VENICE, Italy — Award-winning cinematographer Matthew Libatique is making waves at the Venice Film Festival what with two major Hollywood films—Olivia Wilde's "Don't Worry Darling" and Darren Aronofsky's "The Whale." The 54-year-old New Yorker, who is known for his work with Aronofsky on the films "Pi" (1998), "Requiem for a Dream" (2000), The Fountain" (2006), "Black Swan" (2010), "Noah" (2014) and "Mother" (2017), collaborated with Aronofsky again in the much-talked-about film starring Brendan Fraser and Hong Chau in "The Whale." For the first time, he also worked with Wilde in her second feature narrative, the Harry Styles-starrer "Don't Worry Darling." We were able to talk to Wilde, Chau, Aronofsky and Fraser about Libatique's work in the said movies. Below are excerpts of our interviews during the Venice Film Festival press conferences. How was your experience with Matthew Libatique for "Don't Worry Darling"? Olivia Wilde

I am a huge fan of Matty Libatique's. We've worked together in different capacities. I met him when I was an actor and he was a DP, and I just watched him in awe. And I thought, "One day, if I ever get the chance to direct, I hope I get to work with Matty. He's just so incredible." And we made a short film together, and then I asked him to come on board. And he created this world with me completely. And I think we all felt we were in such good hands with Matty. Particularly as an actor in the film, as well as directing, he was my partner completely. And he did extraordinary work. Of course, he also shot "The Whale," which premiered last night, and he's incredibly prolific, and he's just a wonderful, wonderful artist. And I'm just deeply honored that he's on this film, and that he will celebrate with us tonight. This is your first time to work with Matthew Libatique. Can you tell us what Matty brought to your performance and what was the experience of working with him? Brendan Fraser

He can put a light anywhere, I learned, inside of a small room and tell the story of the emotional reality that's happening in that room. When it's turbulent in the scene, you'll see the weather is hitting rain droplets, and there are shadows on the ceiling as if tears. Sorry, Matty. I was constantly knocking over his lamps with my walker, because he found a way to create a reality that made that small internal space feel external in its emotional reality. I know that as dynamic as that was, it was also quite simple to not be in the way and allow for me to see Hong's beautiful face as clearly as I could and know that we're in a piece of cinema, proper cinema, that's based in a work that was created for the stage. The relationship that Matty and Darren have is very special. One of my favorite memories is when Charlie becomes enraged with his students and he throws his computer and it was my obligation to effectively be the camera operator that day with a little remote camera to show the body and then hurl all of this and the camera could see every single thing save for Matty and Darren hiding behind the furniture cackling because they think it's so hilarious that I'm breaking an expensive computer against the refrigerator. We got it in the first take. But they're like, we got another one. Let's just do it again. I swear. I saw a couple of film students again, just loving their job.

I do want to say something about Matty. I was offered a role in one of those big popcorn movies and I said no to it. But I kept on kicking myself because Matty shot it. And that was the only reason I would've wanted to do it. So, I'm so glad that I got to finally work with him on this movie and getting to watch him and Darren in their partnership, it was so comforting as an actor, because that relationship can sometimes be really fraught, surprisingly. And it wasn't on this set. And Matty was just a very gentle presence and we always felt supported. I love working with Darren because he loves actors. He understands what we do. He's very protective. He was especially protective of Brendan and his energy. And so that was really just a blessing to get to work with these people, especially after the pandemic lifted and we were able to get and get back up and getting to work on a small intimate film like this with a very intimate cast, and having this sort of quiet monastic experience in the freezing temperatures in upstate New York. I was very, very unsure about whether I wanted to get out of my little COVID-19 bubble to come and do this movie because I just had a baby. And I'm so glad that I did. It was a really wonderful experience.