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Most recent update: Sept. 20, 2012.

Radnor explained that Jesse is grappling with some of the same arrested development as his “HIMYM” character, but said that he hopes his movie delves slightly deeper into life, love and early adulthood in New York City than his day job does.

“It’s, to me, a kind of loving but hopefully honest exploration of some really deep questions about nostalgia and aging and growing older, the purpose of reading, of a liberal arts education, of how the kind of analytical mind can both save you and turn on you,” he said. “There’s a lot of things going on in ‘Liberal Arts’ maybe that you can’t quite tackle in 22 minutes on television.”

Radnor spoke with Moviefone on a press day ahead of the film’s release and answered our nagging questions about channeling a teenage girl, being 19 forever and who, exactly, he thinks is “HIMYM”’s titular mother.

Read more behind the cut, or at Moviefone, where this interview was originally published.

They say to write what you know. Your character, Jesse, is not so different from you. You don’t have too much life experience as a 19-year-old girl though.
You think?! In an early draft there are a couple more colloquial things that I was trying to do to point to her youth. I softened some of that and let her be as sophisticated as she wanted to be. What’s so great about Lizzie is there’s this great kind of mash-up of elements with her: She’s very sophisticated, she’s got kind of an old soul, poetic quality to her, but at the same time, every once in awhile, she’ll remind you that she’s a young person. She’s got this adolescent goofiness that pokes out at points. [But] this is not a pro-dating-college-students-when-you’re-too-old-to-do-that movie. I don’t think anyone would see the movie and think that. [To imaginary audience:] Hello! Who’s with me!

In the movie your character’s favorite professor talks about feeling forever like he’s 19 years old, even though he’s obviously not. Is there a certain age you feel inside?
I remember I had a friend in college who felt like a 50-year-old, like he’s just waiting to be 50. And he still feels like that, and it’s just amazing. It always felt to me like he was a little out of place there. I think that there’s definitely some truth to that feeling, that you always feel like you’re a little bit 19 and adulthood is basically a put-on. We’re all acting like we’re responsible enough to do all this stuff and we’re really not, we’re all these scared 19-year-olds who have been given far too much responsibility. But at the same time, I feel like — and maybe one of the reasons I wrote the movie — was to allow myself to grow up, or to retire some of the old thoughts or parts of my personality that were no longer all that useful. Maybe it’s a matter of kind of adjusting to whatever age you are and realizing that’s perfect.

So many important set pieces — Kenyon College, a hotly contested vampire book that’s obviously “Twilight,” David Foster Wallace’s “Infinite Jest” — go unnamed. Was that intentional?
Not naming the books and everything was very intentional. The music, I name Beethoven and Wagner, Wordsworth, Keats, Blake, these are people who are canonized and kind of in the public domain. Because I was going for that timeless quality that the college evokes, I was careful only to list things that had earned their place in the pantheon, whereas some of the more modern references I felt, one, if two characters are discussing “Infinite Jest” by David Foster Wallace, they don’t really need to say “Infinite Jest” by David Foster Wallace. They probably wouldn’t say that. They would only be saying that for the audience’s benefit. The second is that once you name something, people have a response to it. They have an opinion about it. So if I say, “This is my favorite book,” people either say, “I don’t know that book,” and “Oh, should I know that book?” Or, “Oh, I read that book, I don’t like that book,” and suddenly their arms are folded.

There’s also a lack of social networking in the movie. Zibby and Jesse communicate through hand-written letters.
I want the movies to age really well, so my movies don’t have any references to Twitter or Facebook or anything that we’re talking about these days because in 30 years I want these movies to be really watchable and feel really relevant, so I want to be careful of that. If I talk about something that’s too kind of hot button today, I think it dates the movie.

Your character bonds with another troubled college student, Dean, over “Infinite Jest,” and he says that the book sort of consumed him. Is that book important to you personally?
I’m a huge Wallace fan, and I’ve read almost everything by Wallace. Right when I was in grad school, I was traveling and I was backpacking and I brought Wallace and it was this terrible travel companion because it was so heavy! I read half of it, but I keep meaning to go back to it and finish it. He’s a really important writer to me and I was really devastated by his suicide so partly the scene with Dean in the hospital was a way to both celebrate and love him, and a way to be a little bit angry at him for leaving us.

What other books have made a personal impact on you?
Certain books are really important at a time of your life, like I remember my senior year of high school just being bowled over by “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” and I don’t know if that book would stand up to scrutiny of myself right now. I remember right when I got out of college reading “The Unbearable Lightness of Being,” and felt that that book was really telling me something. Again, I don’t know if I revisited that book if it would still do that. I think that the mark of a great book is that it will meet you wherever you’re at and you’ll feel and experience something new and different each time you read it.

