Carey Mulligan is the breakout star of your film. She was also in Pride & Prejudice (2005), but how did you discover her?
Director Lone Scherfig: She was just in a pile of casting tapes. She had done very little, so it was chance. I knew that we probably had to find someone unknown because [her character] Jenny is so young. She was always my first choice — but we saw her again and again, and now I feel really bad that we took so long to make the decision. It’s been going so well, so maybe she doesn’t have to go through all that again.

I hope so, too! An Education is set in 1961. How did that particular time period play into the film? What did that mean for Jenny?
I think it’s really important. The way London was changing at that time is so in sync with how she’s changing. The way she’s bursting with energy for a future she can’t describe because she doesn’t know what it is yet is the way London was shaking the war off its shoulders, wanting to do things for fun and to have much more appetite for life, for art and for literature — and music in particular. That became so much more dominant straight after she [would have] entered Oxford.

I known here in the U.S. right now, that time period is really resonating with our culture — if you look at Mad Men, for example.
It’s a bit different. Maybe what is so attractive with Mad Men is that it’s a period where they, in some ways, were more liberated and also more innocent than it’s the case now. It’s a bit different in England because Jenny, she’s among the last generation of women who had that little future and so few possibilities. It’s almost as if Lynn Barber, who wrote this story, had been fighting at that. What that means is that women since Lynn could relax and take for granted that they had the right to do the things that they like to do, to try and to find individual futures for themselves and to live that future, or live that adult life, at least, if you have an education.

But my guess is about America is that it’s this combination of innocence and freedom that attracts you. Here in Denmark, as well, it was more liberated than it is now, and was definitely more innocent and less dangerous. I mean, when I was a teenager, the world was a lot safer than it is now for my daughter as a teenager, which meant that I could have a lot more fun. It wasn’t risky the way it is now.

Were you familiar with Lynn Barber’s story before you started this project?
It was just a 10-page article in a literary magazine. Later on, I think Penguin commissioned some more chapters, and she oddly became a journalist for Penthouse. She almost went too far because I know her, and I think she’s a woman who’s had a very rich, varied and happy life that is right for her. Her only regret seems to be that she now thinks that she should have been a better wife to her husband, whom she met in Oxford. But apart from that, she has fulfilled a lot of her dreams, and she’s a brilliant writer.

But no, I wasn’t familiar with her or her work, but obviously I started reading it when I got the job, to get to know her better and to portray her better. But Jenny is different. Lynn is more sarcastic, more of a fighter, and her piece has much more self-irony. Because Nick Hornby and I are not her, we could describe her with some warmth that’s not in her piece.

Speaking of Nick, what did he bring to the screenplay? Did he make any significant changes to Lynn’s story?
The story is short, so he fleshed it out. There are a couple of characters that are his, especially the teachers, but the structure and a lot of the details are actually in her original piece. I think he’s given it a tone that’s definitely Nick Hornby — and jokes, too. He’s really humorous. [Lynn] says that Alfred Molina’s role (as Jenny’s dad) is a lot more sympathetic than she had imagined. I hope we have added something as well. It’s just layer upon layer, and as long as we’re telling the same story — a group portrait of a girl and the people her surrounding her, particularly David … the more time we spent on it, the more time [it was] in this development situation, the more detail you see, the more contrast and the more integrity. But it’s the same piece that we’re all working on, and that was really important to me as a director that everyone was making the same film, that everyone contributed to the package and tried to strengthen it and get as many facets as possible but not be over-inventive, just tell the story as well as we possibly could.

I really enjoyed Alfred Molina’s performance. Can you tell us what he brought to his character?
He has really good timing. He’s very musical, and so is Nick. That means that lines are something where Alfred Molina feels immediately at ease and pitches them very well from the beginning. Also, [Alfred] felt that he knew that world very well — he grew up in Notting Hill and he thought that Jack who he portrays was definitely someone that he knows, and that Jack and England have a lot in common at the time, the xenophobia and the fear of everything: the fear of food, the fear of excess of any kind, and also the insecurity because he didn’t have an education, so that’s one of the reasons why they would let someone like David into their home. He seems worldly, and they’re afraid to be prejudiced as well. So they let him in and let him run off with their little girl.

I wanted to ask you about the clothes. I loved the costumes in this film, particularly Helen’s [a friend of David's who takes Jenny under her wing], but also Jenny’s as well. I read that you brought mood boards to your meetings with Odille Dicks-Mireaux, the costume designer…
That was about Paris, though, it wasn’t about clothes. But I did a board for each of the characters because it is a character-based film. I thought that’s a good place to start, to ensure that if I have a language problem, that’s not going to be our problem, that we’re all speaking the same language. A lot of film people, it’s helpful to have visual examples rather than to explain. So it was clothes, but it was also photos of real people at the time and props. Because a lot of people on the crew and in the cast had not experienced that period, it was also about communicating that London was not that “swinging” yet, and it wasn’t that long ago. It may be a period film, but a lot of the things are the same still.

She and I had a really good collaboration, and all of the costumes are just real clothes that have been saved. We only made one single dress, which was the nightclub singer’s dress. It was a copy of my Barbie doll’s ’60s dress. Because the singer is so small, she didn’t fit into any of the clothes that they had at the prop house. But it was so easy, and they have so much stuff in England, it’s probably the biggest place in the world for that kind of thing, and because the actresses are so beautiful, they just jump into anything, everything just fits. It was a good way for me to go and talk to the cast about the characters and to be at the costume fittings because then you get to express the character’s style and what would be in his pockets. I do the same thing with the props department, which kind of wristwatch would she have, who gave it to her, it’s a very concrete and specific way of building characters. It’s a good place to start dialogue with the actors, rather than sitting at reading tables.

Thanks, Lone, for speaking to us about the film. An Education is in theaters now.

The Road is a post-apocalyptic story of a man (Viggo Mortensen) and his son (Kodi Smit-McPhee) heading south in an attempt to avoid the impending winter as they struggle against the deteriorating environment, gangs of brutal men, starvation, and their own haunting fears and memories.

In a culture that seems to use apocalypse-scenarios as vehicles for completely action flicks (Escape from New York, Terminator: Salvation) or as fodder for laughs ( Dr. Strangelove, Zombieland), The Road introduces realism. Every detail rings true, from the fleeting surge of electricity in a discovered bomb shelter to the makeshift braces and bandages taped across their bodies. Every interaction is meaningful. Every endeavor bears the burdensome weight of maintaining a dimming morality. Joe Penhall’s screenplay does not shy away from the atrocious, nor does it manipulate the audience for simple shock value.

For those diehard fans of the book, the trailer may have you wondering about the role of The Wife (Charlize Theron). Let me assure you, every liberty screenwriter Penhall took in this regard only works to deepen the connection I felt towards Mortensen’s character while adding highly dramatic moments I hadn’t imagined as I read the book.

As a member of the first generation born into a world bearing technologies capable of annihilating all of it in a moment’s notice, The Road is a story that needed be told and must be watched. It is simply a wake-up call to the fragility of our Earth. And by imagining a world stripped to its core, we see humanity stripped to its bare elements, as well. The Road shows us the worst in people, but ultimately, it is a film about our best. It is not only a story of the bonds between father and son, it is a story about the timeless responsibilities of a man and mankind.

Jordan Bonitatis (jordan.bonitatis@hulu.com)
Hulu’s Film Fanatic

There’s a bit of an announcement we’re hoping you can make about Brief Interviews with Hideous Men. Can you tell us about that?
John Krasinski: Hulu’s premiering the movie first on the Internet [after it finishes its run in theaters], so we’re a part of that, and that’s fantastic. I think anybody in this business would be incredibly fortunate to be a part of anything having to do with Hulu, to be honest. Hulu is one of those ideas that is so cutting edge, that you just know it’s going to be a huge, huge part of people’s lives from now on. Not only for what it is doing and is capable of doing now as an interactive site, but also for what it has potential to grow into, which I think is nothing short of world domination. [Laughs] So we have that to look forward to, that our president will be Hulu.

