Little Miss Sunshine cast reunion at Sundance, 20 years later

The cast of the cult comedy celebrated the film’s anniversary at the festival where it all began.

Initially, it’s a small independent film. It has become a real phenomenon. In 2006, Little Miss Sunshine was presented at Sundance. The film by Valérie Faris and Jonathan Dayton has become one of the best acquisitions in the history of the festival. Awarded the Oscar for best screenplay and best supporting role for Alan Arkin, as well as the César for best foreign film, Little Miss Sunshine is today considered a cinema classic.

It’s the story of Olive, 8 years old, qualified for a beauty contest, who takes her whole family on her adventure to the other side of the United States. During the trip, tensions explode, tongues loosen and each member ends up speaking their truth. A colorful weekend, overflowing with emotions, but with therapeutic virtue. In the cast, we found Abigail Breslin as an eccentric little girl, a young Paul Dano as an introverted teenager, Alan Arkin as a rebellious grandfather, Toni Collette as a disillusioned mother and Steve Carell as a depressed homosexual.

20 years later, some of the actors returned to the festival which had revealed them to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the film: Paul Dano, Toni Colette, Abigail Breslin and Greg Kinnear., as well as the directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris.

Abigail Breslin, now 29, played little Olive in the film, earning an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress when she was just 10 years old. “In a way, I wish I was older when I did it, so I could appreciate the experience better.” she said on the Sundance red carpet. “But on the other hand, I’m happy to have done it at that age, because I think I would have been a little too jaded after that.”

Paul Dano returned to the incredible reception of the film at Sundance, 20 years ago: “JI remember the screening. I had never seen people applaud during a film. I remember people laughing a lot, I didn’t expect it because I had seen the film alone before we came. There the laughter was truly contagious“.

The cast also took advantage of this meeting to respond to attacks from Quentin Tarantino, who had severely criticized Paul Dano a few weeks ago, in particular Toni Colette who declared that the director “must have been smashed“.