Steele’s full of secrets! Dakota Johnson revealed that her upcoming film Fifty Shades Darker will pay homage to her famous mom, Melanie Griffith. The 27-year-old actress teased the tiny tidbit during an appearance on the Today show on Wednesday, February 1.
“There is a moment — there is a little surprise moment especially for my mom in this movie,” Johnson told Hoda Kotb. “I can’t share it! I don’t want to spoil it, but she won’t ever see it. Maybe she’ll see this one specific little clip.”
“It’s kind of an homage to your mom in some way?” Kotb, 52, asked. “Will people watching it understand it right when it happens?”
“I think so,” Johnson replied. “I hope so.”
In February 2015, Johnson got irritated when Griffith, 59, said on the Oscars red carpet that she didn’t need to see Fifty Shades “to know how good” of an actress she is. “All right! You don’t have to see it,” Johnson snapped back. “Jesus Christ.” The How to Be Single star told Kotb that Griffith will probably skip out on its sequel too.
Johnson reprises her role of Anastasia Steele in Fifty Shades Darker opposite Jamie Dornan (Christian Grey). “You see the two of them grow into their really intense feelings for each other instead of just setting up the story like we were doing in the first,” Johnson explained on Wednesday. “You really get to understand who these people are.”
Still, nudity is to be expected in the film, which is adapted by E.L. James‘ erotic romance novels. “It’s never really easy, but it was definitely not completely unchartered waters, and Jamie and I having obviously known each other for a long time now, we have a level of comfort with each other and trust,” Johnson said of stripping down for the sex scenes. “As uncomfortable as it is to do scenes like that anyway, we probably figured out the best possible way to do it.”
Fifty Shades Darker hits theaters on Friday, February 10.
