Florence Pugh Recalls Taking Grandparents to See 'Midsommar': 'How Am I Supposed to Explain This?'

Florence Pugh has no problem taking her older relatives to see her movies—even the disturbing ones with more than their share of nudity. The star of Thunderbolts* reflected on bringing her grandparents to see another of her starring roles, 2019's folk horror film Midsommar, in a recent appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers. 

"I remember afterwards, my granddad going, 'Welp ... I wouldn't have watched it if you weren't in it,' " said Pugh of his response to the Ari Aster-directed flick. "I'm like, 'Not surprised.' But he was like, 'You were brilliant, absolutely brilliant, darling.'"

Pugh went into detail about one particular scene she forgot to warn them about.

“When there’s a naked body splayed over breathing organisms,” she recalled. “And I was like, ‘How am I supposed to explain this to my grandparents?'”

In the end, Pugh’s reason for bringing them to the theater to see it stemmed from how much work she put into her portrayal of the main character.

"I think I'd just worked so hard on it and I knew the performance that I'd given, and I knew how impactful that time shooting it was, that I was like, 'Well, of course my family will want to see that,’” she explained. "Then you watch it with all the people that you've taken and you're like [mouthing], 'Oh, fuck!”

Regardless of what she or anyone else does in her movies, Pugh claimed that her family will show up to support her.

"They will be there come rain or come shine. Even when I'm not in the city to attend the premiere [of one of my projects], they will be there and they will show up in, like, full Pugh force,” she claimed.

Pugh’s latest film, Thunderbolts*, is being hailed as a return to form for Marvel after it’s had its fair share of misfires — including Captain America: Brave New World, which dropped earlier this year.

Of the many aspects of Thunderbolts* that are garnering praise, perhaps the highest is Pugh’s performance as Yelena Belova. In a recent interview with Variety, Pugh opened up about one of her favorite aspects of her character.

“One of the things that I love about her is that she’s always trying to help the person that maybe isn’t as strong, or maybe needs a bit of love,” explained Pugh. “She did that with Kate Bishop [in Hawkeye]; she did that with Bob. She saved the hamster — she adopted Fanny Longbottom. She’s someone that really understands what it feels like to need help.”