To have Hulu support you in any way and display the ads for the movie and things like that is incredibly exciting, but then to have the movie be premiered on Hulu after its first run in the theaters is incredible. I think that Hulu’s done an incredible amount for The Office, and we are indebted to [Hulu] in a huge way. I think that it’s a massive part of our popularity, and why people have continued to watch us. We’re really, really lucky to be part of it — I have had experience with being part of a project [The Office] that benefits from being on site like Hulu, so to have our movie on Hulu and accessible to anyone at anytime, it’s really an honor, to be honest.

Well, thanks! And of course, I would say we wouldn’t be Hulu without The Office.
Awww, that’s nice.

Now you lined up some really incredible people for this project. Did you have some of the actors in mind from the start?
Absolutely. When I got the pilot to The Office, I used that money to buy the rights [to the book], but I had actually started writing the script a little bit before I got the rights, which was incredibly — in a negative way — ambitious. I’m sure it’s what more people would call stupid. In doing so, I started writing the script and knew exactly who I was going to cast. At the time, I was waiting tables in New York, and though I was having a great time, I wasn’t necessarily creatively stimulated, so I was constantly looking for inspiration anywhere I could find it. I definitely found it all the time in the theaters, by going to the theater, and by going to independent movies. I just consistently did that as often as I could. The people who I saw have these awe-inspiring performances were the people that I knew I wanted to be in this movie. And all these incredible New York actors who were just so brilliant on stage and in these small, independent movies, where a lot of them were coming out in New York, I just knew that those were the people I wanted in it, and I was just lucky enough to get them.

This being tied to David Foster Wallace, did that make it easier to get these actors?
Yeah, I’m sure it did. I think that being part of a project that is not only based on but also very much his actual writing … The movie’s not at all based on the book. It is completely the material itself. In doing this movie, my only intention was to bring his material to a wider audience in a different medium, but in no way to take the movie and change it in some drastic way. My being involved in the movie and so connected to the book was because of his writing, so I just wanted to do him justice and sort of show more people how incredible this author is and show what an impact he could have on you. I think that, truly, without him knowing it, I think David Foster Wallace wrote near-perfect acting material in these characters. So I didn’t have to pitch the movie very hard to these actors who I said had to come in a day, maybe two for some of them, and have these interviews that they could basically act in one day and really sink their teeth into. They very much appreciated it.

As a writer, how do you approach such a revered author’s work? I would have been intimidated!
Yeah, it’s funny, because to be really honest, Brief Interviews is the anomaly, I think. I can totally see why he hasn’t been adapted before, because his work is incredibly intimidating in that respect. It’s intimidating because you’re so admiring of it as a reader. When you’re a reader of his books, it’s a unique experience that you’ll never have with anyone else. I think he’s bar none one of the best writers ever to have lived, and he’s right up there on the pedestal with all the greats, in my opinion. And the real truth is, there’ll ever be anyone who writes like him again. For me, this book is the anomaly because he actually wrote these characters speaking dialogue, so there are actual words being said that were actually written as characters representing themselves. To me, it was almost near-perfect dialogue and the biggest challenge was editing it down to a piece that could actually fit into a watchable movie rather than an epic miniseries or something. And then also, he was also an incredibly literary guy, and so there were moments where I chose to leave some of the literary vibe into the dialogue, and some where I had to tone it down in order to allow the guys to be a little more accessible. But other than that, really, the script in the movie is all David’s work. I can’t take much credit for it, because the work he did as a writer in this story is what brings such incredible life to these characters.

I understand that he actually called you to give you his blessing. How did that call go?
It was thrilling, for lack of a better word, it was just fantastic. He was incredibly kind, and incredibly generous. I remember him being so soft-spoken and so nice. He put me at ease right away. I remember him being flattered that someone had taken up this book and tried to run it up the hill. He told me that his intention for Brief Interviews was to write a story about a character that you never see or hear from, but by using all the characters around that person, you find out all you need to know about them. And that’s exactly what I’d done. I’d already written the script when I talked to him, and I’d done just that in the script, because all the signs were there. It was just incredible to have that connection with him; that I was not only on the right path, but charging down the right way. It was so inspiring and such a pick-me-up that it was a great way to go into the actual shooting of the movie, knowing that we were on the right path and that we were representing him in the correct way.

You know, the big cinematic move that I did and probably the biggest part of the adaptation that I did is that [the female lead, played by Julianne Nicholson] connected to one of the characters, and I remember he was incredibly excited about that. He said that he had seen Brief Interviews as sort of an incomplete project because it hadn’t fully tied into itself, and there was nothing that could tie them all together. So when I sort of brought one of the characters in the book and connected it to her personally, all of a sudden there was a linear aspect to the movie. I had written one draft that was extremely linear and had all these incredible arcs that were fitting in pretty well, but at the end, when you re-read it, you realized that it just didn’t feel right, that it was feeling forced and fake. And so I realized that the best way to adapt the book was to go back and allow it to be what it wanted to be, which was spontaneous and slightly erratic and something that basically presented itself when it wanted to present itself.

You end up appearing in the film, but that wasn’t always your intention.
It wasn’t at all. My intention was solely to direct. I was pretty sure that these actors could do any of these characters way better than I could, but then we had an actor pull out at the last minute. There was this scheduling conflict, just one of those things that happens. We only had two weeks until we shot the scene. Normally that would be fine, but unfortunately that is such a big monologue and, as such, a huge part of the movie. I had shot all of the other interviews, so it was the last one and it needed to fit in just right. It would be a very stressful situation for any actor to just come in and sort of take on that much dialogue and that much intricate storytelling without knowing any of the other pieces, and I was the only one who knew the pieces. So the producers and I sat down and we decided that I’d be the best person to do it, solely because I’d read it 100 times, for no other reason than I knew what I was talking about when I was sort of relating the story to her and how it would connect to everything else.

Because this was a passion project for you, was the acting easier for you?
It was by far the scariest performance I have ever given; rather, it was the most scared performance I’ve ever given. It has solely to do with the fact that I was the director, and not because it hard to direct myself or anything like that — that’s not at all what happened. The reason why it was so scary was that I had sat behind the monitor and watched all these incredible actors turn in performances that were nothing short of awe-inspiring. The day before, we had shot the bathroom scene, which is one of my favorite scenes in the movie, and so to literally be the last person to go and to be the last piece of the puzzle, and to know that if this didn’t work, the movie wouldn’t work, was probably the worst position I could have put myself in. But I really didn’t want to fail everybody else. Hopefully it works out.

I can imagine how challenging this must have been for you, but I think it worked, I really do. But I have to ask — on behalf of all of the fans of The Office — can you tell us what we’re going to see in the new season? A little teaser, perhaps?
It’s funny, the season premiere is just sort of an old-time structure of The Office — it’s just a really funny episode of The Office. There aren’t necessarily any incredible spoilers; it’s sort of getting back to the season in a way that I think is a really smart way to do it, which is just getting everyone back in the office. But then definitely the wedding episode is coming up and it is fantastic. I think that — and I think I can speak on behalf of the entire cast when I say this — we’re all just huge fans of the show and we love it so much. To get those scripts, we’re as excited as any fan would be to see what’s going to happen next, the way they deal with the wedding and how [Pam and Jim] get together. It’s a scary thing to get married on a show, because it’s always a tough conundrum of whether it’s good for the show or bad for the show. Of course the writers are so fantastic that they did it perfectly.

