Here's Some Foolproof Advice for Making Your First Movie (Hint: It Involves Jessica Chastain and Waiting 10 Years)

The director of one of this year's most ambitious films discusses his long-in-the-making love story, starring Jessica Chastain and James McAvoy.

Image via The Weinstein Company

If you think Marvel's The Avengers movies are ambitious, just watch The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby in all three of its forms: Him, Her, and Them. It's a tragic love story told from the two perspectives within a relationship. Him focuses on James McAvoy's character, Connor, as he struggles to keep his restaurant afloat while salvaging what's left of his marriage; Her is seen through the eyes of Eleanor Rigby (Jessica Chastain), who becomes hardened and depressed after an inexplicable tragedy destroys her relationship with Connor. Both movies clock in a little over an hour-and-a-half, so Them is the two-hour combination of both. And although that combination is just as poignant, the story was always meant to be seen in its two parts. It's been that way for over a decade now.

About 11 years ago, writer/director Ned Benson met a then-unknown Jessica Chastain at an L.A. film festival where he was screening his short to an audience of about 12. Enthusiastic to work with him, Chastain, a struggling actress who had just moved to the City of Broken Dreams, helped Benson develop this two-part love story that he wrote with and for her. Then untested by Hollywood, the pair struggled to convince the bigwigs to take a chance on an ambitious intimate movie. Unbeknownst to them and every investor they met with, Chastain would go onto become one of the industry's most in-demand Academy Award nominees. And now what was once a pipe-dream of a film (or films, rather) is here, in theaters now, and Benson, a first-time feature film director, is actually fielding Oscar questions about it.

What inspired you to write this story?

I was walking through Central Park one evening in June about 10 years ago and all these fireflies started flaring. I just thought it was so damn beautiful. I thought, “Wow, what is the scene that belongs here? What can I write?” And that is what inspired the whole script for me.

I knew I wanted to write a love story. I was talking to Jessica [Chastain] about the script and she was asking me questions about Eleanor Rigby and then all of a sudden a light bulb went off and I was like, “Oh my god, the only way to tackle a relationship on film is to show both sides of the relationship and both different perspectives.” Ultimately I had a story in which I could use the two sides. Showing that would ultimately fulfill what I think a relationship is, and it's two separate experiences that become a part of this cumulative whole. 

Did Jessica Chastain help you write the female perspective?

One hundred percent. I placed myself in the characters while I was writing them, but Jessica helped me a lot with the details in the scenes. Jessica’s best friend, Jess Weixler, played her sister in the movie. They went to Juilliard together and they had this idea of eating ice cream in the bathtub while they were talking or helping each other get ready for dates. It's those little things I don't necessarily think I would've known to write.

Why was it such a challenge initially to convince the studio to make these two films?

Because I am the wild card. I’m a first-time director and nobody knows whether I can pull anything off or if I'm just some idiot, which is definitely still possible. [Laughs.] Jessica and my producer were unknown, too. You had unknown people trying to make a really difficult concept: a two-part love story, which really hadn’t been done before. Everybody was like, ”Are you crazy?” And then ultimately Jessica’s career took off and that definitely helped. She was so passionate about the project that we started to gain a little bit of momentum and then we would fail and then we would gain more momentum and we failed again.

About eight months before we started shooting, Jessica had The Help come out, which did really well and got her an Oscar nomination. Then James McAvoy said yes the second time I asked—​at first, he didn't want to deal with the subject matter because he just had a son. So that combination of James with Jessica and the moment that she was having persuaded investors to finance us.

1.

At any point within those 10 years, were you ready to quit on the film?

I kind of distracted myself because I was writing for hire trying to make my living. I had tried to put other movies together that fell apart as well, but of course it's the one that is impossible that gets made. [Laughs.] There were days when I wanted to pull my hair out, but I had Jess and my producer Cassandra [Kulukundis] supporting me and pushing me and believing in me the whole time. At the end of the day, that's what puts you over the top. You're pretty much delusional until it becomes a reality and without their support, I don’t know that I would've gotten to be sitting here talking to you right now.

Growing up in the city, were there any New York love stories or rom-coms that shaped your idea of love?

I mean, there's so much. I loved watching movies like Manhattan and Annie Hall. There are also references to A Man and a Woman in the movie, which is a French film. Those were sort of the basis of where I was coming from. 

What kind of kid were you growing up?

I was definitely a romantic because I wanted to be a writer, though I think my identity was confused because I was an athlete but I also loved theater, and writing, and the arts, and I didn’t know really where I fit. But I always knew I wanted to be a part of movies.

Were your parents in the industry? 

No, my mom was a teacher and my dad was a banker, so I had no one to tell me how to write or direct. I was an English major at Columbia and I loved film and was making movies with friends. Ultimately I learned how to direct own my own, but I did have support from my family. I’m sure at one point they were like, “What are you doing?” Like six years after college and I am still banging my head against the wall trying to make this two-part love story. [Laughs.]

Do you think there is room for passion projects in Hollywood that studios would be open to? How do you wish things would change?

I would love that to be the case. I think the space does exist in independent film, but obviously, as the studios get more corporate, they have these bottom lines that they need to meet. They have such huge investments in these tentpole movies, which are the ones that make the money, but at the end of the day, there is space to make these smaller films.

I'm hoping that people will see that sometimes it's worth the risk to do something much more personal and to have these passion projects. But at some point, you have to get really lucky. I had a great cast and I can’t say that this movie would be interesting if I didn’t have the great actors that I was working with. There are so many elements that go into why a film has more exposure or not, and one of them is finding a collaboration that works in order to get these films moving.

I want to do what I can to support other first-time filmmakers that are trying to do something different, because I think I got really lucky. I'm really grateful to have had this opportunity and I hope others do, too. 

Tara Aquino is the Pop Culture editor who absolutely loves this movie and will recommend it to everyone and anyone. She tweets here.

Latest in Pop Culture