first, I met Sophie on a Zoom call that lasted for an hour and a half, me in LA, her in Adelaide. I didn’t even need persuading, but she persuaded me. You’ll see the minute you interview her, she’s just a wonderful, big-hearted person who’s an expert at what she does. One of the great things about the film is, because it’s an autobiographical film about a filmmaker, you see exactly how Sophie goes about making a film. She is an actor’s dream.

John Lithgow may still be best remembered for his hilarious turn as the extraterrestrial Dick Solomon in 3rd Rock From The Sun, but one of his most infamous characters in recent years is a much more chilling one. Dexter‘s Trinity Killer, who was responsible for murdering Dexter’s wife Rita in season 3, is getting his own prequel series. Lithgow narrates the character’s inner monologue (similar to Michael C. Hall in Dexter: Original Sin), and he offered up invaluable advice for the next actor to play Arthur Mitchell.

John Lithgow: Just be on his side. [Laughs] Not an easy thing to do, with the Trinity Killer, but be on his side.

Aud Mason-Hyde Is Proud Of Their Jimpa Family, Both Onscreen & Off

The actor also addressed the timing of Jimpa’s festival premiere in the U.S.

ScreenRant: You get to play a very unique family unit with John Lithgow and Olivia Colman, but you’re also working with your real-life mom. What is that blurring of the lines like?

Aud Mason-Hyde: Well, they are very blurred, the lines are. But it’s been wonderful. I think it’s just been a process of pure joy and pure family.

I have to say, I’m working with my real family, and we have an onscreen family – but I also feel like the whole crew became family. It’s been so wonderful and so loving, actually. And it just felt like a bug hug at times.

Jimpa, for all its light, premieres at a dark time for LGBTQ+ communities – especially in the United States. As Frances and her grandfather’s friends discuss the hardships faced by previous generations, the current administration is rolling back protections. Jimpa takes place in Adelaide and Amsterdam, but Mason-Hyde still spoke about how “conflicted” they felt when considering the movie’s place in global society.

Aud Mason-Hyde: I feel extremely happy that we’re premiering this week, actually. I feel like it’s the right time for us to shift our focus as communities; to shift back into ourselves. Not hide away, but to come together and unify; to be in solidarity and hold each other close.

I feel like that’s what this film is about, so I’m actually really excited to be here and be showing [the film to] everyone.

The Witcher’s Eamon Farren Explains His Jimpa Role & Shares The Lessons He Learned From John Lithgow

Farren also teases Liam Hemsworth’s introduction as Geralt in The Witcher season 4.

ScreenRant: What can you tell me about Richard and his relationship with Jimpa?

Eamon Farren: I think Jimpa found Richard at a point in his life where he was really at the bottom of it. I think he’s scratched around Amsterdam and England for a long time, and Jimpa finds him at his worst and builds Richard up and gives him the permission to find himself.

He becomes Jimpa’s ᴀssistant – kind of a life ᴀssistant and work ᴀssistant, and I think what Richard learns from Jimpa is how to love and be loved. Richard turned up with not a lot of knowledge of that, and that’s what Jimpa gives to him.

It’s a beautiful thing to be able to [portray], and working with John and all the cast is just one of those things where you literally turn up and can just trust that you’re going to play and exist together. It was a really beautiful experience.

Naturally, Farren looks up to the great actors with whom he shares the screen, especially John Lithgow and Olivia Colman. The star explained what he learned from his costars that he will take into other films, and those lessons fit perfectly into the ethos of Jimpa: acceptance and generosity when dealing with fellow humans.

Eamon Farren: John Lithgow and Olivia Colman are just incredible artists, and I’ve been lucky to work with a lot of them. I think the thing that I take away, especially from John and Olivia, is a generosity and a kindness and a trust. There’s no bulls–t. There’s no f–king around with all the bells and whistles of stuff that doesn’t matter. They just turn up ready to work and ready to be honest with their open hearts.

I think if actors can get together and do that together, that’s where the [theater] lies. That’s where the catharsis is.

Last but not least, Farren teased The Witcher season 4, which sees him return as Cahir. Not only will the new episodes introduce Cahir’s father (played by Christopher Sciueref), it will also be the first time fans of the franchise meet Liam Hemsworth’s Geralt after he replaced Henry Cavill in the тιтle role. Farren vouched for his fellow countryman and the show as a whole, saying:

Eamon Farren: Yeah, The Witcher has been a ride. Cahir’s back for season 4, and we’ve sH๏τ that. Of course, Liam turns up, and it’s great to have another Australian on board. We’re slowly taking over The Witcher set, and I really like that. It’s been a bunch of fun.

I love playing Cahir because he allows me to be super physical and aggressive and express myself in ways that are completely opposite to something like Richard in [Sundance selection] Jimpa. That’s the joy of this job; being able to plumb the depths of yourself and give permission to play.

The Witcher set is every little boy’s dream. When I used to play fight and do flips in the backyard, this was what I dreamed of doing, so I really enjoyed it.

Sophie Hyde Knew Olivia Colman Was The Only Actor Who Could Play A Version Of Her In Jimpa

Hyde also provides an update on An Ideal Wife, starring Emilia Clarke.

Director Sophie Hyde has explored Sєxuality and idenтιтy in fascinating forms through her previous movies Good Luck To You, Leo Grande and 52 Tuesdays, but Jimpa may be her most uplifting and celebratory work yet. At the Sundance premiere, she shared her joy at bringing together so many members of the LGBTQ+ community, and how their various experiences were reflected in both Jimpa and Frances’ stories.

Sophie Hyde: I guess just by having so many different members of the community inside our team, inside our cast and onscreen, it was wild to be able to have our four older gay characters talking to a teenage non-binary character about ideas of queerness and also about ideas of living and love and what that means.

It was great to be able to see them enjoy each other’s differences, as well as at times argue with each other. We always wanted to tell a story that felt like it wasn’t a singular story. It wasn’t standing in for any one part of a community, but it was exploring the idea of the expansiveness of community, and how open and loving and joyful it can be as well.

The director also gushed about Olivia Colman’s performance, explaining in a teasing tone why the veteran performer was the perfect choice to portray a character that essentially represented Hyde herself.

Sophie Hyde: How can you ever go past her? Olivia is so kind and smart and empathetic and brilliant at what she does. I wanted somebody very warm in the role. The character is quite a cold character in some ways, which is funny to say because she’s based on me. It is largely based on me. It’s also fictional.

I wanted someone who just felt like they would emotionally connect with an audience and could bring together a big ensemble cast. And Olivia is just a master. She’s just brilliant.

Finally, Hyde offered ScreenRant an update on An Ideal Wife, which was first announced in 2022 and is set to star Emilia Clarke. The wife in question is Constance Wilde, married to famous playwright Oscar Wilde, whose own Sєxuality landed him in prison during the Victorian era. Hyde revealed that An Ideal Wife is shooting this year, and explained her perspective on dramatizing the Wildes’ marriage.

Sophie Hyde: For me, Sєxuality, gender, and all of these things are very expansive ideas. We are not designed to be placed in boxes or into any binary idea about things. Our world is not like that. Biology is not like that. And certainly, socially, we’re not like that. We are incredibly interesting, amazing, vivacious creatures, and I think it’s really important to me to break away from the idea that you can only be one thing or that you have to fit a box that’ preordained for you.

Oscar Wilde is a great example of that. What does it mean to break down the idea of what’s anticipated or expected for your life?

Check back soon for more Sundance 2025 interview coverage, including:

• Jordan Michael Blake Talks Paradise Man (ii)

Source: Screen Rant Plus