Last season was such a great season that I really can’t wait to see what’s in store now. Well, thanks, John for your time – we really appreciate it.
Absolutely. Thank you.

Spread opens in theaters August 14, but you can get a sneak peek right here on Hulu with this exclusive clip from the film. We also spoke to Kutcher about the film, his role as producer, and his co-star, Margarita Levieva. Check out the interview below the clip embedded below. — Rebecca Harper (rebecca.harper@hulu.com), Editor

Hulu: In addition to starring in Spread, you also produced it. You’re famous for so many different things, what draws you to producing?

Ashton Kutcher: I feel that producing is a just sort of a deeper engagement in the film process. When you act in a film, you go and you give your performance and then so much is done in post and pre-production that manipulates the performance. And I feel like, when you produce a film, you have an opportunity to sort of craft the big picture and details at the same time. In some ways, when you’re telling a story; the context of the character that’s within the story can be manipulated one way or another based on all that’s around that character. When you’re producing, you get a more active hand in the storytelling process. I really enjoy that, and I also appreciate facilitating other actors and performers and creators, and helping facilitate their visions. I just find the act of giving that to be a very rewarding action.

Spread has some racy moments — especially coming from the guy that starred in That ’70s Show. Can you tell us about your character, Nikki?

My character, Nikki, is a guy who came to Los Angeles with this dream of sort of being in the glitz and the glamour and the life of all that the city promises. He finds himself not necessarily having the talent or the wherewithal to get where he wants to go, and so he makes some moral compromises for himself [so he can] feel the effect of the hard work he hasn’t done through an alternative means.

Do you think Nikki is likable?
I think he’s likable enough. I think he’s likable enough to take a journey with him. But I don’t think he’s, you know, outwardly likable. He’s not Barack Obama, I’ll tell you that.

Some of the buzz around this film is that the subject matter hits kind of close to home for you. Why did you take on a role like this, where you’re playing a younger guy who hooks up with older women?

I think that there’s only one older woman in the movie. I think most of the women in the movie are actually younger than him. You know, I don’t know that there’s really a correlation between my personal life and the relationships that I have in my personal life and the relationships that this character has and pursues. So I think that the people that are assuming a correlation — based on the fact that one of the women that he dates is older — are looking at it from a very surface point of view, and maybe they’re only looking at the log line of the film, and that’s probably where they’re drawing those correlations.

The older woman in Spread being Anne Heche, of course. This film also introduces us to Margarita Levieva, who plays another interest of Nikki’s — someone who’s closer to his age. She’s a relative newcomer. Can you tell us about her?

We were looking at this list of people that the cast and directors build that they’re interested in. It usually starts with people that are well known, and different people that you feel can take on the role, that people know of. We had that list put together and we were getting ready to pursue some of those actors. At the same time, you’re always auditioning new people that most people have never heard of or seen. Margarita came into my office and auditioned and was just so incredible and captivating. She carried all of the essential properties of the character, but did it in a very fresh way that none of us had seen before. She had an innocence, but when she turned the corner, had such a manipulative side to her, that we all felt like “Why even pursue the list when we have someone that we know can perform this role in a way that nobody else can do it?” And then she came in and, even though she’s a young actor, she just came in and hit home runs every single day. She was interesting and sexy and smart. She’s a really, really intelligent girl. She’s Russian and speaks English flawlessly. There’s something about that multi-dimensional layer, you feel like she’s hiding something all the time, but you can’t really put your finger on what it is that she’s hiding. And it played really well in the character.

What do you think draws Nikki to Heather (played by Levieva) in the first place? When he meets her, she’s not living the lifestyle he’s grown accustomed to.

I think we’ve all got this preconceived notion of who we should be with in our heads. A lot of people that are single are kind of fooling around with this preconceived notion that the person they’re going to be with is gonna be like this, and they’re gonna be like that, and they’re gonna have this, and they’re gonna have that, and then, eventually somebody comes into your life that pushes back in a way that nobody else pushes back, somebody that challenges you and who you are and what you believe and what you want and, all of a sudden, all of those superficial parameters that you placed on who that person is that you’re going to be with kind of go out the window. Because what we really want deep down, or what I believe our soul wants, is somebody who is going to push us to be a better person. I think that [Heather] does it from the get-go. The scene in the coffee shop — for this guy, every other girl would fall immediately and be invested. And this girl sort of pushes back and says “You know what? I don’t want anything to do with you.” I think that just the very challenge of that makes her more enticing to this guy, because he knows she’s someone that’s not going to tell him just what he wants to hear.

You famously have a legion of fans following you on Twitter these days. How are you going to use Twitter to get fans to see this film?

Well, for me, it’s not about getting my fans to see this movie. If the fans want to see the movie, they’ll see the movie. I think the great thing that Twitter will provide is I can let them know when the movie’s coming out. And I can show people the trailer, so what’s nice about it is, there’s an instant connection with the fans and the people who are already interested in what I’m doing and the work that I’m doing. It’s a really great sort of broadcast tool, where we can talk about the movie in a deeper way and I can show the materials in the movie, and then if they want to see it, they can go see it. For me, it’s not about pushing people to see the movie, it’s making them aware that it’s out there. What the great thing is, while actually in the process of making the trailer for the movie and things like that, I’ve taken different music and posted it on Twitter, and said “Hey, do you guys like this song? Do you think it would fit the trailer for the movie?” and they were like, “Yeah, we love this song. We think it’s great.” So I put the song in the trailer for the movie and it really helped me design the campaign for the movie in an interactive way. In a part, it’s their movie, as well, which I think is very cool.

Hulu: In this film, you play yourself, correct?
Paul Giamatti: Yes, sir. I play a character based on myself.

Did you feel it was easier or harder to play a character based on yourself versus playing any of the other character’s played in your career?
It really just felt to me like a character, like any other character, you know. He just happened to have my name. I was, I guess, sort of conscious that to some extent I was playing on a persona that I kind of have in a couple of movies. So, I was conscious of that but, other than that, it really just felt like a character. I didn’t feel any pressure to be myself, and it is not particularly autobiographical in any way, so I just felt I was supposed to play a particular kind of neurotic, New York actor.

What are your personal thoughts on the soul? This film obviously delves deep into what it is like to have troubles within your soul and then, in a twist, have that soul extracted and traded on the Russian Black Market.
Geez … I don’t know. I’m not a very religious guy and I don’t necessarily believe that it has to be a religious thing. I don’t know that I necessarily believe that there is one. I’m not so sure that people aren’t just made up of a lot of chemicals firing off in their brain that make up a person’s soul in some way. So I don’t know that I necessarily buy that there is such a thing as a soul.

Did you find that your personal feelings on the soul affected how you played having a soul and then having it removed?
No. I could definitely buy into the idea for the movie, sure.

How did you prepare yourself to play being soul-less?
The director [Sophie Barthes] had definite ideas about what she wanted to do. One of the things I thought I’d try to do, I am not sure that it works in the movie, when I first had my soul removed, was at least be a little bit more, sort of, emptied out and blank. Her idea was that in some ways the guy becomes overly confident about things. He is self-involved to begin with. I think he thinks that removing his soul will make him not so self-involved when the fact is that he becomes ten times more self involved. Her idea was to find a way that the guy is just indulgent of any stupid whim that comes in his head. So hopefully there is a discernable difference, but that was kind of the idea.

How do you feel that this film compares to other meta-comedies like Being John Malkovich?
The hardest thing for me about that question is that I have not seen that movie. It sounds to me like there are similar ways to me that it is meta like that and sort of comically philosophical, but unfortunately I have never seen that movie so I don’t know how to compare it.