The movie is really kind of sweet and earnest, in a time where it seems like cynicism reigns supreme.
That’s how I see the world. I don’t know a lot of evil people, and if I do, I try to get away from them. I try to surround myself with good people, and as a filmmaker it’s interesting when people call my films nice or earnest. I wonder if that’s a criticism a little bit? I don’t think it is, coming from you, but earnest can be kind of a dirty word. I think we’re in a time where to be cynical or negative is considered to be sophisticated. “Oh, you’re seeing the world clear-eyed because the world is really nasty.” But I think the world is very complicated and complex and varied, I think the world is a lot of things and it’s up to us to decide what we’re gonna lean into and what kind of world we’re going to create, because it’s a much more participatory process than we realized. Cynicism is kind of like folding your arms and stepping back and commenting on things, like the old guys in The Muppets, just throwing out comments all the time, whereas there are other people on the ground really trying to affect things and improve their lives and the lives of other people. I think it’s noble and I think it’s cool. The same way that Zibby says talk about what you love and keep quiet about what you don’t, I really believe that.

So “How I Met Your Mother “has been on for a little bit now…
117 years. Kidding.

…and this could be the last season. Do you want it to be the last season?
Right now I really feel like, I have four, four-and-a-half months a year to play with every year, and the idea of having 12 months, mapping out a year, to have all that time, feels really exciting to me. At the same time, if they can work out some sort of deal with all of us and with the writers, none of us are saying like “Get me out of here,” anything other than “Man, if we finished after eight, that would also be amazing.” I think that they need to figure out something, because they have to let the writers know if they’ll be ending this year or next year. It’ll all be figured out in due time, but I think we need to get this figured out for the writers.

I’ve been watching the show forever, and I have to ask: Do you know who the mother is?
No, and there’s a nice little tease about that at the first episode. I think it’s a good sign that people ask about that a lot, because there’s real investment in the show, but at the same time, for me playing the character I’m playing it forward, I have to play it with some naivete, so it serves me better not to know anything. I don’t try and do a lot of snooping around, I just go week to week and see what misfortunes befall poor Mr. Mosby.

So what you’re saying is that Marshall’s the mother.
Marshall might be. Fingers crossed.

Together, Miller and Graynor’s characters navigate the choppy waters of friendship, romance, making rent, and talking with a giant dildo shoved into the corner of your mouth, to hilarious and heartfelt effect.

Prior to the release of the movie, Miller called BUST to talk about making your own destiny, wrapping raunchiness in an “adorable pink bow,” and her father’s favorite euphemism for a certain male organ.

Read the Q&A behind the cut, or at BUST, where it was originally published.

This is absolutely a movie that my friends and I would have seen together in college and quoted to each other every day. Now we’ve all graduated, so it’s gonna have to be gchat quoting.

That’s what we want. Now you’re too cool and you’re older.

This movie has been your life for years, between the writing and development, production, the shoot itself and post-production, and now press and finally a theatrical release. That’s a lot of buildup. Since it’s an indie, you really have your hands in every aspect.

We wrote the script three years ago and tried to make it in the studio world, but it was a pre-Bridesmaids time. The script was met with so much praise and love; Katie and I probably had 50 or 60 meetings all over town. Everyone loved it, but no one wanted to make it, because they kept saying female R-rated comedies don’t do well. So as the story goes, I was traveling and I was in a hotel room and I had this Lost In Translationmoment where it was like, “What am I doing with my life?”

As far as acting goes, it was something I’d been trying to do for a long time and it was going truly nowhere. The year before Sundance, I’d had five auditions. In a year! I just had this moment where I was like, “You know what, if this is ever going to happen for me, I’m going to make it happen for myself.”

I’m a big believer in making your own destiny and taking control of your life, so I sent Katie this email and said, “Look, we have this script and the character is based on me, her name is Lauren, and I know we can do it. We’ll make it on our own and we’ll produce it and maybe Ari Graynor will be in it, and maybe it’ll be at Sundance next year, and that’s what we’re gonna do!” And that’s what happened! I keep saying I need to email Katie again and say, “And then we’re gonna win the lottery!”

So you wrote the part of Katie specifically for Ari Graynor after seeing her as the drunk best friend in Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist.

I didn’t see it right when it came out, I saw it a few months later. I was out traveling and I watched it in a hotel room. I never forgot about it. Years passed, and I never forgot about what an incredible and truly inspired performance she gave for this supporting character.

So when we sat down to write the script, we had it in our heads of how great she would be [as the lead]. But we were gonna make the movie in the studio world, we weren’t allowed to send the script to her, which is insane, because you’ve seen it: No one could play that part but her! But it wasn’t the case. That moment that we decided to make it on our own, she was the very first step.

I loved her in that movie too. She should be way more famous than she is.

Right? Well, I’m sure after this, she will be. I told her, you’ll never be able to go to The Grove [mall in L.A.] again.

You said that studio execs turned their noses up at R-rated, female-led comedies. Now, we not only have your movie and Bridesmaids, but Bachelorette and so many others. Do you just want to run back there and give the studios the what-for now?

It’s interesting, because the script, we wrote it three years ago, before Bridesmaids was even shot. And I think that movies go in trends. In the ‘80s there was an incredible boom of female comedies, with Bette Midler and Shelley Long and all of those talented women. But that sort of wave subsided for a while, and then there were kind of amazing romantic comedies that were kind of about women getting the guy.

