Amanda Seyfried Sings—And Screams—in ‘The Testament of Ann Lee’

Before she emerged as a founding leader of the Shakers in the mid-18th century, Ann Lee gave birth to four children. All of them died in infancy. Lee grieved these losses in quick succession, then dreamed up a rebellious Christian sect that advocated for total celibacy, the abandonment of marriage, and female leadership. Mona Fastvold’s new film, The Testament of Ann Lee , imagines Ann’s personal tragedy as a fateful turning point—dramatizing it as an alternately ecstatic and harrowing musical sequence, choreographed with precision and performed at an operatic scale by star Amanda Seyfried . The goal was not to transport the audience, but to ground Ann’s experiences in spiritual realism.

“Amanda and I were both very excited about having the births be as real and direct and gra