Eva Victor is Hollywood's most original new voice

The writer, director and star of Sorry, Baby was a viral internet personality. Their debut film shows a deeper side

- By RACHEL BRODSKY

EVA VICTOR IS carrying a ludicrously capacious bag. When I can’t help but reference the now memed-to-death Succession bit, Victor juts out their jaw and says, in a pitch-perfect Tom Wambsgans impression, “Shiv.”

I'm relieved, if not surprised, that Victor got the reference. The actor-writer-director, who is 31 and uses they/she pronouns, has spent the past decade or so as a niche internet presence, going viral periodically with satirical videos and bone-dry one-liners (“Someday, I hope a man takes off my clothes with the same care he takes off the tinfoil of his carnitas burrito”). But now, they’re introducing themselves to a whole new audience — in a whole new way — with Sorry, Baby, an intimate, poignant drama that just closed the Cannes Film Festival in May and will have its UK premiere at the Edinburgh International Film Festival on 22 August. The film, which Victor wrote, stars in, and marks their directorial debut, heralds the arrival of a singular voice.