Anna Baryshnikov

Daisy is in love with Lou in Love Lies Bleeding (2024), and will not be persuaded to take the hint. We laughed at Daisy’s refusal to be discouraged, because Baryshnikov lets the desperation show through the determination. Rose Glass gives her a useful place in a noir crowded with dangerous people: she gets most of the laughs, but her wanting is hardly reassuring. It is a supporting performance worth seeking out.

As Sandy, one of Patrick’s girlfriends in Kenneth Lonergan’s Manchester by the Sea (2016), she had an early place in an ensemble built around painful, awkward comedy. That film asks for patience and earns it, although Casey Affleck and Lucas Hedges do the central work. The more sustained opportunity came with Lavinia in Dickinson (2019–2021), where she could put physical comedy alongside modern language and behaviour in a period setting. It is a useful setting for her eccentricity, with room to develop it beyond a brief supporting appearance.

The risk is that eccentricity becomes all a part requires of her. She has often played lovelorn or socially awkward women, and a writer can settle for having such a character turn up, behave oddly and leave. Glass and co-writer Weronika Tofilska give Daisy a clear desire to pursue, which is more useful than a collection of comic habits. Even when Love Lies Bleeding becomes too loud and overblown after its strong first hour, Baryshnikov’s comic contribution remains a reason to stay.

Playing Margarita Levlansky in Idiotka (2025), her first lead film role, is a sensible next step. She also serves as executive producer, taking on responsibility beyond the performance. We would like that move to bring parts in which being peculiar is only one of the things she gets to do. For an introduction, try Love Lies Bleeding, provided a bloody noir is your idea of a pleasant evening.