Since the wildly successful Fifty Shades trilogy came to an end a few years ago, Dakota Johnson has been pursuing various movie projects that range from indies to star-studded ensemble films. More recently, the Austin native also took on the Netflix period drama Persuasion, which is based on a novel by Jane Austen.RELATED: Dakota Johnson Didn't Expect This Movie To Turn Out The Way It DidIn the movie, Johnson plays the lead character Anne Elliot who is unexpectedly reunited with a lover (Cosmo Jarvis) she refused to marry eight years ago. And while the onscreen chemistry between the two is undeniable, it might surprise fans to know that the two stars only developed this over the course of several meetings on Zoom.

Dakota Johnson Found It ‘Exciting’ To Play A Jane Austen Character

Now, Johnson may be an unlikely choice to play a Jane Austen heroine, but that’s exactly the reason why director Carrie Cracknell chose her for the part.

“She's so thoughtful, and she has a kind of boldness and a modernness as well as an actor and I think, you know, she sort of really honors that, but she brings very much her own sort of atmosphere and attitude to the character, which I really love actually,” Cracknell said of the actress. "And I think is one of the reasons why it feels very alive.”

As for Johnson herself, who is a longtime Jane Austen fan, the role presented an interesting challenge that she just couldn’t pass up on. “It was a great juxtaposition to play a character who is both immensely emotional and vulnerable and also incredibly sharp. [Anne] has incredible strength and weakness all in the same moment,” she explained.

“And that to me was very, um, just exciting and, and I found it so, uh, so true, you know, so much like me and people, I know women, I know who can be so incredibly strong and incredibly vulnerable at the same time.”

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And with Johnson in the lead role, Cracknell confidently set about giving this period drama a slightly modern twist by having the actress speak to the camera directly in some moments of the film.

“We experimented a lot on set with it. Dakota would test out different ways of looking to camera, different kinds of connections with the camera,” the director revealed.

“For me, it felt [like] casting the audience in a way as her confidante and kind of drawing them into her story. It really gave her a lot of opportunity to kind of express her inner landscape and find more humor as well.”

The Chemistry Read Between Dakota Johnson And Cosmo Jarvis On Zoom Was 'Surreal'

And while Johnson’s light-hearted moments while speaking directly to the camera gave this film something unexpected, it’s her character’s romance with Jarvis’ Wentworth that’s really at the heart of its story.

Perhaps unbeknownst to many, however, much of the pre-production for Persuasion took place at the height of the pandemic. And so, Jarvis and Johnson had to develop their characters’ relationship while on video calls.

“In the pandemic, chemistry reads were on Zoom. So we were on Zoom on a Friday night,” Cracknell confirmed. “It was a very surreal, very surreal event. Cosmo in his flat in Hackney, in London, and Dakota at home, miles apart from each other. And they read really beautifully, but it was quite an unusual event.”

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Despite being unable to meet in person, however, Johnson and Jarvis committed to their roles so deeply with Cracknell noting that “both had a really interesting attitude and connection” with the roles they were playing. And once they finally got together on set, the stars also had some time to bond with each other more.

“We rehearsed for two weeks before we shot anything, which was great,” the director further explained. “So we had a lot of time for them to get to know each other and to sort of build, you know, the backbone of an old relationship, which is the thing that they’re trying to reconnect over.”

Dakota And Cosmo's Chemistry Translated Well On-Screen

By the time the cameras started rolling, the chemistry between Johnson and Jarvis was quite apparent, so much so that they also capture the moment that their characters first meet again after splitting up all those years ago.

“Working with Cosmo and Dakota on the reunion scene, we were looking for kind of a combination, I guess, of wanting and excitement, and sort of terror and trying to capture the awkwardness and the sort of pain when you reconnect with somebody, and you say all of the wrong things,” Cracknell said.

“I think when you’re with someone who you desperately want to connect with, and you just cannot find a way through, there’s like this field around you both. And neither of you can find the right words to make it OK. And so it was really fun while we were building that scene to kind of hold on to all of those elements.”

Following Persuasion, fans can expect to see Johnson next in the upcoming Spider-Man spinoff Madame Web. The actress is also attached to the upcoming Christy Hall drama Daddio with Sean Penn.