That’s great, and I love those movies as much as anyone else, but I also wanted to be a movie that wasn’t about that and was just about females being powerful and being friends and being individuals and really explore that delicate intense relationship that can be female friendship. We’re excited that Bridesmaids sort of opened the door and proved that there was an audience for these movies, and we’re just excited to be a part of it and hope to keep doing it.

Are you going to ride that wave, then? Are you and Katie working on anything now?

Yes, I want to continue writing these movies. I’m working on some stuff, nothing I can talk about, I’m sorry. We do have a lot of ideas, and hopefully we’ll continue these female stories not just about finding a guy and not just about falling down.

The movie focuses on the friendship between Katie and Lauren, but each of them have a romantic entanglement plot. Was there ever a version of the movie that didn’t have a male love interest at all, or was there always a romantic element?

[We had] many different levels of romance throughout the story process. Charlie, that character [who dumps Lauren at the onset of the film and reappears later, played byLone Star’s James Wolk], had many different levels of how involved he was, and he came back in a different way. In one version he came back and proposed.

I think we found the perfect balance, because I think that females, we are romantic, and we love romances and love. It was so important for Ari’s character, Katie, to explore that romantic world and her feelings and her emotions in that way. It’s Lauren who helps Katie become someone who is open to a romantic relationship, because she couldn’t before.

Do you think there will ever be a movie about women that doesn’t have a romantic plot element?

I definitely think there could, for sure, absolutely. Maybe we’ll write it. Women go to the movies too. We want to see movies about us, just like anyone wants to see a movie about themselves. Also, I think movies are an amazing way to take a break from reality and that can be done in so many different ways. It could be incredible to have a movie that’s just about friendship, and I would hope that it would be accepted the same way that our movie has been accepted. I think it would be great.

What’s your favorite female buddy comedy?

It’s a tough choice between Clueless and — well, I’m just gonna go with  Clueless. It’s my favorite friendship movie. Actually, it’s just a perfect movie.

There were a lot of little ‘80s touches in this, from Ari’s omnipresent jumpsuits to the hot pink rotary phones and other things, but it’s set in the present and there’s a very millennial quality to it too — the whole DIY small business idea, single girls living in the city, all that. What’s behind the retro detailing?

I think that while our movie is somewhat realistic, we created a world here. I credit that entirely to [director] Jamie [Travis], who really is the one who gave the movie its look, and our amazing designer Sue Tebbutt, and our amazing costume designer Maya Lieberman. They were the ones who really brought this world alive.

We were really influenced by movies in the ‘80s, that was part of it. It was Jamie who had the idea, this is Katie’s grandmother’s apartment, maybe she’ll wear some of her grandmother’s clothes and be a little Mrs. Wilper. Maya was the one who was like, “These are girls, let’s make them as cute as possible in this candy-colored world.”

I think that it’s part of also why our movie is accessible. It has that raunchy, that sexy, that bawdiness to it, but because it comes in that adorable pink bow, it becomes more accessible for people who may shy away from it if it were just this gritty tale.

In the movie, your character Lauren is shocked to discover that her new roommate Katie has a night job as a phone sex operator. Of course, this is based on real-life Lauren, you, and real-life Katie, your college roommate who also co-wrote and co-produced the movie with you. What was your reaction to finding out that real-life Katie was talking dirty for money?

Katie did phone sex out of her freshman year dorm room at Florida State, which she told me when we lived together the following year. She came into my room one night clutching her pink fliers and she told me all about it and she said she may start doing it again, working for another company. It was interesting for me. I’m not as judgemental as movie Lauren and I was like, “Look, if that’s what you wanna do, then do it, but I don’t want to hear about it. Keep it in your room.” I’m a big believer in doing what makes you happy and what works for you and that’s what worked for Katie in college. It was a great story for her to tell always, and the perfect place to set our movie.

In the movie, you eventually take up a rotary phone of your own. Did you ever try it in college?

No, I never did! I hate being so disappointing in giving that answer, but I did not. Much to my husband’s displeasure, I did not.

Did Katie ever coach you on how to do phone sex for the movie?

Well, I’d heard enough about it over the years that I had a pretty good idea, but the movie’s not a phone sex documentary in any way shape or form. It wasn’t about being true to the calls that she had way back then or phone sex calls that are happening now, it was about being funny and entertaining and realizing what the locations that our characters are in and who are playing them, and how to turn our audience on with laughter, not with sex.

There have to be some good stories from a set dressed with a stripper pole and a wide array of dildos.

I think one of the funniest things on set was how desensitized we got to it all. For example, with the dildos. We loved when the production designer would be like, “Dildos in, dildos out?” And we’d be like “Dildos in! They’re in!” And, frankly, what was most uncomfortable to shoot were those real moments between Ari and Mark Webber [who play’s Graynor’s love interest]. They were the ones with the real chemistry, telling the real tale. Those were the moments on set when you’d be like, “Woo! That was spicy!” and flush a little.

In the credits for The Dark Knight Rises, someone was credited as the batsuit wrangler. Did your movie have a dildo wrangler?

Oh, God, we did kind of! They didn’t have that title in our credits, but we had amazing prop guys. The scene where we put them in our mouths, they had a dildo washing station. They had so much fun, they made a sign for it that said dildo washing station. Everyone just could not have had more fun with it.

