There’s no box for Julia Fox. The New York scene girl has been on everyone’s radar for at least a decade—painting in her own blood, posing nude in Playboy, working doors downtown, inspiring a viral Charli XCX lyric, and everywhere in between. In recent years, Fox has become a pillar of the chaotic, absurdist black comedies favored by a stimmed-out generation (there’s the Safdie brothers’ 2019 bender Uncut Gems, of course, and more recently Tony Kaye’s The Trainer, in which she starred opposite Vito Schnabel, who she’ll reunite with in the upcoming heist comedy Mykonos).
This fall, Fox adds another film-world feather to her cap with Him—the latest contribution to the Black Surrealist canon from director Justin Tipping, under the auspices of Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions. The film follows a promising upstart quarterback (Tyriq Withers) who enters the dark, violent underbelly of the professional sports machine when his idol (Marlon Wayans) invites him to his extravagant desert compound for one-on-one training. The only knife to cut the film’s nerve-fraying tension is Fox—the ultimate WAG living the good life as the bubbly counterpart of a retired football legend.
Clad in next to nothing and sporting a set of bleached eyebrows that Tipping told her she could keep when she arrived on set, Fox traipses through a scene just as the sense of foreboding becomes too much to bear, filming videos of herself hawking jade vaginal eggs for her online followers while coaxing the young athlete deeper into the underworld.
Fox will tell anyone who’ll listen that she loves trying new things, and while being a font of comic relief is nothing new for the 35-year-old, the project did expose her to a lot of blood and gore. “I’d never done anything like that before, with the prosthetics and knives,” she recalls. “All that blood squirts in your eyes. That was new.” In the end, though, the real pull for Fox, who has plumbed the murky depths of fame and fortune herself, was the tension at the film’s heart. “It’s really about the lengths people will go to and the sacrifices they’ll make to their bodies and their spirits just to be a part of this world,” she muses. “It’s like a drug.”
For her CULTURED cover feature, Fox—fresh off a plane from New York to Los Angeles—fielded questions from her friends, admirers, and collaborators on how to do it all.
What’s one physical object you would give to your inner child? One for baby Julia and then one for teenage Julia? —Petra Collins
“I’d give baby Julia a microphone. And for teenage Julia, a copy of my book. That’ll let her know it’s going to get good.”
If you had to stop serving, what would your next aesthetic be? —Paul W. Downs
“If I ever stop serving, send help. It means I’ve lost the plot. But if that day comes, maybe I’d go like, clean-girl, trad-wife. Kinda hot?”
Thoughts on being in love? Would you recommend it as someone who has gone through it and has (presumably) chosen to distance herself from it? Is it worth the sacrifice? —Jemima Kirke
“When it comes to love, I’ll say this. If you are in the market for loving a man, I would look for men from other countries. American men are very sensitive. They’re poorly emotionally regulated. They get offended a lot. They get in their feelings. A British man, for instance, is a lot more playful. They’re more self-deprecating. Their love language is putting each other down; it’s just all fun and games. If you tease an American man, he’ll be like, ‘What, bro? You got something to say, bro?’ I don’t take myself too seriously, and I like people who are also that way. I have found that men from other countries don’t think they’re gods. You know what I mean?”
You’ve achieved the Holy Trinity of having a car, a dog, and a baby in New York. What would the fourth thing be in the NYC quaternity? (I looked up what the proper word would be, and I’m disappointed that that’s what it is.) —Bowen Yang
“Bowen, you are too good. It is crazy to have all those things in New York. It’s a lot. The final thing would be having a cat, and I have three. There’s Frankie, who was found in the trunk of a car in New Jersey. Alfie is from Russia. And Myko, he’s from Mykonos. I found him while I was shooting a movie over there, and brought him back with me. I was kind of like, ‘Am I ruining this cat’s life?’ But the locals said they love it when the tourists take the cats, so I was like, ‘Say less.’”
