Jessica Alba Explains Why She Wanted Women Behind the Camera for ‘Trigger Warning:’ “There Wasn’t a Lot of Screaming and People Weren’t Walking on Eggshells”

For Jessica Alba, working with female crew members on her new action movie, Trigger Warning—which began streaming on Netflix today—meant getting to relax on set.

“It wasn’t a testosterone-filled set,” Alba explained to Decider in a recent Zoom interview. “There wasn’t a lot of screaming, and people weren’t walking on eggshells. It was very collaborative. We were just chatting and getting through the day. It was a lot less scary than other action sets that I have been on, which was nice.”

Alba, who also served as an executive producer as well as the film’s star, pushed to hire screenwriter Halley Gross to do a pass on the early drafts of the Trigger Warning script, which was co-written by Gross, John Brancato, and Josh Olson. The story centers on a military officer named Parker (Alba) who’s pulled back into her hometown drama following the tragic death of her grandfather. While cleaning up her grandfather’s old bar, she starts to suspect his death wasn’t an accident. Parker is determined to get to the bottom of the mystery, and more than happy to kick some bad guy butt along the way.

Also starring Mark Webber and Anthony Michael Hall, Trigger Warning is the first feature-length English-language film from director Mouly Surya. For Alba—who is 43 and known for her roles in action films like Fantastic Four, Sin City, and Machete—the movie was a chance to create the kind of action movie she’s always wanted to see. “The director was a woman, DP was a woman, our on-set producers were women, a lot of our heads of departments were women,” Alba said. “This is what a gritty, fierce feminine version of an action movie is.”

The star spoke to Decider about Trigger Warning‘s stand-out fight scene, creating a female action hero that goes beyond the male gaze, and her future as a film producer.

DECIDER: You have this stand-out fight in a hardware store where you use all these fun props. Can you walk me through the training, the rehearsing, and the filming process?

JESSICA ALBA: I did two months of training and conditioning, just to get myself up to the level where I can jump in and do any kind of choreography. We went back and shot that scene special, because it was in a real hardware store! Everything was practical, and it’s always more challenging when you’re doing this type of action, where it’s very grounded—a lot of hand-to-hand combat—and it’s in a practical location. It was exactly as it looked. It smelled like hay and corn feed in there and there was like Carhartt up on the walls, mixed with the chaps, and all the different supplies that you would need on a farm. It was legit! It was fun to shoot in.

As an executive producer on this film, you advocated to bring in writer Halley Gross to do revisions on the script. What were those early drafts of the script like, and what got changed?

You know, I think the early drafts of any script, for the most part—especially in this genre—are all done through the male lens. You just haven’t seen a ton of women in this genre. It is a very male-dominant genre. For me, it was really important for Parker not to feel like a dude. I wanted her to feel very much like a woman—a badass woman that is layered and complex. She can be soft, and she can be grieving, and she can be feminine—but at the same time, don’t mess with her, because she will literally cut you and take you out if she needs to. [Laughs.] I also wanted her to have a real connection to this community.

The bad guys just never saw it coming—they would never suspect her, because they overlook her. I feel like there’s a lot of parallels in women feeling overlooked and undervalued. Being able to stand up to these powers that be, and being able to expose this corruption—it was important. The director was a woman, the DP was a woman, our on-set producers were women, a lot of our heads of departments were women. This is what a gritty, fierce feminine version of an action movie is.

How does that affect the creative process for you, as the star and also as the producer, to have all of these women in these different roles on the set?

I think the biggest thing is that it didn’t feel very dramatic. [Laughs.] It actually wasn’t a testosterone-filled set. There wasn’t a lot of screaming, and people weren’t walking on eggshells. It was very collaborative. We were just chatting and getting through the day. It was a lot less scary than other action sets that I have been on, which was nice.

You’re embarking on a producing career. What other kinds of movies or TV shows are you hoping to make?

I am doing a lot of different stuff in many different genres. Unscripted, to thrillers, to comedies. The lens is how can I help elevate and lift up underrepresented people and communities. That’s really my focus.

In the case of Trigger Warning, is there something specific about action as the genre you wanted to take on, and bring more women into?

I just love watching it. I feel empowered. When I was growing up I loved this genre. but it was so male dominant. The women were usually the damsel in distress. They needed to be saved, or they were a male fantasy version of what a badass woman is. I couldn’t relate to it. I just feel like women want to see women kicking ass. They want to see it in a way that feels right, and feels authentic.

I did appreciate that, at the end of the day, Parker’s journey is not about a romance with a guy.

Yeah, I mean, she does have her moment with her ex. But yeah. It is what it is and it feels really real. Like, if you did go to your small town, and you’re grieving, and your ex is there—maybe you hook up, maybe you don’t. But it doesn’t have to be more than that. It doesn’t need to be a guy is saving her, or whatever. She’s following her truth, and she really is trying to do right by her community.