Did you take any souvenirs from the set?

I have a pink phone. Katie and I each have a pink phone.

No commemorative dildos?

No dildos, unfortunately. I wish I’d gotten the bedazzled one, but I don’t know who got that one. Maybe Katie did.

In the movie, your character is mortified when her parents find out that she’s a phone sex operator. How did your parents react to you spending years of your life writing a movie about talking dirty?

I sent the script to my dad early on in the writing process, because he’s a big movie fan, and I really wanted to get his thoughts and he really wanted to read it. It was like oh god oh god we’re sending it to my dad. His notes in the script were that we weren’t being creative enough with the terms for penis. He put a list of suggestions in there. I was like, “Oh God, Dad, please stop talking like this!”

What did he suggest?

He really wanted “schvantz” in there.

“When I first started getting read and I started having [meetings] and Bachelorette made The Black List [a peer-nominated Hollywood list of the best unproduced screenplays], it was like, ‘So you’re a female Neil LaBute!’” Headland, who made her name as a playwright, said. “And you wouldn’t say, ‘You’re a gentile Neil Simon,’ you know what I mean? You wouldn’t say, ‘You’re a white John Singleton.’ Women are actually the majority in this country, so why are you using that adjective to describe my writing? Why can’t you just say it’s like Neil LaBute, which I would take as a huge compliment?”

Read more behind the cut, or at The Hairpin, where this feature was originally published.

As moviegoers will soon find out, Headland’s writing is, well, pure Headland. Whether it’s Isla Fisher as party animal Katie goading Kirsten Dunst’s type-A Regan into licking the sidewalk to admit defeat (“just a little cat lick”) or Lizzy Caplan’s bitter mean girl, Gena, expounding on the appropriate level of blowjob enthusiasm for every occasion (“I’ll give you a 6 after a fight when we’re making up. An 8 when you spent a shitload of money on me or get me something that’s a sweet gift or something. I’ll do a full 8”), Headland’s Bachelorette-isms are distinctly different from film dialogue in recent memory.

The same goes for her decidedly unladylike — but lifelike — characters. Caplan, Dunst and Fisher stomp through the movie fueled by cocaine and petty high school bitterness, coupled with the inevitable wear and tear that comes from life’s little frictions. The trio, which Fisher laughingly referred to as “the bitchelorettes,” portray high school friends brought together to celebrate the nuptials of their clique’s fourth member, Becky (played by Rebel Wilson). Old resentments and judgements also come to the party: the whip-thin trio compare their lives to Rubenesque Becky’s and glower, wondering how it is that she’s the first to the altar, seemingly “having it all.” Which, of course, she doesn’t — no one does. Not Katie, who seeks validation through wild partying and one night stands, using a sleek physique to mask low intellect and high insecurity, nor Regan, who so craves control that she sticks her fingers down her throat, nor Gena, whose rampant drug use and guns-blazing sarcasm keep past traumas at bay. Even Becky, still haunted by classmates’ past taunts of “pig face,” and that nagging inner monologue whispering that she’ll never shine in a sea of beautiful girls. Nor you, nor me, for that matter.

Some critics have slammed the movie, saying the characters’ bad decisions (mountains of cocaine, purposeful vomiting, cruel remarks, general hot mess-ness) indicate bad characters, which Headland called out as a sign of the male/female double standard.

“Little did I know that everyone was going to have a nervous breakdown about it. ‘Women doing drugs!’ I was like, ‘Oh, God. Get over it,’” she said. “It just didn’t occur to me until later, when the play was up” — a version of Bachelorette was also performed onstage — “and people were like, ‘We fucking hate this,’ and I was like, ‘Oh, OK, well, if they were all 40 and men and it was calledHurlyburly and starring Christopher Walken, you’d love it.”

In addition to being three-dimensional, the women (and men; Adam Scott, James Marsden, and Kyle Bornheimer star as equally hapless groomsmen) of the film are also living believable lives. These anti-heroines don’t have a Transformative Moment in which everything suddenly comes together. Katie doesn’t suddenly grow smarts, Regan doesn’t relax, Gena doesn’t let her guard down, and Becky doesn’t forget her past demons. Covered — to varied degrees — in vomit, their status at the film’s close is the same as any honest woman’s: working on it.

To that point, Headland said that she identifies with all of her work-in-progress characters. No one character is based on her — they all are.

“I’m Regan when I work, Gena when I wake up in the morning. I’m Katie — what’s really sad is that men think they’re getting in bed with Gena, and then they wake up with Katie,” she said. “They’re like, ‘Oh God!’ and then I’m this like sad little girl who’s just sort of like, ‘Do you like me? Do I look OK?’ And they, like, thought I was going to be somebody else. I’m like, ‘Please just like me, please just like me.’

“The thing that’s probably most autobiographical is just the sentiment of the piece. Like, this sucks. This really sucks. I feel inadequate as a woman and I’m not exactly sure why, and I’m not exactly sure why I was handed a piece of paper that said ‘feminism’ at the top and it was actually just a to-do list of things I was supposed to get done by the time I was 30. I was just like, what the fuck is this? That’s not — I don’t want it all. I don’t actually want that.”

