‘Drive-Away Dolls’ Trailer Centers Queer Women in This Upcoming Comedy Caper

What happens when a road trip to Florida turns into a journey to escape from a band of criminals? You get the film Drive-Away Dolls. 

Written by husband and wife duo Ethan Coen and Tricia Cooke, and directed by Coen, Drive-Away Dolls is setting itself up to be the queer comedy caper of 2023. The film follows Jamie (Margaret Qualley) and Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan), two friends with different reasons for embarking on an impromptu road trip to Tallahassee, Florida. For Jamie, the uninhibited free spirit needs to get over a breakup, and for Marian, Jamie’s uptight and demure counterpart, she needs to loosen up. This trip is meant to be the solution to all of that, until a chance encounter with a group of inept criminals causes their plans to go awfully awry.

The upcoming film is definitely star-studded. Alongside Qualley and Viswanathan are Beanie Feldstein (Funny Girl), Colman Domingo (The Color Purple), Pedro Pascal (The Last of Us), Bill Camp (Boston Strangler), and Matt Damon (Air). Many of Drive-Away Doll’s actors have had their profiles skyrocket, as of late, so expect this film to be buzzing when it comes out in September. 

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What will also create plenty of commotion is the fact that this film continues the trend of high-profile queer women-led films. Movies like the Gen Z thriller Bodies Bodies Bodies, the Cate Blanchett–led Tár, the coming-of-age film Crush, and Rachel Sennott and Ayo Edebiri’s upcoming Bottoms are ushering in content dedicated to queer women narratives and sapphic relationships. Cooke, who identifies as queer, understands the importance behind creating and promoting queer stories in film. In a recent interview with Variety, Cooke discussed developing the queerness in Drive-Away Dolls. 

“I’m queer, and I’ve always identified as queer. Making a queer movie that was fun, playful and didn’t take itself too seriously especially back when we wrote it in 2002 seemed like a really fun and interesting idea,” said Cooke.

She also reaffirmed the importance of queer narratives in film, but also highlighted how levity in these films is just as relevant. 

“There aren’t that many movies or these films about lesbians,” added Cooke. “It’s important that it’s a queer movie and important that it doesn’t take itself too seriously.”

Drive-Away Dolls is in theaters on September 22.