Of all the absurd scenes that are in the film, what did you feel was the most absurd to play? I thought the most absurd was when the guy who runs the soul extraction company (played by David Strathairn) tells you that you can avoid sales tax by shipping your soul to their warehouse in New Jersey.
The whole thing has a kind of absurd quality to it. The hardest thing for me to do was to do the Russian Chekhov “Vanya” play stuff. That was the thing that made me most nervous … I actually had to be bad at it, which was fairly tricky to think of a way to be bad at it, and that’s where that overconfident thing came into play. The hardest thing about it was to actually be good at it at some point, because the whole idea won’t get sold unless you see a difference between me being bad and being good at it. I don’t know if it was the most absurd thing, but it was the one thing that gave me the most anxiety. Even though [you see] only a little snippet of me being good at it, you actually have to be kind of good at it and I didn’t know if I could be good at it.

You were classically trained in theater. Did that play at all into the scenes where you have to do it on screen?
A: I have actually done a fair deal of Chekhov plays in the past, so I don’t know if that helps or not, but it helped me feel a little more relaxed, thinking that at least I have done some plays by this writer. I think it probably helped a little bit in that regard, helped to calm me down a little bit.

How was it filming in Russia?
It was good. All the Russian actors you see in this movie are Russian, were hired out of Russia, and they all said it was going to be a nightmare. They said that the crews would be horrible and it was all mobbed up and just crazy, but it ended up actually being great. The city [St. Petersberg] is amazing. It’s just an intense place. It’s Russia. There is no more intense country or group of people in the world than Russia. It ended up being great; the crew was great, the city was great. I actually wish I could have stayed longer.

How long were you there for filming?
I was only there filming for 10 days. The rest of the production team was there for a lot longer, but I was only there for the 10 days.

Any favorite moments when you were over there?
I don’t know man, it was crazy. There was a scene in the movie that got cut that was one of the most bizarre things I have ever seen. There was a bear, a trained bear, on the sidewalk. Like a homeless guy had a pet bear with him. It had on a diaper and he would give it a baby bottle to drink from. We actually filmed me just standing there watching it. It unfortunately didn’t make it into the movie, but it was one of the more bizarre things I have ever seen. It was a (expletive) BEAR and it was just chained to a lamp post drinking out of a baby bottle.

How big was the bear?
It was a young bear, but it was the size of a big dog, like a Newfoundland dog or something. It was a BEAR, man. It was really intense. You could go right up to the thing and pet it. The guy who owned it looked more like a bear than the bear. He was this big fat dude that was hairy and just hammered and just crazy. There was just something very, very Russian about it.

During the course of the film, do we see any actors or actresses who may not have been mainstream before this film and might see a nice pop in their careers?
These Russian actors are kind of amazing in it, but in Russia, these actors are HUGE. The woman in the movie, Dina Korzun, is like the Meryl Streep of Russia. It would be nice if these actors ended up in more American movies. The woman that plays the Russian mobster’s girlfriend [Katheryn Winnick] is kind of amazing because she isn’t Russian. She is Canadian and she learned Russian for the movie. It’s kind of amazing that she pulled off being a Russian. Hopefully she gets more out of this.

Any big projects coming down the road for you?
I am doing a movie next with Dustin Hoffman called Barney’s Version, which shoots in Rome and Montreal.

One last question, are you a Hulu user? If so, what shows do you watch?
I don’t know much, but a friend of mine took me on there the other day. You have an old Japanese TV Show, Johnny Sokko and His Flying Robot, a really bizarre old Japanese kids show that I hadn’t seen since I was a child. I was amazed.

Hulu: Thanks so much for taking the time out to talk to us today.
No problem at all. Have a good one.

Hulu Paper Heart is one part documentary, one part feature film. Can you tell me the idea behind approaching the story like that?
Charlyne Yi: It was supposed to start off as a traditional documentary because I was skeptical about love. I think right after high school, I was kind of questioning — how do you like someone for so long and yet want to be together still? It sounds totally mean. I don’t know, I’d only been in a handful of relationships pre the movie. Also, I’d watch shows like ElimiDate and you’d see these people in Jacuzzis together making out on their first date, and I’m like “Oh my god, the world is so scary!” and “Oh my god, I hope I don’t have to be like a slut in order to get some attention and go on a date with someone!” And I know that’s not the way it is, but I think when I was 18, I was scared.

Later in life, when I moved out to L.A., most of the people I hung out with were comedians. There were these 48-year-olds that I was friends with, and all sorts of different ages. And at a certain point, I just met people who had interesting stories, like there’s a man who got married and years later, he goes back home and looks in his attic. He finds this photograph up there. He and his wife are from totally different states, and he went to college somewhere else. So the picture was of him at this party, posing, and his wife is posing in that picture, as well. They had never met. They could have met years ago, and that didn’t happen. Stories like that really inspired me to want to make the documentary about love.

Also, the fact that I think that everyone wants to find love, so from there I talked to Nick [Jasenovec] about my perspective on love and how I wanted to make a movie about love, but it actually being a documentary. He wanted me to be on the screen, and I didn’t feel comfortable about that. But then he also mentioned his interest in me actually finding love, and how that would be great for the documentary, if I fell in love. I said didn’t feel comfortable about that, either, and eventually we came to the conclusion of making a film about that, treating it more like a fictional film where this girl meets this guy, and eventually falls in love, but she doesn’t actually believe in love. We’d use the documentary pieces as more a way to brace the film in hopes that, if I were to play a character named Charlyne, and everyone else played versions of themselves, that if the viewer didn’t know what they were watching beforehand, that maybe they would care more about the story and maybe there’d be more weight to it. We also didn’t want to fool them so much that they thought it was true, so we paid credit to writing and also have the director played by Jake Johnson as also a way to show that.

You said you hadn’t been in many relationships before this film. Have you had a ton since?
[Laughs.] I guess not before the film, what I meant was when I was like 18 and scared of the world. I think I realized more along the way. No, no I haven’t. I don’t know why I said that!

Jake Johnson seems to be the one person in the film who doesn’t play himself. Why didn’t Nick want to be on camera, playing the director?
He’s not so comfortable being on camera, either. And also, I’m not saying this to be mean, but he admittedly says that he is a bad actor, and I think so, too. [Laughs.] But why Jake? Both of us were really big fans of him, and we really love his work. He’s also really, really good at playing realistic characters. We’re mostly friends with comedians, so we thought he was awesome for the part.

I thought you actually had good chemistry with him, in a friendly way of course.
[Laughs.] I think part of that was because we were all friends in the beginning, so we were just acting as friends.

Do you hang out with all these guys all the time?
Maybe not all the time, but yeah, every once in a while, I hang out with them. I think it’s harder to hang out with people you work with, because me, Jake and Nick are actually working on something right now, another project, so we spend a lot of time with each other already. I think the more we work with each other, the less we hang out, because we see each other almost every day. When we’re not working together, we hang out.

Can you tell me a little about your “woman on the street” interviews, where you basically stand on the corner with a microphone? Paper Heart kicks off that way, and you have other segments like this posted on the Internet. How do people react?
I’m really bad at talking, so I don’t know how to come up with questions. So I was like, what if you threw a mic in someone’s — well, you wouldn’t throw it, but put it out there and extend your arm and either wait for people to come up to you and be like “Hey, what’s this camera doing?” and see what happens. Usually they feel obliged to talk, or if you go up to someone with a mic, they react in some sort of way that’s funny to me, at least.
And then with the man on the street in Las Vegas [in Paper Heart], no one really wanted to talk to me, except for the really drunk people who just wanted to scream things that didn’t make sense.