Bachelorette isn’t a downer, though — the easiest sumary is Mean Girls times two, divided by The Hangover, plus Bridesmaids, plus a pile of narcotics, minus a rom-com with a rosy, happy ending. While the trio brood and barf, they also have a driving purpose: in a lightheartedly bitchy moment, two of the svelte girls demonstrate that they can fit in Becky’s tent-like dress together. Unsurprisingly, it rips. Mission impossible: repair the dress before dawn. Havoc ensues.

If the the essential thread of the film is that hell is other people (and yourself), then it’s bolstered by Headland’s opinion that hell is other people at a wedding.

“Both my younger sisters have gotten married, and I was like, ‘Why is everyone such assholes at a wedding?’” Headland said of her inspiration for the story. “I just couldn’t believe it. I was like, ‘Why isn’t anyone making a movie about what fucking dicks people are?’ It’s like, really? This woman is getting married and pledging eternity to this dude and you’re making this whole night about you? Like those people who sit in the front row and sob, like wahhhh! This is about your own self pity. This has nothing to do with you being happy for someone.”

If there’s one thing Headland stressed, other than the fact that high school truly never ends, it’s the need to make your own happy endings. There is no universal checklist for fulfilment, and no right way to live your life. Spouse, no spouse; kids, no kids; fat, skinny; sober, not — there’s no definitive right answer.

“I only have a short time where I’m gonna get to be able to do this, I might as well do it the way I want to,” Headland said. “And like the movie says: fuck everyone. Fuck it. Because they don’t know what’s going on. I look at women who are married and have children and they’re totally miserable, and I look at women who have children and they’re totally happy. That material stuff doesn’t, that relationship stuff doesn’t — I have been in relationships where I have been so in love, I thought God put that person on earth just for me. I’ve been in a relationship where the idiosyncrasies of someone else made me want to fucking kill myself. I was like, ‘I never want to do this again, I never want to be in a relationship again, I can’t stand living with this person.’ About someone who I used to adore. It just … it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter if you don’t get those things.

“Everyone’s just running around trying to get the thing to put on the top of their pile to say, ‘Look, I’m okay. I am okay because I have these things,’ and you’re just not gonna be okay.”

Despite her no-holds-barred, did-it-my-way attitude, Headland did admit one regret: “I wish I’d slept my way to the top. I wish I could do that. I’d get laid more. I never get laid.”

[This feature was also excerpted on Jezebel.]

BUST chatted with Graynor on the phone ahead of the film’s release about the psychic stresses of Twitter, feeling like a surrogate mom, and the infinite struggle between fashion and easy bathroom access.

Read more behind the cut, or click over to BUST, where this interview was originally published.

Congratulations on the movie. How’s the press tour going?
It’s so funny, we’re traveling across the country for a couple weeks and doing this sort of daily. I’ve never done anything like this for any other film. It’s like we’re politicians. I’m running for office next.

Running on a phone sex platform?
Exactly, yes.

In the movie, your character and Lauren’s character sort of clash at first, then settle into a lovely friendship. I can tell that you and the real Lauren and Katie are all good friends now, but how was your first meeting with them? The first time I met them was actually at a table read for another movie. We all sort of looked at each other like, “Hi! Hi! Hi! It’s so nice to meet you!” There was just that sort of nervous excitement that I almost felt like they were parents adopting a baby and I was the birth mother. That feeling like you’re sort of ginger with somebody and nervous and excited and you just want everybody to like each other. We quickly found our own kind of friend love and started having lunches and working on the script. It makes me feel really cool when Katie and Lauren talk about the first time we hung out, when they were in their car like, “Do you think she’ll like us? Do you think she’ll be friends with us? Do you think we’ll go to her apartment and stuff?” I just love that they ever had a question about that, and we’ve all become really great friends.

You’ve also all recently joined Twitter to promote the movie and interact with fans. How are you feeling about that so far?
I mean, Katie is kind of like, the queen of Twitter. Lauren and I are still figuring out how to use it. I’m intimidated, but I love this movie so much, and it’s so our baby that I will live on Twitter if need be, to help get the word out. It’s hard! It’s harder than I thought. You have to be so clever, otherwise it’s so boring.

You can’t just say, “I’m eating a sandwich, go see my movie.”
Yeah, it’s so much pressure!

Katie and Lauren wrote this leading role for you after seeing you in “Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist.” Lauren told me that after she saw that movie, she was “obsessed” with getting you to star in this. That must be an awesome feeling.
It was incredible. It was so incredibly flattering and humbling, especially because they wrote such a genius character and such a beautiful, fun, zany movie. It was a deep, deep, deep honor, especially because this is loosely based on them and their lives and I just wanted to make them proud and happy and not regret their decision. They also invited me to be an executive producer. They invited me into this process that is unlike anything I’ve ever been a part of, in terms of how closely the four of us [Graynor, Miller, Naylon and director Jamie Travis] work together and developed this story together and sort of fine-tuned it in a way to come up with one voice from the four of us. To make it all come together was such an exciting and inspiring process, and they were so generous in that — they didn’t have to be, but they were. It’s just an incredible gift.

