Sydney Sweeney connected with whistleblower Reality Winner to portray her in the new movie Reality.

While speaking at the Berlin International Film Festival on Saturday, the Euphoria star opened up about playing the whistleblower in Tina Satter’s drama.

“When I was auditioning, I went and found as many interviews as I could of Reality so that I could watch how she speaks, moves, and her different mannerisms,” the actress said during a press conference, reports Deadline.

After she landed the role, Sweeney had the “honour and the privilege” of being able to communicate with Winner via Zoom.

“I was able to Zoom with her. Tina connected us, and I would text her throughout the process,” she explained. “When Tina connected us, I was like, ‘Omg, this is a dream for an actor because I’m actually getting to speak with the real person and dive into their mind and what she’s gone through in her life.'”

In 2018, Winner was given the longest U.S. prison sentence ever imposed on someone for the unauthorised release of classified material, at five years and three months. The former intelligence officer had passed on documents pertaining to Russian interference in the 2016 elections to the media. She was transferred from prison to a transitional facility in 2021.

During the press conference, Satter also spoke about co-writing the screenplay with James Paul Dallas for the movie adaptation of her play, Is This A Room.

“There were so many factors that made it hard to make her legible,” the director said of Winner. “This blonde woman named Reality Winner comes onto the news, and no one can really understand what she actually did; they don’t even understand how it went down and how she was captured. So there’s always this weird enigmatic thing about her.”

Reality premiered in Berlin on Saturday.

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