One of my favorite scenes in this film was when you went to a playground in Atlanta and interviewed kids. It seemed like the kids were more open — you could just stick a microphone in their faces to get them to start talking.
I think before we started shooting, Nick said, “Go make them feel comfortable, go play with them.” I’m like, “Go play with them?” I think I was 22 at the time. “I’m a 22-year-old woman; don’t you think I’m going to creep them out?” And he said “No, you look like one of them.” I forgot that kids are so much more different from adults. You can make a friend when you’re a kid on the playground instantly, you just say, “Hey, wanna play?” And they’d say yes or no. But as an adult, when you see someone you want to play with, it’s creepy! You can’t just go up to someone in some situation and say “You seem cool, wanna play? Wanna play some basketball?”
So I just ran up to one of them and said “Tag, you’re it!” And they all started playing with me and screaming and pushing me around like I was one of the kids. And I think even one girl, she was like a bully, she actually kind of hurt me. And I was like “What should I do? I’m an adult. Should I be like, ‘listen little girl, you don’t know how old I am, you better back off?’” I can’t push her back, that’d be horrible. Her parents were probably watching me. Anyhow, it was cool to see how accepting the kids were and how eager they were to talk to me and play, and talk about love for the camera.

When some of the people you interview talk about love, you do something unusual to depict their stories. I’m going to call them animated diorama sequences. How long did you spend building those? Did you have help?
I made of them, but I had a little help with the construction because I couldn’t cut things with the wood. He had some good ideas for the movement of the river. And this other guy helped with the last sequence, with the trees moving, because I couldn’t build that in time, either. Nor did I know how to. I spent maybe two or two and a half weeks building all the stuff. I felt like this crazy person, because I would just lock myself in the room and order food. It’s so meticulous, building these puppets, and I felt like a crazy person. My friends would ask me to hang out, and I’d say [lowers voice to sound crazed] “No, I have to finish these puppets. You don’t understand, this project will never be done!” They would offer help, but I’d be like, “No, you can’t do it. You can’t read my mind, only I know my mind!” It took so much time despite how crappy they look.

How you found love since you started this movie?
[Giggles.] No. I have found my love for a new food. I experienced a new food that I’m really excited about. I didn’t know what a panini was. I mean, I knew it was a sandwich, but it’s a really tasty sandwich.

A panini?!
Yeah. This is really embarrassing, but I took Hooked on Phonics, and I’m a really poor reader. I accidentally said “pa-NAN-ni” when I ordered it. And then my friends were making fun of me, so the next time I ordered one, I tried really hard to get it right, and to stress the syllables. So I told my friend “I’m going to get this right,” and I looked at the lady and I go, “One cheese pa-NAN-ni, please!” I got it wrong again. [Laughs.] But as far as a real person, I have not actually found love yet.

Zombieland
In theaters October 9, 2009
A lovely little tale of sister grifters, Twinkie hunting and good old-fashioned battles with the undead, Zombieland will be coming for your brains this coming Halloween season. Woody Harrelson stars as Tallahassee, the Twinkie-obsessed zombie killer who forms an unlikely team with wussy clean-freak Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg from the raucous teen comedy Adventureland). They meet up with sister grifters Wichita and Little Rock (Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin) and wreak havoc on the undead.

There were some interesting discussions during the press conference, but the topic that dominated more questions than any other was the “fast vs. slow zombie” debate. For those not in the know, it refers to the fact that many modern zombie films (28 Days Later started the trend) contain fast-moving, agile zombies who spew every body fluid imaginable, while the zombies in older films were slow, plodding and decidedly less athletic. Director Ruben Fleischer let us know that he played the zombies in the film as they were written, of the fast variety. Writers Rhett Reese and Ryan Kavanaugh defended the decision, saying it made the zombies scarier. Despite a few follow-up questions, the feverish zombie debate rages on for another day.

In case some of you were wondering what goes into zombie vomit (applesauce, diced pineapple, honey, oats and some other healthy ingredients), what Harrelson’s fake Twinkies were made of (cornmeal — he tries to keep his intake natural), or what fake blood tastes like (refreshing peppermint), the cast and crew were all too happy to share the surprisingly non-gory details. I asked if Breslin got any good zombie kills in, and Fleischer said that she was a fast learner with a wide array of guns at the range, which was both reassuring and disconcerting at the same time. I think everyone watching the film is going to be surprised to see “Little Miss Sunshine” slaying the undead with a double-barrel shotgun.

This film sounds like a fast-paced, zombie kill fest — just what Halloween 2009 ordered.

2012
In theaters November 13, 2009
Roland Emmerich was beaming with pride as he told us all about his next end-of-the-world epic. For those unfamiliar with 2012 and its subject matter, the Mayan calendar ends on December 21, 2012, and many people don’t think this was a matter of the Mayans being lazy and not getting around to the next calendar. They, in fact, believe it signals the end of the world. As the trailer shows, the amount of CGI work used to destroy the world is staggering: over 1,400 CGI shots. (Yes, you read that correctly.) The creators cast special effects houses like actors, using one for water shots, one for earthquakes, and so on. Hundreds of artists continue to work around the clock to get things just right for the November 13 premiere, which will go off with a few bangs, earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunami waves.

When asked about the creative process for the film, Emmerich said he had wanted to do a modern retelling of the Noah’s Ark tale. The vehicle for this worldwide flood came after many discussions with his creative brain trust, finally settling on the 2012 prophecy (though he didn’t love the idea at first). He also made an interesting analogy, saying that Area 51, the main setting for his film Independence Day, has a mythology that has sparked the imagination for decades, much as the 2012 prophecy has done for centuries, and this is the driving force for 2012. The most amazing aspect of the research for Emmerich was the unbridled interest in all things 2012: There are hundreds upon hundreds of books dissecting every single detail of the numerology, astrology and geology behind the supposedly-coming cataclysm.

He also gave us some interesting details on his upcoming projects:

• Independence Day Sequel: He has had discussions with Will Smith about it, saying that he is game for a second run at the aliens. However, that is as far as it has gone. There is no story or anything like that.
• The Foundation trilogy: He has hired Robert Rodat, best known for his Oscar-nominated script for Saving Private Ryan, to write the screenplay. It is based on Isaac Asimov’s epic space saga which spans hundreds of years.

— Matt Sugarman, Hulu’s Trailer Guy, and Jason Nellis, Hulu’s Jack of All Trades

The Book of Eli
In theaters January 15, 2010
This thriller follows Eli (Denzel Washington) as he makes a cross-country journey to protect a book that contains the secrets to saving the human race after an apocalypse. Co-starring Gary Oldman and Mila Kunis, the film has been characterized as a “post-apocalyptic western” — an interesting concept, but not necessarily the angle filmmakers (and brothers) Albert and Allen Hughes were aiming for.
The film is about survival: How something as simple as a clean water source can easily shift power in a decimated world, and how a human’s scavenger instinct takes over when struggling to make it, just like an animals’. Washington got big laughs when he mentioned “meat sandwiches,” which he didn’t further describe, but you can certainly use your imagination. The trailer looks slick, with plenty of action, hard looks and tough words to go around. This world sounds like a challenging place to survive, but it seems like Eli is up to the task.

A Nightmare on Elm Street
In theaters April 30, 2010
Just like Nightmare films made before this reimagining, Freddy is back to haunt the dreams of teenagers everywhere. This time, however, the razor glove, sweater and cap are donned by Jackie Earl Haley, (last seen as Rorschach in Watchmen). In the panel discussion, the original Freddy Krueger, Robert Englund, mentioned that Haley’s “performance makes Freddy who he is,” with Haley adding that putting on Freddy’s glove for the first time was “pretty freaky.”

Director Samuel Bayer told us that he wanted to create an Elm Street that could almost be believed, much like Christopher Nolan’s imagining of the world of Gotham, where the audience is able to suspend disbelief about superheroes that dress up and fly through the city. This version is a bit less hokey than the previous titles in the franchise, but will still contain a touch of the dark humor fans come to expect from the franchise.