You’re my Queen, and part of the reason for that is seeing what an amazing mother you are. What is the most moving thing about motherhood for you? Any advice? —Vanessa Kirby
“It changes your perspective on everything. But when you’re on the other end of it, you’re like, Wow, that needed to happen. It kind of feels like if life were a video game, you just got to the next level.
The main thing it taught me was just knowing a love like that. I’ve had so many boyfriends and girlfriends, but [my son] Valentino showed me what real love is. It’s not always pleasant. There are times where I’m like, Oh my God, I can’t wait to get away from him. But then I get away from him and I’m like, Oh my God, I can’t wait to go be with him again.
My biggest advice is to take a vacation from your child. Just like anybody else, when you’re together all the time, it starts to wear on your nerves. It’s okay to go to the beach for a couple of days, relax, have a few margaritas. Your kid will survive. My other piece of advice is to really integrate your child into your life, as opposed to vice versa. I love the European model, where you just take your kid with you everywhere and they just deal with it. You want to set them up to be in the real world, you know? You’ve got to show them how to be good people.”
What is X feeling in the following equation: 2(4-x)-3(x+3) = -11? —Julio Torres
“Okay, I feel like X in this equation is the feeling of going out to dinner with your friends. When it’s time to divvy up the check, you end up paying more than everyone else for some reason, even though you didn’t drink.”
As a dyed-in-the-pale New Jersey girl who wanted to be a California girl, I’d love to know what self-tanner or spray bronzer you recommend for an on-the-go, random Tuesday glow? —Lisa Taddeo
“That is hilarious. I’m also a really pale city girl, and I never go out in the sun, so I actually do have an amazing product for that! They’re glow drops, and you mix them with your moisturizer. I’m going to have to look at my TikTok shop purchases… how do I find that? Fuck. Okay, here it is. They’re the Isle of Paradise self-tanning drops. The bottle is so tiny, and you just mix it in with your moisturizer.”
My dearest Julia, I fully realized how hilarious you are when we bonded as judges on Project Runway. Would you ever star in a fashion comedy? —Willy Chavarria
“Love you, Willy. Definitely down to star in, like, a Zoolander remake. Fashion is so serious—those people have no life outside of fashion. They don’t get married. They don’t have kids. I can respect people that are committed in that way, but I would definitely do something where it’s poking fun at just how insane these people are. I’d be the disruptor protagonist who rocks their world.”
From your on-set diva bestie: do you think hell is real, or is it just group chats we can’t leave? —Tyriq Withers
“First of all, I love you Tyriq. This is really your moment, and I’m just happy to be along for the ride. Regarding hell, I’ll say this: I’ve politely muted every group chat I’ve ever been inducted into against my will. I think we are responsible for our own happiness, but yes—hell’s real, it’s just not some mythical place beneath the earth.”
When you look ahead to the future, what sparks fire in you, what pulls you closer with curiosity, and what shadows your mind? —Richie Shazam
“I’m really about trying everything, even once. I would love to direct a film one day, when I feel like I’m ready. I want to write more books—different genres—write movies, maybe put out an album, all of it. The only thing I really dread is monotony, getting stuck in a loop. A lot of people get caught up in that in the world we live in. It’s easy to put joy and happiness low on the totem pole when you’re just trying to live. I guess that’s scary to me.”
Purchase your copy of Julia Fox’s Art + Fashion issue here.
Hair by Sean Bennett
Makeup by Rommy Najor
Nails by Naomi Yasuda
Set Design by Lane Vineyard
Executive Production by Dionne Cochrane
Digi Tech by Lorenzo Fariello
Lighting by JP Herrera
Modeling by Walter Prince, Richard Liotta, Mollie Altucher, and Layla Hussein
Creative Assistance by Peter Knopp
Photography Assistance by Evy Brain
First Styling Assistance by Jack Novotny
Styling Consulting by Ava Anita
Styling Assistance by Dylan Gue and Abby Lorenzini
Hair Assistance by Peizhao Sun
Production Assistance and Model Casting by Brittany Thompson
Production Assistance by Thalia Saint-Lôt
Location: The 1896 Studios & Stages
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