T
HEY COULD FEEL MOTHER ANN’ S PRESENCE as the a cappella singing filled the hallway of the Meetinghouse. It was early dawn; the faint light was starting to spread across Hancock Shaker Village. As the filming continued, they could sense something special.“ It was so moving to us all— all of the sudden to hear this hymn song in that specific place,” says
Mona Fastvold, director of The Testament of Ann Lee.“ You felt something tugging at that little string between the present and the past.” It is a moment that Fastvold will likely never forget, and an extraordinary movie that many of us who have seen an early screening are still turning over in our minds. Regionally, the film was shown at the Woodstock Film Festival in October. It opens in theaters in the U. S. on December 25 by Searchlight Pictures.“ Mona wrote an amazing version of Ann
Lee’ s life,” says Amanda Seyfried, who stars in the epic film.“ Some things are surreal, and some things feel like a fever dream, and then some things feel very, very intimate. I don ' t think I ' ll ever get this experience again.”
Seyfried’ s film credits include Mean Girls, Mamma Mia!, Les Miserables, and Mank, among others. She is the kind of actor who seeks out roles that challenge her. This one certainly did. The Testament of Ann Lee was one of the most layered characters Seyfried has played.“ It was a meal. It was a full Thanksgiving feast,” she says.“ I had to fixate on one thing at a time for a long time. I had to fully integrate into this world because I’ m in 2025. I can ' t relate to the 1770s. And that ' s the gift of Hancock Shaker Village.”
Seyfried, who grew up on the East Coast, believes that things in her past led her to this movie. She was obsessed with Colonial Williamsburg and everything from that period. To be transported back to the time when Ann Lee, who was called“ Mother Ann” by her followers, was a thrill for Seyfried.“ Hancock Shaker Village remains so perfectly situated in that time period,” she says.“ Who gets to shoot in a museum? It makes the story feel that much more potent. Also, for me, it felt like I was home. Even though I ' m in the Catskills and you ' re in the Berkshires, it ' s not that far away. It’ s very similar. It’ s the mountains, it ' s rural, the land. It’ s potent history, and it ' s so romantic.”
The movie was shot on 70mm at Hancock Shaker Village in Pittsfield and in Hungary. Fastvold and her co-writer and partner, Brady Corbet, used the same team in Budapest that they had making the Oscar-winning The Brutalist.
Hancock Shaker Village grounded the film team in the authenticity of Shaker life from the very first day. For almost a year starting in November 2023, Fastvold and a tiny crew began visiting the historic settlement to film the different seasons, the interpreters and their work, as well as the artwork and the architecture. They not only studied and filmed different parts of the village, they obtained copies of Hancock’ s blueprints and recreated the Meetinghouse in Budapest.
“ I walked the grounds at Hancock Shaker Village in the winter and during
Holiday 2025 BERKSHIRE MAGAZINE // 19