Would you like to spend more time on the other side of the camera, producing?
Absolutely, yeah. It’s something that I had wanted to do before, and I think that once you’ve done it, it’s a hard part of your brain to turn off. I’ve learned so much in this process and it’s fun and empowering and creative in a totally different way. Sometimes as an actor you feel helpless and at the whim of other people. This has been one of those really empowering and inspiring situations where it’s like, OK, you want to do something, make it happen! Now I feel like I have a better understanding of how to go about making something happen.

There’s a whole montage in the movie of your character teaching Lauren’s character the art of phone sex, so to speak. But before you can teach it, you have to know how to do it yourself. Did somebody give you a little how-to in phone sex at all?
The truth is, the goal with the phone sex is always to be funny and not overtly sexual or titillating. So, if anything, it was kind of about turning off the sexual part of your mind and trying to turn on the sort of slightly dirtier comedic side. I didn’t want to call a phone sex hotline, I didn’t want to get too involved in the realities of that world. We wanted to make it into our own little bubble world, but real enough that people would buy it. Luckily, I have a naturally scratchy voice which sort of lends itself nicely to talking on the phone in a sexy way.

Open your heart and the phone sex will follow.
It’s true, very true.

One of the things I loved about you in “Nick and Norah” was how convincingly wasted you were for pretty much the entire movie. Did you always know that you could do an A+ drunk?
That was a special skill that I did not realize I had until “Nick and Norah.” It’s tricky, because it’s so easy to go over the top, and once you go over the top, you lose that sense of reality and your audience. It’s true of all things, with this movie as well. We more than anything wanted to ground their friendship so that it feels real. The second it doesn’t, you lose the good graces of the audience, I think. But the drunk thing was a good lesson to learn, and I think I’ve probably exhausted that skill in my lifetime now.

Did you keep anything from the set? Is there a souvenir dildo somewhere in your apartment?
I have some of the clothes. Lauren and Katie, those bitches, took the phones. Jamie and I, I think, are going to have like a craft night and get some phones off eBay and spray paint them pink because that’s all those are anyway. I think that’s all I took. I look fondly at the white jumpsuit hanging in my closet often. I wish I had the denim one. Oh, and I have my weave! I have my hairpiece.

One thing was nagging at me, looking at you wearing all those jumpsuits throughout the movie: How did you possibly pee?
I mean, you have to, you gotta take it all off to pee. It’s definitely a lot of work, but I really, really love a jumpsuit, as you can probably tell from the movie.

That’s commitment.
I have a lot of jumpsuit commitment.

“The thing that leaps to my mind about that less-than-a-month last summer: Jesse Eisenberg, Jesse Eisenberg and Jesse Eisenberg,” she told Moviefone during a recent chat ahead of the film’s August 17 release.

“I knew the first time I met him that there was a great hope that he’d play my son in the film,” she said. ”[I would have been upset] if anybody else would have ended up playing that boy, because he was so perfect for it, the maternal instinct I had for him the second I met him, and the respect and the admiration.”

As luck would have it, Eisenberg would end up joining Leo for “Why Stop Now.” The film tells the story of a son trying to get his drug-addicted mom, Penny (Leo), to rehab, and himself to a performing arts college. To get to their happy ending, the mother-son duo must navigate red tape, a dealer named Sprinkles (played by Tracy Morgan) and a sock puppet with a vicious temper.

Leo, who was recently passed over for the role of Mags in the second installment of “The Hunger Games” franchise, spoke with Moviefone about dysfunctional families, cliches that don’t make sense to her and how a little gold man named Oscar changed her life.

Click behind the cut to read more, or head to Moviefone, where this interview was originally published.

It sounds like you have a long and involved history with this project, from the short “Predisposed” to now this full-length feature, five years later.
Well, [“Predisposed” and “Why Stop Now” co-writer and director] Ron [Nyswaner] had suggested to [co-writer and director] Phil [Dorling] that he should pick an actor he knows of and write a role with that actor in mind. I got an email from Phil asking if it would be all right [if that actor was me], and I said, “You plow on, son!” And the short came of that. We shot that and learned from that, [but] we were told that the story would sell and be more likely to be seen if it had some more humor in it and a dark statement that was being made. It was quite a challenge to bring the humor and lightness to this story of a dysfunctional family. So we were blessed with Tracy Morgan!

What was it like to work with Tracy Morgan? He has a reputation for eccentricity, to say the least.
I don’t know if you know the list of the roles they’ve given me thus far, but not a lot of them fall in the comedy category! Tracy’s not a straight-up comic character, but there’s a humor in the film that’s a necessity. Having Tracy there, a prince of the genre, was a boost in my confidence. He would laugh at my jokes off-camera, I don’t think he was just being polite. We had such a hoot. He’s a dear, sweet man and, like most comics, a deeply misunderstood and complex man. It was a pleasure to meet him and I see him out and about now, what a beautiful human being he really is. Those comics, man, they’re something else.