Jonah Hex
In theaters August 6, 2010
Josh Brolin stars as Jonah Hex, a facially scarred, western anti-hero bent on revenge — and he dedicated a lot of himself to the role: It took more than three hours a day to fix his Harvey Dent/Two-Face-like makeup during the 46-day shoot. Playing his female sidekick is the always beautiful Megan Fox, who almost set off a stampede when she and Josh Brolin had an autograph signing at the Comic-Con convention. From all the buzz surrounding the teaser trailer shown at the panel earlier in the day, this film will undoubtedly be one of the big blockbusters next summer.

Sherlock Holmes
In theaters December 25, 2009
Robert Downey, Jr. takes a break from Stark Industries to play the well-known Sherlock Holmes this holiday season. (See an earlier Sherlock trailer here.) At his side will be Jude Law as Watson (unable to attend as he was “off playing Hamlet”) and Rachel McAdams, who plays a well-traveled lady of the night. In the director’s chair, Guy Ritchie (also not in attendance) added his own stamp to the movie, as you can see in the trailer.

Downey, Jr. charmed the crowd with stories from the set (he nicknamed Jude Law “Hotson,” short for “Hot Watson”) and said that, if the stories were right, in 20 years he would continue doing films for franchises he is already associated with, but likely would not be kick-starting any new ones. McAdams told us that she is, in fact, a girlie girl and loved the costuming for the film — with the exception of the corsets, which were made even tighter by the crew, who made her laugh while she dressed so they could pull even tighter.

Producer Joel Silver ended the press conference by sharing his enthusiasm for this take on the Sherlock Holmes franchise. On an unrelated note, Silver mentioned that the rumored He-Man movie, inspired by the classic cartoon was still in very early stages of discussion, and there was nothing concrete to share just yet.

The Box
In theaters October 30, 2009
Cameron Diaz took some time away from her usual comedy/romantic comedy fare for this thriller, which has a simple, effective plot device: a box. A mysterious stranger visits Diaz’s home while her husband (James Marsden, whom you may remember as Cyclops from the X-Men films) is at work, and makes her a very indecent proposal. If she pushes the button in this box, she’ll get $1 million dollars. The catch? Somewhere in the world, someone she doesn’t know will die, with no explanation of why. Oh, and she has 24 hours to decide, or the offer expires.

This film has morality at its core, and the cast had a great time debating the moral dilemmas that their characters face on a very compressed time frame. Marsden’s scientist character looks at the situation clinically, noting that the box is just a wooden box, and pressing the button inside couldn’t possibly kill anyone. Diaz told us that we push a button every day as we live our lives and go outside, eat the food we eat or make decisions that could be seemingly inconsequential. Hitting theaters right before Halloween, this movie looks to be a nice, thrilling break from the numerous slasher/horror films so common that time of year.

District 9
In theaters August 14, 2009
Written and directed by Neill Blomkamp, District 9 certainly is not your average science fiction story: Its budget is likely just a little bit more that the craft services budget on a lot of big-name, sci-fi films out there. The film, we find out, was born out of the unfortunate shelving of the Halo film that Peter Jackson and Blomkamp were working on together. When the film was shelved, Jackson still wanted to work with Blomkamp, so the South African director (who has shot ads for Citroen, Adidas and Nike) set off to make this film. It was all kept under the radar, and the first time most folks may have heard or seen of the movie is the thought -provoking ad campaign on bus shelters and billboards across the country.

Set in South Africa, we quickly see the not-so-subtle ties to the cultural and racial issues that have dominated the history of that nation. Non-violent aliens, refugees from their own planet, landed on Earth 30 years ago and are set up in a settlement camp called District 9. Their weapons have awesome power but, because it requires alien DNA, the human race has not been able to make them work. A field agent gets infected with a virus that begins to mutate his DNA, and the manhunt, or, in this case, alien hunt, begins.

The response from everyone who’s seen the film (sadly I did not get into the very intimate screening on Thursday) has been fairly unanimous praise about what Blomkamp and crew have been able to do with such a limited budget. The focus on telling a unique, compelling science fiction story which touches on so many parts of the human condition seems to have worked out quite well.
Jackson also shared a little of what he is working on now:

• Halo: The rights for the film have reverted back to Microsoft, and the corporation is deciding what it wants to do with the highly valuable franchise.
• The Lovely Bones: Jackson’s next film debuts December 11, with a trailer set to hit in early August.
• The Hobbit: The team is a few weeks away from submitting a first draft script to the studio.

— Matt Sugarman, Hulu’s Trailer Guy, and Jason Nellis, Hulu’s Jack of All Trades

Hulu: Who are your comedic inspirations?

Armando Iannucci:I love Woody Allen, Billy Connolly, Buster Keaton and anyone who writes lots of original, imaginative gags, like Monty Python.

How much of the spectacularly vulgar dialogue was improv and how much was scripted? It would seem that once you get a head of steam going like Peter Capaldi does, improv would follow …

Surprisingly little of the out-and-out vulgarity is improvised. We spend a lot of our time trying to make the swearing as interesting and as varied as possible, so we put a lot of thought into it. The cast are more than happy to learn the swearing syllable by syllable so it all spews out without a moment’s hesitation.

“The Swear Doctor:” fact or fiction? If that’s for real, how does one apply for that job?

In the credits, you see “Additional Dialogue by Ian Martin.” Ian has become known as our swearing consultant, simply because he’s very good at coming up with elaborate and articulate vitriol. He does more than this, though. I discovered him via a U.K.-based satirical website he does called Martian.fm, which I’d heartily recommend. It made me laugh, so I got in touch, and asked him to write.

How do you find the transition from directing television to directing film? What are the biggest challenges?

The biggest challenge was to avoid getting carried away. I wanted to avoid playing with the Director’s Big Box of Tricks, like swooping crane shots and Technicolor sunsets and parping comedy music. These things never make it any funnier. What I loved, though, was having more time to lay the story out, to play with the structure more, so I could delay the arrival of big characters and dramatic moments until well into the film. In TV, with 30 minutes, you have to get everything into the air within the first five minutes. With a 90- to 100-minute film, it’s great to focus on one group and one storyline for a while before choosing the moment to bring the next strand in.

Speaking of television, there has been buzz (perhaps wishful thinking) of adapting In The Loop as a cable series here in the U.S. Can you speak to that?

Well, early stages at the moment, and all I can say is that I’ve done a two-project deal with HBO to develop a couple of story ideas, one of which will be set in Washington, D.C., and the other of which will be somewhere else very, very different indeed.

This film is shaping up to the kind that people pass along as a found treasure. Do you feel that way about any movies or TV shows?

There was a show in the U.K. called Fifteen Stories High, set in a tower block, by comedian Sean Locke, which I thought was genius, but got buried and then forgotten. You can get it on DVD.

Sure, we had glimpses of what was to come through appearances on The Tonight Show, The Today Show and the MTV Movie Awards (a moment Eminem will surely never forget), as well as the trailer. But those clips don’t give it all away — there are dozens of moments meant to offend, shock and poke fun at society as Bruno travels the world in search of fame. We’ll just let the fashionista speak for himself:

Rebecca (rebecca.harper@hulu.com)
Editor

Hulu: Can you tell me a little about Lance Clayton, your character in World’s Greatest Dad?
Robin Williams: [He's] a writer with aspirations of writing a novel. He teaches poetry at a small private high school. I think it’s a private high school, or maybe a public school that has uniforms. And he has a very kind of tough son who’s fairly rough.

Yes, I saw the trailer and clips. He seems like he’s pretty difficult.
Yes, I think “difficult” is a better word. Thank you. He requires tough love and I try and give it, but I don’t know if I’m working very well at it. Kind of the opposite of Dead Poets Society.

