F  L  A  U  N  T

Many of us are wary of making wishes — our fragile hopes and dreams cast blindly out to the universe. Each a bottled message hurled into the vast cosmic sea, with dim chances of being answered. So when given the opportunity to speak with a renowned actor, you have to wonder, haven’t her wishes already come true? Approaching one of Hollywood’s most recognizable young talents, the question is: how does Natalia Dyer see the world?

Her presence on the international radar became dramatically evident during the summer of 2016, when an oddly enthralling show involving monsters, an alternate universe, and Winona Ryder captured the world’s attention. The meteor-from-space success of Netflix’s Stranger Things rocketed the then-21-year-old into stardom, where she has remained to this day with her performance as Nancy Wheeler in Hawkins, Indiana.

And now comes Dyer’s latest performance in Yes, God, Yes as 16-year-old Alice. Winning strong reviews, Dyer is quickly solidifying herself among the coveted ranks of elite leading ladies — something all actors desperately wish for but rarely achieve. It is clear that Dyer’s career is not limited to simply Stranger Things, the curse so many stars of hit franchises endure, never able to move beyond their original breakout role. Her trajectory lies wide open ahead. “I wish to try on as many hats as possible,” she shares. “I wish for opportunities to be challenged and grow and learn. I always feel like a student. I’d love to do some theater. I’d love to write.”

Dyer is perched perfectly poised as she accepts my incoming FaceTime call (in true pandemic fashion). She’s smiling and, as we begin our conversation, immediately creates an at-ease, comforting mood. It’s dark outside her windows and a rich, pink light casts a warm, colorful glow over the room. Her brown hair is pulled back into a chic, messy bun with light tendrils grazing her cheeks. Natalia’s monochromatic ensemble includes a dark, black turtleneck peeking out from underneath a lighter black sweater, paired with a tennis skirt. Her presence offers sharp contrast against the bright, fl oral couch where her cat, Mona, paces back and forth behind her, each purr a plea for attention.

Now 25-years-old, Natalia is in her temporary Atlanta, Georgia home, where the on-and-off again filming of season four of Stranger Things has resumed. She has been living there for almost a year, with friends, patiently waiting out the COVID-19 menace. She gazes around the room and acknowledges that continually rearranging her furniture has been a creative outlet during the quarantine. “I’ve dabbled in a lot of different things,” she says laughing, “writing poetry, drawing, painting. I bought plays and forced my housemates to do them with me. It’s also just getting creative within my own space and moving furniture around a lot. It’s more so been an interesting thing of trying to reconnect with what-do-I-like-to-do-for-myself kind of creativity.”

Yes, God, Yes gives a smart, dryly humorous look into the budding sexuality of Dyer’s sweetly innocent character, Alice. In this semi-autobiographical movie, from writer and director Karen Maine, the Iowa high school student faces a reckoning as she explores her budding sexual feelings and the inevitable questions that arise. While trying to grasp this biological terra incognita that all adolescents endure, Alice’s natural process of self-discovery collides with heavy-handed messages from her Catholic school instructors. At her class’s gathering at St. Ignatius Retreat Center, she learns that the perils of giving in to her newfound lustful desires could result in an eternity licked by hell’s flames. Karen Maine’s deft storytelling unfolds the confusing—and often outright contradictory—nature of fraught religious prohibitions against sex with one’s self or with others. Alice struggles with this tumult of confusion and fear, and it is both humorous and unnerving. 

Dyer leads the film, joined by co-stars Francesca Reale, Alisha Boe, who play her peers, and Timothy Simons as deceitful retreat leader, Father Murphy. As the experience progresses, Alice discovers that she is not the only one at the wooded retreat dealing with coming-of-age emotions. Although we have become accustomed to seeing Dyer as the monster-fighting Wheeler, in Yes, God, Yes, it is gratifying to see her display such layered sensitivity and vulnerability on delicate and deeply personal matters. Dyer exudes innocent curiosity and tactful social maneuvering as her character Alice confronts continual hypocrisy from peers and authority figures, but also the omnipresent question of transparency—how much of ourselves should we ultimately divulge to others? 

Dyer is asked whether Father Murphy’s startling hypocrisy, along with the dishonesty of others, has pushed her to adopt a mistrustful life stance in appraising the sincerity of real-world religious and political leaders. “I don’t know if this film made me feel more cynical,” she responds, “but it did remind me of that time in life that inevitably comes when you begin to realize that your parents, your teachers, and all the ‘adults’ in your life and in the world are just people; that there’s no magical age when you feel like an ‘adult’ and you have everything figured out. We’re all learning as we go. And something about that is frightening, but it’s also kind of beautiful and freeing.”