You said Tracy is misunderstood — can you be more specific?
I don’t follow a lot of public perception, but there was some big hoo-ha and it didn’t seem like it was the first time and I don’t think it’ll be the last. Something he said as a joke, because he walks an edgy, racy line. [He’s] brilliant, like so many of the great, great funny people before [him]. He’s really standing reality on its end so perhaps it can really be seen in its truest light, you know? So that way when someone is so adored by the public as Tracy is, sometimes every breath means something or another to one person or another. It’s at that level that things can be thrown out of proportion.

Between this and the episode of “Louie” you were on recently, it looks like you’re taking on more comedy roles.
I’ve always been interested in doing everything that the art has to explore and the few cases on which I’m asked to do something with humor in it, there’s nothing like sitting in a theater and hearing something that you intended to be funny being laughed at by a crowd. There’s no applause, no — ugh, just amazing. It’s really an accomplishment. I know there’ll be some chuckles along the road, I just know it!

The first time we see you in “Why Stop Now,” you’re painting kind of an earth goddess version of yourself on your living room wall. Is that a Melissa Leo original? Did you really paint that?
Well, there’s great joy and disappointment in the question for me. The intention was that it would be a Melissa Leo original, but what was there was so far from what I would have put on the wall. It was put on the wall by a man, and I asked, “Who did it?” Because we had talked long and hard about me doing it. I had the time, I was on the location, it was really, really important to me. While you see me painting [in the movie], I got permission from the supervisor and the director and cameraman that it would be all right for me to embellish on what was there.

I know that Tracy Morgan is known for riffing. Did you join in on the improvisation during the shoot?
I’m not a big fan of it. I’ll jump in there, and the better people that you’re riffing with, the better it can be. I probably have too much self consciousness to improv. When you’re allowed to repeat it on angles is really the way you use it on film. I’m an actor who likes to know what they’re doing. That’s not always the case, there’s sometimes this kind of devil-may-care and following a direction, a style of acting that’s to be admired. That’s just how I work, I was trained in a way that the preparation is everything. The name of the book on which my whole teaching was based is called “An Actor Prepares.”

In the film, you have a daughter who communicates almost exclusively through a sock puppet that she wears all the time. The growly little hell voice that she used was really jarring to me. What did you think of that?
The psychology about the sock puppet was understood by each of us in a different way in the way that, perhaps, it would be in the family. The little girl was a good little actress. She was doing what she was told. For Penny, it is, as she says in the film, an instrument of communication for the child. It’s saying, “F–k you,” but at least she’s saying something.

Penny thinks it is right as rain. And there’s a lot of people who complain about rain! It’s a funny expression, because really no one likes it when it’s raining, but it has to rain. So it’s right as something that, maybe it’s a little uncomfortable, but what are you gonna do?

How have things changed for you since winning an Oscar?
The short and most concise answer to that question is that the biggest change has been within myself, within my self perception. And grounding in a group that is both illustrious … it’s like, “By God, I’m there!”

That’s so, so much in the work. Everything you see will have a Melissa Leo role to it. A lot of supporting work, which is what I’ve always done, which is what I won an award for. It’s good, there’s sort of a self confidence in it. I guess up until a couple years ago I kept on like I was gonna be an actor one day. And I am, as they say, I am an actor. I will work, I certainly hope, as long as I like to.

[Post image via IMDb]

“Lynn Cohen is Mags!” Elizabeth Banks, who plays Capitol crony Effie Trinket in the popular series, crowed on her blog early Monday morning. Lionsgate confirmed Cohen’s casting late last week.

Cohen, whose previous credits include “Sex and the City” and “Munich,” among others, will play the aging former Hunger Games winner who becomes important to heroine Katniss Everdeen over the course of the series’ second installment.

That was news to Leo, who was rumored to be a contender for the role.

Click behind the cut for Leo’s reaction, or read at Moviefone, where this article was originally published.

“I would have liked to have done it, but it doesn’t look like it’ll be mine,” she said while chatting with Moviefone Monday afternoon, in support of her new film, “Why Stop Now.” Informed that Cohen had been confirmed as an addition to the cast, she responded, “Who? Oh, I’ll have to look her up.”

Leo said that being a part of the Hunger Games franchise was “a dear hope.” She hadn’t read the books, she told Moviefone, but the trailer for the first film excited her.

“I’m not much of a reader and that might very well be part of the reason that I did not get the role,” she said.

Banks, for her part, was thrilled about the choice of Cohen to play Mags.

“She seems like a pretty rad lady and I’m excited to work with her,” Banks wrote. “I know she’ll mentor Finnick like nobody’s business.”

As for Finnick Odair, that part remains uncast. Sam Claflin, who was last seen in “Snow White and the Huntsman,” is rumored to be the frontrunner for the role.

This article was picked up by the New York Daily News and CinemaBlend.

Haircut

Getting my hair cut for the first time in five months was what I like to refer to as a Carrie Prejean moment: I AM DOING THIS. I felt flush from getting a few freelance checks, bold from staring down a girl I dislike in the street and, well, hot from having an untamed mane in 100-ish degree heat.

Into the salon I marched, and sat down in the chair before I could run home to my apartment to pick my split ends with one hand and loving stroke my cash with the other.

