Werwulf (2026) 

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Marie-Gabrielle's movement choreography and coaching  involvement for Eggers latest film, expanded considerably and she worked with many of the featured cast as well as movement choreography for key scenes with large amounts of extras (witches, crones and peasants). Her main extensive movement coaching was for Aaron Taylor Johnson and for the young actor Vidal Arzoni. 

 

With Aaron Taylor Johnson, she coached, trained and created with him over six months to hone a precise choreographic ‘score’ that melded the key beats in Egger’s script, with her movement language and with Aarons actor ability for emotional intensity and athletic, physical prowess. The intention was  to create a movement scaffolding that allowed  Aaron the space to delve into a deep emotional well and physically own and embody the material.  Normally,  a coach is  trying to get the actors to move with ease. In this instance, as Aaron is a skilled mover, with a background in gymnastics, the task was to ensure the  movement  looked raw and instinctual. Her approach is far from anything like  'classical or contemporary dance' and intrinsic to all her choreographic methodology, informed by Butoh, somatic and psycho-physical actor approaches, is the idea that movement begins from within, and issues from both the darkness and light of the self.

 

In this film she was also inspired by the work of legendary Polish director Jerzy Grotowski who developed the idea of the 'holy actor' - one who can bridge the planes between darkness and the divine, between the horizontal and vertical worlds. She has drawn on some of these ideas in the key 'transformation' sequences. A talented actor, like Aaron, can freely tap into those inner worlds and find the perfect balance of form and emotion. 

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​Traditional Werwolf  films relied heavily on costume and makeup. Rotie is  bringing to contemporary horror a faith in and focus on the performer's body,  capable of producing unfamiliar patterns of locomotion. Crawling, asymmetrical balance, fragmented gestures, and sudden changes in muscular tension produce creatures that audiences instinctively perceive as unnatural. It seems counter-intuitive to think that the body in and of itself could be as equally frightening as prosthetics or CGI, but that is her particular interest and research mission as a choreographer. 

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The script, and multiple  close readings of the beats in the script, is always her starting point as a choreographer and movement coach, and Eggers and Sjon's script was beautifully detailed and rich in evocative  language that helps to develop the characters and the movement. Script reading as a primary is  the  bridge between method acting  and movement based psycho-physical approaches  as the script becomes the portal to the objective, the super objective and the beginning of construction of a 'backstory'. Her role is to then work with the actor to ensure all the movement fits with the characters intentions and tells a 'truth' on screen.  

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​Robert Eggers in Interview with Empire: 

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"Aaron has a dance background and is incredibly physical and athletic, and I knew that he could do the kind of body work that he does in this film, in collaboration with [movement artist] Marie-Gabrielle Rotie, who worked with Lily on Nosferatu.

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"I can’t think of another actor of his caliber who could really do it, with the pathos and pain that this character needed to have, and also a kind of traditional masculinity, while still feeling internally fragile. It’s a balance of a lot of things. His performance is truly harrowing. I’m super proud of what Aaron did. It’s quite extraordinary."  Empire 

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