In discussing religion, Dyer is judicious in expressing herself. She clearly appreciates the complexity and heaviness of the issues that this film examines. But she believes that “controversy and art can be good and important.” Dyer goes on to underscore the significance of recognizing the humanity of each person, and the positive structure that religion can provide an individual.

The success, however, of this film’s treatment of Catholic doctrine regarding sexuality may lie in its gentle humor. Dyer observes that “figuring out your own sexuality can be really funny. Teenage sexuality can be confusing and weird, especially when no one is telling you what’s going on and you’re just figuring it out for yourself. It was taking this ‘thing’ that is so taboo and sort of be like, ‘No, look at it! This is funny. This doesn’t need to be such an off-the-table subject.’ There’s a lot of humanity, and I think humanity and humor go together.”

Scenes are carefully presented, some with little dialogue—as when her character is exploring her body for the very first time. An arduous acting task, but seamlessly accomplished by Dyer, who has grown up before the world’s eyes, and is now revealing a different, more adult dimension in her work. The same poise and self-assuredness can be seen clearly in her cover shoot photos herein, dressed head-to-toe in Saint Laurent with gold chains, lace blouses, leather jackets, and latex trousers.

This self-maturation leant to a dynamic working and personal relationship between Maine and Dyer, helping her develop her Alice character. “I remember swapping stories about how she grew up,” she recounts. “It was cathartic and funny in a lot of ways. Karen and I would try a lot of different things and it felt like an organic connection. I don’t think we had to discuss in too much detail what was going on. It was such a combination of herself, myself, finding those parts, and emulating it together.”

The Yes, God, Yes story is intimate and personal, and it succeeds because it is told through an authentic lens. For so long, women’s narratives have been hijacked and distorted by men. But Dyer speaks passionately about how a shift in command now lends to more genuine storytelling: “Having females directing and writing is something we need a lot more of. I just don’t think there’s been enough—especially when it comes to female sexuality, and young female sexuality. There are things we’ve been given to look at on film and television, and many of them have been created, directed, and written by men. And that’s fine, there are different perspectives inside all of us. But I feel very strongly for myself, my younger self, my younger sister, for girls, for women, that it’s so important for us to have our version of that narrative. It’s so important to see how women feel about women’s bodies and women’s sexuality. The beauty of storytelling and film is showing people something that you know, you’ve thought about, and giving a version of your own experience.”

Natalia understands her words hold weight in the public space, and she is exquisitely selective in her social media posts. Just how transparent she should be, how much disclosure of her private life is appropriate, is a question she often considers. Although she has six million followers on Instagram alone, she has only posted twice in 2020. Once was to promote Yes, God, Yes and the other was to support the Black Lives Matter movement. While her bio encourages people to vote, she posted during the George Floyd urban unrest, “…Please know I am reading, watching, listening, and educating myself. I am with you and I am angry. If you can protest safely, please, please consider it. If you can donate there is a link in bio for places to contribute.” 

On her current relationship with social media, she notes: “Right now, I feel like sometimes social takes more than it gives, so I shy away from it. Of course, it feels almost necessary to have it in your life these days, to stay informed and connect with the world, and sometimes it amazes me. I’m grateful for the perspective it can give you, but I’m also protective over my real-life space.”

Dyer brings a similar consciousness to her wishes for what young women who see the film will take away from it: “Any sense of really taking charge of what it means to be in touch with yourself and what you want, and your pleasure, and that it doesn’t have to be sexy all the time—or any of the time. And that it’s really just you and yourself and it doesn’t matter what anybody else says.”

And, ultimately, for what young men will take away from the film as well: “Challenging societal ideas about what it means to be sexy, what it means for a woman to be sexual and sensual, creates more breathing room, a little more laughter, and more space for that kind of conversation.”

Regarding the 2020 presidential election (we speak just a few weeks after Biden has reigned victorious), Dyer is wishful at what is now to come. She was in Georgia during the 2016 election as well, and she acknowledges how markedly different the atmosphere feels these days, even amidst a global pandemic. “There’s a lot of hope,” she says, “for 2021 and the next few years, and what can be done.”

It is from the beating heart of hope that we launch our wishes skyward. Whether you are Hollywood royalty or, like most of us, running with the herd, this—the hope for the unknown, wishes for a better future, dreams of progress and change—is the fire that keeps us going despite life’s uncertainties. This is what makes it all worthwhile.

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Written by Andrew Gelwicks

Photographer: Kat Irlin

Style Director: Mui-Hai Chu

Stylist: Brandon Garr at crowdMGMT

Hair: Katie Ballard

Makeup: Yolonda Frederick at crowdMGMT

Location: Hotel Clermont, Atlanta.