DARE I ASK WHO? Like John Hawkes, actually. I had him come in and read. . . . And he’s so open to . . . like, he was a fan of my early recordings and performance works, so he really was, like, open to doing it as I would do it. And he was actually the one where I realized, okay, this was a great performance that he just did. If I’m not happy with this, maybe I should just figure out how to do it myself.
WELL, YOU DID A FINE JOB OF DISTINGUISHING YOUR PERFORMANCE OF PAW-PAW APART FROM YOUR ROLE AS SOPHIE. DID YOU WRITE THE ROLE OF JASON WITH HAMISH LINKLATER IN MIND? No, I wrote it, and then I had the impossible task of casting my own boyfriend, which seems fun for about four seconds, then . . . you know? [Laughs.] Yeah, it was . . . the thing I needed was someone with some humor, who could also be quite soulful, and who looked right. I wanted to be simplistic almost, about him looking right, and Marshall not looking right for me. Might as well use the visual medium.
AND DAVID WARSHOFSKY’S SUCH A WONDERFUL CHARACTER ACTOR. . . . Yeah. I love David. And then, Jason had to be my age, and there are a lot of talented people who are about six years younger than me.
AND HAMISH LINKLATER HAS A SIMILAR HAIRCUT TO YOURS; WAS THIS INTENTIONAL? We had that! [Laughs.] His hair was longer at the time, so it took me a while to realize that I cut it like mine, and I realized, “Oh, it is just like mine.”
THE LONGER SOME COUPLES STAY TOGETHER, THE MORE THEY BEGIN TO RESEMBLE ONE ANOTHER. Yeah, yeah. So, he was a lucky, lucky find.
HOW MANY OTHER ACTORS DID YOU LOOK AT FOR THE ROLE? Oh, so many. I mean, you don’t even want to know. Like, around the world, too. I was like, “Who knows? Maybe Jason’s from France, or Germany or Norway.” I mean, I honestly auditioned or met with great actors around the world.
WAS IT EASIER TO CAST THE ROLE OF MARSHALL? No, because people wondered if maybe I could cast a star in that role, or someone who was a star, a former star, because it seemed plausible. I was open to that to a point. I was also like, well wouldn’t it be cool if you didn’t know when you first saw him that he was going to become an important character? And you can’t have that if he’s a star. So, I met with a lot of well-known people, but I had my eye on David from early on and, ultimately, my financing was such that I had free reign, in that I had so little money. [Laughs.]
WATCHING HOW TIME UNFOLDS IN THIS FILM, IT WAS QUITE ENJOYABLE FINDING THE RHYTHM OF YOUR NARRATIVE. WAS THIS ENTIRELY SCRIPTED, OR DID YOU DISCOVER THE PACE WHILE EDITING? It’s all scripted, the idea of time stopping for one character, but going on for another one. The exact cuts, of course, I had certain ideas about how that rhythm would be that of course change while you’re looking at it, but yeah, the whole thing is basically as written.
WHAT CAMERA SYSTEM DID YOU USE FOR SHOOTING? The Red camera.