Read more behind the cut, or at The Billfold, where this essay was originally published.

Worth it? I came out with bangs! Bangs that I didn’t ask for, but bangs that looked pretty nice. Bangs aside (even though they can’t be, those bitches go nowhere but straight down across my forehead), what I really got out of this purchases was a sense of trust in a hairdresser that I haven’t had since my mom’s favorite salon guy bullied me with a can of hairspray when I was 10.

At the most recent place I went, everyone who worked there made really sly mean comments, like saying that an angled bob—my cut of choice—was for “really thin fashion girls” (they wrote that off as “a Korean joke”). So this was a relief. If you’re too old to sit in a plastic car with The Wiggles playing four inches from your face so you’ll sit still, you’re too old for haircuts to be scary anymore.

Patriotic manicure, $25.50 ($8 metallic blue essie polish, $8 white crackle polish, $9.50 Sephora by OPI red glitter polish, gifted silver glitter polish)

I’m not so bougie that I go and get my nails did—living room is just fine for me—but I do love painting my nails (if I had a nail blog, it would be called “Nailed It”). I also I love the Olympics. I love the Olympics so much that I cried a little when Nastia Liukin fell flat on her face in the trials. I love the Olympics so much that I started obsessing over a good patriotic manicure weeks in advance and bought a bunch of colors for it, including a white crackle polish that I will probably never wear (again).

Worth it? The seemingly high cost of this probably-single-use color combo, however, is offset by the fact that I nearly bought an online-only patriotic glitter topcoat from Sephora, and was only stopped by the fact that I refused to pay shipping on the single ($9.50) item and Eventually Felt Wrong about spending an extra $50 on nonsense to get free shipping. USA! USA!

Gym membership, $40 for 30 day membership plus two personal training sessions (thanks, LivingSocial!)

I’m told that regular exercise is part of a “healthy lifestyle,” and I can’t bring myself to wheeze my way around Prospect Park in the billion degree heat as often as Jillian Michaels says I should. I’m also tired of Jillian Michaels yelling at me from my TV, so when a deal came along for a fancy schmancy gym, with classes and everything, with extra sprinkles and a cherry and personal training sessions on top, I pounced.

I’ve taken full advantage in the week since I joined, to mixed results. Saturday morning Zumba: dumb, and how does she do that with her butt. Wednesday night spin: I’ve been violated by a bike seat. Personal training session numero uno: The one compliment he gave me was that I had good lower body strength, but that was “probably from carrying all that weight around” (pardon me?). According to Trainer Phil, I need five to six months of weekly training sessions, to the tune of a thousand dollars a month, to not be a lardo. Buddy, I came here on an EMAIL COUPON. What do you think my answer is?

Worth it? Unclear! I saved a jumbo-ton of money on the deal ($250 initiation fee, training sessions run about $70 per and a month’s membership is around $80), BUT I feel like I’ve paid hundreds of bucks’ worth of mental bummer through the gym’s introduction process: Everyone is constantly trying to sell me things, the membership lady’s response to my (within official medical “normal” range!) BMI was that I wasn’t “really really overweight” and nothing can ever make me forget that she tried to convince me that strip-dancing cardio class was a great idea for me. But! Fitness is forever? Or something?

New Shoes, $35.69 (40% off clearance price, plus 15% student discount)

So I had blisters the next day, but now I have stylin’ feet until I get tired of my new kickds/wear a hole in them. I haven’t been a student for two years, but I look plausibly young, my ID doesn’t have a date on it, and I like seeing people’s faces when they try and decide if the pasty blue-haired girl in the picture is actually me. The guilt is a small price to pay for the awesome discount.

Worth it? Absolutely. I don’t care if they’re suede, I don’t care that I’ve gotten them dirty in one wearing. If you find a pair of flats at J. Crew for $35, if you’re me, you buy them.

Jackie Siegel’s, on the other hand, will. Or at least, that’s what she and her husband, David Siegel, hoped when they began construction on what would have been the largest single-family residence in the United States, a 90,000-square-foot masterpiece of a home in Orlando. They called it “Versailles.”

I say “would have” because construction on Versailles has halted, yet another victim of the financial crash. The 99 percent may have been hit by the economic downturn, but Lauren Greenfield’s new documentary, The Queen of Versailles, puts a face on the 1 percent, too: Jackie.

What is it like to watch somebody with all the trappings of wealth — teetering heels, a litter of fluffy little dogs — lose it all? Greenfield spent more than three years filming Jackie and her family, stepping over the same dog turds ground into the carpet after the household staff was let go to save money as Jackie, David, and their eight kids did.

Roughly the same age as the titular queen [of the documentary], Greenfield and her camera were a mostly-silent presence in the Siegels’ life, witnessing Jackie, an RIT-educated engineer, thinking aloud that her children “might have to go to college” if the money ran out, and David theorizing that “anyone who doesn’t want to be rich is probably dead.”

The base conundrum is this: what does a relationship between an engineering student-cum-beauty queen-cum trophy wife and a documentarian focusing on social ills (Greenfield’s first feature documentary, