Dakota Johnson Talks ‘Cha Cha Real Smooth’ And Why She’s Excited For a Diverse ‘Persuasion’

It’s fitting that the first two movies Dakota Johnson produced via her company, TeaTime—founded in 2019 with former Netflix development executive Ro Donnelly—are centered on coming-of-age stories for adults. Because it feels like Johnson, who is 32, is finding her voice in the production world.

Cha Cha Real Smooth, which was released on Apple TV+ today, is the latest indie drama from writer-director Cooper Raiff, whose 2020 film Shithouse won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature at South by Southwest. In Cha Cha, Raiff stars as a gregarious college graduate who fumbles his way into a job as a Bar Mitzvah party host—and also fumbles his way into a relationship with an engaged woman named Domino (Johnson) and her 13-year-old autistic daughter Lola (Vanessa Burghardt). It’s a coming-of-age story for Raiff’s character, but it’s one for Johnson’s character as well, as she struggles to figure out what it is she really wants from this world.

“I don’t subscribe to the idea that you have to have everything figured out by a certain point,” Johnson told Decider in an interview over Zoom. “I think if we allowed ourselves more to be evolving creatures for the entirety of our lives, it’d be such a relief.”

Cha Cha Real Smooth first premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival to overwhelmingly positive reviews, and was in fact one of two films at the festival that Johnson starred in and produced. Am I OK?—which is coming to HBO Max at a yet-to-be-determined date—also stars Johnson as a woman in her 30s finding herself, after she realizes she is gay.

Decider spoke to Johnson about working on Cha Cha, what it is that’s drawing her to these stories, and why she’s excited for audiences to see her in Persuasion this summer.

Decider: How did the script for Cha Cha Real Smooth come to your production company, and how involved were you with the script sort of before production?

Dakota Johnson: Cooper [Raiff] first met with my producing partner, Ro Donnelly, and he said that he had an idea for a movie called Cha Cha Real Smooth, for me and TeaTime to make. Ro told me that and I was like, “That’s the best title I’ve ever heard. Let’s do it.” And then I watched his movie Shithouse, and had a meeting with Cooper. I was filming The Lost Daughter in Greece and so, we had a Zoom and then we just started going. Like, he went away for a week and wrote, like, half the script. And then, the three of us collaborated for the next, like six months on the script and developed it pretty thoroughly—the characters, the relationship dynamics. And then obviously, you know, took it out for financing.. had quite a time getting it made. Nearly got it shut down…nearly, nearly didn’t make it, but it made it.

What changes or contributions did you make to the script during that development process?

A lot of Domino’s complexities and her relationship with Andrew and with Lola—a lot of that was Cooper and I just talking and talking and talking. And a lot of the time, him just writing what I was saying. We would just keep talking and talking and talking until we got to like, the core of what these two people are, where they’re at in their lives and what they mean to each other.

Tell me a little bit more about working with both Cooper and Vanessa, who play Andrew and Lola, as scene partners.

They’re both amazing. I mean, luckily, everyone on this set is. Maybe it’s the people that Cooper wanted to cast—and that Ro and I wanted to cast—but really, everyone was so open. Their hearts were so open and so vulnerable. And that I think, working with Cooper and with Vanessa, they both are so available, so present. I really appreciated that. I loved it so much.

In the movie, Domino has a speech about depression. One line, in particular, stuck out to me: I’m scared of doing or the things that will help me the most. Do you find that to be true, for yourself or for people around you?

Yeah. I think it’s like, in a very obvious example, like—talking about your feelings or your fears or your experiences are usually the scariest things, but that’s the most healing thing. So, instead of doing the thing that is really just all in here, you can express it. Instead [of doing that], you go and like try this thing and do this thing or take that thing—use that drug or sleep with that person, whatever it is, you know. Trusting that your healing can lie within you is scary. I don’t think we’re taught to trust ourselves that much.

You had another movie at Sundance this year, Am I OK?, that embraces a similar theme. Like Cha Cha, your character goes through this coming-of-age transformation, though she’s a woman in her 30s. What is drawing you to these coming-of-age stories right now?

I always feel like I’m coming of age. And the conversations I hear people having all of their lives—at all different stages—people are always coming of age. I don’t subscribe to the idea that you have to have everything figured out by a certain point. That you know who you are, or what you want, what you like, what you want to be, or who you want to be, or what you want to do. I think if we allowed ourselves more to be evolving creatures for the entirety of our lives, it’d be such a relief. And so fulfilling. So to make movies about, you know, a woman in her 30s going through something over here [in Cha Cha], and in Am I OK?, that over there… It just feels really honest. It feels really real to me.

Last question, since the Persuasion trailer is now out—what can you say about that experience, and what are you looking forward to audiences seeing when it comes out?

That was really fun. That was like. really, really, really fun for me. Kind of dreamy and crazy. But I’m excited for people to see a modern adaptation of Persuasion, and especially a supremely diverse adaptation. I think that that will be very cool for people.

It seems like this movie going to be a bit funnier than the book, with your humor shining through, would you agree?

Hopefully. [Laughs.] I hope so.