Interview: Kirsten Dunst Talks 'Midnight Special,' Making Her Directing Debut, Reteaming With Sofia Coppola, And More

For the last of our interviews with the key players behind this weekend's "Midnight Special " (director Jeff Nichols' interview is here, actor Michael Shannon's is here and Joel Edgerton's is here) we finish up with perhaps the film's biggest star, who, though crucial, actually has one of its smaller roles. But Kirsten Dunst, who plays the mother of the supernaturally-gifted boy Alton, who is reunited with him on the run when he and his father Roy (Shannon) escape from the cult (called The Ranch) that they all used to belong to, has always pursued a strange kind of stardom. Her emergence as a Hollywood player (breaking out in "Interview with the Vampire," starring in Sam Raimi's "Spider-Man" blockbuster series and more) never quite eclipsed her career as an indie sweetheart.

That parallel track really took off with Sofia Coppola's "The Virgin Suicides" and since then, Dunst has worked with a wide range of independent and...