Speaking of, I was going to ask — this isn’t the first time you’ve played a teacher, for instance, you did Dead Poets Society …
This one might be called “Dead Penis Society.”

Was your character already a poetry teacher in the script, or is that something you added?
No, no, he was already an English teacher. He has a poetry class that’s somewhat popular, but barely holding on, and they’re about to shut it down because of school cutbacks. I guess it’s the principal who says, “Your class isn’t very popular.” And I say, “Neither is poetry.” But it’s the idea that teaching it is kind of an optional class. He loves it, but not many people are attending.

What draws you to these teacher-type roles?
What drew me to this role was working with Bobcat and the father-son relationship. Teacher roles, this one — he’s not exactly the most successful teacher. So that’s why it’s a view of the other side of the coin. He’s an unpublished writer, too, so he’s got a lot of you know premise envy going on.

In the film, you and your son butt heads over Bruce Hornsby, so I wanted to ask, do you really like Bruce Hornsby?
Actually I do. I really like his music. It’s very sweet. I’ve been listening to it because I’ve been putting together a CD with some of his songs. I love a lot of his instrumentals especially. They’ve got a very Southern gentility about them, which I kind of love. The songs are very sweet and, I don’t know, they’re kind of melancholy when you listen to them. Maybe that’s just my state of mind. But I do, I do like him.

How much of the role was scripted versus what you brought to the character?
It was very well-written. … There’s no percentage. Given the fact that most of the players were friends and family, we’re real easy with each other, so we know we can go off on it. Especially the boy playing my son [Daryl Sabara], who’s really great at improvising, because we would try stuff and Bob would say, “OK, go a little further,” and we did. Which is rare, but when you have a director that you know that well, you feel safe enough to go “Sure, I’ll do it. Let’s try this.”

Do you think Lance is the “World’s Greatest Dad?”
Hardly. He’s a work in progress. I think he needs a lot of work, but he loves his son dearly and tries to do the best he can. It’s nurture versus nature sometimes, and he’s trying. Being a single dad, too, he’s got a lot going on. But he’s a dad, and all that implies. He has flaws, and obviously his son is pretty exacerbating. His son pushes the envelope a lot. [Lance] tries to be loving and kind and supportive, but at the same time going, “You’re a prick!”

How long have you known Bobcat?
Oh my god, 30 years, I think.

And what was it like working with him?
Wonderful. He’s a really brilliant guy. We have one image of him basically doing that one character he used to do in his standup years. [Makes whining noise.] You know, Bobscratch Goldfarb. But if you’ve seen his other movie, Sleeping Dogs Lie, you never see him shy away from unusual premises. He’s really knowledgeable in film and he’s, I think, a very good writer, too. So I think it was a great combination. And also I have total trust in him. Because as a friend, I went, “OK, let’s try this.” It was one of those movies where it was so simple. It’s kind of like working with Gus Van Sant. You don’t have to worry about anything, you just do it. We shot in Seattle and that also felt very comfortable because it was supposed to be based in Seattle. We weren’t in Vancouver pretending to be L.A.; it’s all in Seattle in a sweet, small, strange neighborhood. It felt great to shoot there and be part of this cast of people who, like I said, are mainly friends and family, so it’s even more comfortable. It borders on being a documentary that way.

That sounds really nice.
Oh it is, it’s really kind of… I don’t know. I think Bob is like Cassavetes. He gets together a group of people that know each other and are really comfortable with each other. You can try stuff, especially if you’re doing stuff as weird as this — you have to be comfortable and not feel like, “Um, what are we doing here?” You know what you’re doing.

You must have had some interesting moments on the set. Do you have any prize moments you’d like to share with us?
There was a strange moment where I’m on this supposed talk show, where all of a sudden this woman starts talking about my son. And it’s that weird thing where you’re caught in a lie, but at the same time, she’s going “He must have been an extraordinary boy.” At that point you realize, no actually he wasn’t. It’s that weird thing about remembering him and missing him, but also laughing at the giant joke of it all, the kind of a cruel joke. And then I find myself weeping and laughing at the same time. It was pretty strange. I think it was like a breakdown, but a strange one. And everyone was going, “Wow, I haven’t seen that before.” And neither have I. It was kind of interesting as it was going along, and then we finished the first take and Bob starts going, “Do you think you can do that again?” And I say, “Oh, yeah.”

The woman who was doing the interview was actually great because she did work on a local morning talk show, so she was perfect. I’m laughing and crying, and she kept going, “This must be very hard for you.” I was like, “Yeah, it really is.” It was this kind of surreal thing, and the audience gets it, and it’s huge. At this point, they kind of realize “You’re caught, dude.” There’s just a lot of that, trying things where it’s new. And to be there and do it and go “Yeah, let’s try it again,” and not be afraid to go again and see what we find. That’s kind of great. That’s kind of the moment where you’re like “Hey, this is why we make movies,” to find that moment. I haven’t seen that before. And Bob said when he saw that moment, “I haven’t seen it in the movies before.” I think it’s interesting.

It sounds like it was a really great experience for you.
I think it was. It’s tough material, but the people … when you work with people that good and that nice, it’s worth it. And that’s what I want to keep doing.

You’ve played a whole range of characters through your career, from Mork to, more recently, Teddy Roosevelt in the Night at the Museum movies. What have been some of your favorite roles?
I think it’d be the teacher in Dead Poets Society, Mr. Keating.The doctor in Awakenings because it’s based on a friend, Oliver Sacks. Parry in The Fisher King. Armand Goldman in Birdcage because it was a great ensemble of people. And Good Will Hunting.

All great roles.
They’re all experiences where the making of the movie means just as much as the movie itself. That, to me, is a great thing. And the characters, if you look at them, they’re pretty bizarre and quite different. Mrs. Doubtfire just because it’s massive. It’s like full-body puppeteering. Once you’re inside that makeup with the beanbag breasts, it’s like “Wait a minute. I’m a Muppet at this point.”

Are any of these roles a close reflection of you personally?
I don’t know. I don’t really know what “me” means, the core. But philosophically, Dead Poets. Psychically, Fisher King. Just because of that idea of being slightly damaged, I think. Awakenings in terms of the curiosity of the human brain and the mind, and the functionings of the human mind. I’ve been so fascinated by that stuff ever since I did Awakenings. I can’t really say one’s most like me. I think they all have parts of me. As anyone would say when they’re acting, you put a little of yourself in every role.

Robin, I want to thank you so much for your time.
I want to thank Hulu for this. Bob said the trailer has been doing great on Hulu. It’s so cool. For a movie this unusual … Hulu is great that way.

The film revisits some familiar Old Testament stories as a pair of lazy hunter-gatherers (Jack Black and Michael Cera) stumble on some key moments from the Book of Genesis. Given the talent involved with this Judd Apatow-produced film — joining Black and Cera are David Cross (another Arrested Development alum), Paul Rudd, Christopher “McLovin” Mintz-Plasse, Olivia Wilde (House) and more — there’s bound to be plenty of funny moments … if you’re low-brow Old Testament jokes, that is. (And really, who isn’t?)

“[Jack Black] reminded me of John Belushi, even though he never probably ever thought of copying anything Belushi did,” Ramis told us during our interview. “He plays these kind of lazy rascals really well, and that’s exactly what the character is. And then Judd Apatow suggested Michael Cera. … We put them together for a table reading for the studio and it was hysterical. Everybody loved it immediately and there was no doubt that they were the team.”

The full interview is available in the Movie Trailers discussions area. Want to share your thoughts? Simply reply to the thread to let us know what you think.

Rebecca (rebecca.harper@hulu.com)
Editor

Hulu spoke to director James Toback (The Pick-up Artist, Black and White) about the film and how his long-standing friendship with Tyson made it possible. You can read the interview in the discussions area just below the main page for the clip.

Rebecca Harper (rebecca.harper@hulu.com),
Editor, Hulu

While the live stream event has passed, we’ve worked some magic to get you the on-demand version right away, so you can watch Harry, Hermione and Ron to your heart’s content. Thanks for your patience, and we hope it was worth the wait.

Rebecca (rebecca.harper@hulu.com),
Hulu’s own Hermione

Hulu: You’ve said Bart Got a Room is semi-autobiographical. Can you tell us a little about Steven Kaplan, who plays the lead, Danny, and why you chose him?

Brian Hecker: There was a lot of pressure from the producers to cast someone who was a known actor. A lot of the kids who are in that 18-year range are very, very charismatic, very good-looking and very polished. And it was very important to me, based on having suffered through my adolescence, to find a kid who wasn’t a heartthrob. There’s no way I suffered through high school to have some kid with girls flanking him on a regular basis on the set.

Steve Kaplan came my way and he was such a charming, authentic and earnest actor. He’s a really, really cool kid and he was one of ten kids on this DVD from a New York talent agency. I had all the kids audition with the ice cream parlor rejection scene and I just really felt bad for him. He did the scene and my heart went out to him. He was so earnest and endearing, and I knew he was the boy to play Danny Stein, my alter ego — me as a nerd when I was 18. So I had him fly from New York to L.A. to read with William H. Macy. I knew that I would be able to convince everybody that Steven was right for the role because I’d just tell everybody that William H. Macy was insisting on him. That was my secret plan, because of course no one was going to question William H. Macy.
Now he’s one of two actors being considered for the lead in Brighton Beach Memoirs, the Neil Simon revival on Broadway.

I was just reading a review of Bart Got a Room and the article mentioned how your film is reminiscent of Brighton Beach Memoirs.

That is a great honor, to be associated with Neil Simon, because he was certainly an influence in many respects to my writing.

You worked with an all-star cast: William H. Macy, Cheryl Hines and Jennifer Tilly. Were there any great moments on the set?

This is a case of life imitating art imitating life because the movie is based on my life growing up as a kid with these embarrassing parents. William H. Macy and Cheryl Hines play my divorced parents in the movie. And on the set, my parents were very supportive and helpful. My dad helped find some really cool locations for the movie and my mother was very involved with the extras casting. She helped get hundreds of seniors in the retirement communities of South Florida to be in the background. My mom is a frustrated actress who used to perform with the community theater and perform songs. And there would be times between takes when William H. Macy and my mom would sing songs while he strummed his ukulele in his trailer. It was a really cool, thrilling experience, a real family affair. Not only is this movie, in a way, about my experiences, but to have my family so actively involved in the filming was a real thrill.

Did you manage to get your parents in the film?

Cheryl Hines plays a realtor in South Florida in the movie and my mom is an extra in one of the scenes; she’s a realtor in the background. My dad and mom are both in the big bar mitzvah scene where everyone’s running around dancing the horah. In one of the frames, you can see William H. Macy with the curly hair. My dad, with the same curly hair, is in the background. They’re mirror images almost.

What do your parents think, now that this film is out there for everyone to see?

Of course it exposes our family’s idiosyncrasies in a way for thousands of people to see, but I think they’re charmed by it ultimately. As much as the movie talks about the ways they embarrassed me growing up, it’s also a celebration of how much unconditional love and support they’ve given me over the years. The parents, in a way, are the heroes of the film. To a certain extent the movie starts out being about the prom, but it’s really a celebration of family. In a way, it’s a love letter to my parents.

I think that’s evident. It ends up being a wonderful, touching story about family.

We opened at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York last year. My dad hadn’t seen the movie, but I asked him to come and wear one of his cream-colored suits. He was in the audience with about 450 people while I was up on stage for a Q&A. Someone asked me why I chose to have William H. Macy wear curly hair, and I said “Dad, could you stand up for a moment?” He stood up in the middle of the audience, and here was my dad in the cream-colored suit and the curly hair and everyone was laughing really hard at that. He just stood there with a big, goofy grin. It was a pretty funny moment.

What do you think makes this different from other coming-of-age prom flicks?

One of things that I sort of went into this moving thinking was if, for example, Woody Allen wanted to do a teen movie, what would it be? So it’s sort of like a John Hughes movie or Judd Apatow movie-meets-Woody Allen. A lot of teen movies hyperfocus just on the element of teenagers, the high school arena. I think that, sometimes, it’s funnier or even more accurate to take a step back and look at all the variables that surround the teenager’s experience, and family is a big part of it. What does a teen go through not only in high school, but also with their family? It’s sort of a portal into someone’s psyche. To me, that was really important, to have a three-dimensional perspective of what this boy’s going through. I think that John Hughes does this really well, and Judd Apatow certainly does that.

The movie uses South Florida as a setting, which gives it a timeless feel. Can you talk a little about the location?

The setting was really important to me. We tried to establish this timeless quality of a retirement community sort of stuck in another time. To me, a lot of the best movies, especially in the teen genre, particularly the John Hughes films — and Risky Business in particular -— are very much about a place, an environment. And those movies have a timeless quality about them. They’re very, very specific. It was really important to shoot this in South Florida, the area I grew up, and to utilize all these elements that are indigenous to that particular region. I wanted every frame to somehow include a color palette that was reflective of that environment. We rented egrets and lizards. We had seniors in every frame, and tried to incorporate the puffy white clouds against the baby blue sky, the golf courses, and all of the homes off of canals, with water very present in the movie. The cumulative effect of that was to add this quirky but still very specific flavor and tone to the movie.

You can catch the Two Lovers preview in Hulu’s movie trailers section, where you’re free to email it to your friends, post it to your Facebook profile, or embed it on your personal blog. To read the Q&A with Gray, just scroll down to the discussion boards for that video.

We’ll continue to offer little extras like this going forward — it’s a great way to build a community around our favorite films. Enjoy the trailer, and feel free share your thoughts in the video’s discussions.

Rebecca (rebecca.harper@hulu.com),
Editor

If you missed Quantum of Solace in theaters over the weekend, get a taste of the action by previewing its trailer, also featured in Hulu’s Movie Trailers section, home to previews of upcoming releases, current hits and recent blockbusters. It’s a great way to get a feel for what’s coming to a theater near you and, like other videos on Hulu, you’re free to email your favorites to friends, post them on your MySpace or Facebook page, or embed them on your personal website.

Shaken, not stirred,

Rebecca

rebecca.harper@hulu.com

Editor

Hulu’s Movie Trailers page gives you the chance to see what the buzz is all about for movies like Watchmen, Terminator: Salvation and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, plus many others.You can post these trailers to your Facebook account, MySpace page, or other social networking sites; embed them on your blog; or just email them to your friends. And, like any other video you share on Hulu, you can send or post the whole trailer or just the part you want your friends to see.

You can access the movie trailers page from hulu.com/trailers at any time. We’ll make frequent updates, so you’ll want to check back often. In the meantime, make up some popcorn, sit back, and enjoy the show; then use our discussion boards or reviews to share your thoughts with the rest of Hulu.

Rebecca (rebecca.harper@hulu.com),
Editor

Sarah Jessica Parker recently appeared on Inside the Actor’s Studio to discuss the film, as well as the impact of the original series. We have a number of clips from her interview with James Lipton, including this one, where she talks about getting back into the role of Carrie Bradshaw after a four-year break:

I can’t wait to see what happens with Carrie and Big, but until showtime, I’m catching up with the girls, thanks to clips like this one from Hollywood News:

You can find more clips in our Sex and the City: The Movie collection.

Here’s to a fairy tale ending, (Taunya)

Get your popcorn and check it out for yourself this Memorial Day weekend.

Have a great weekend everyone,

Eric (eric.feng@hulu.com)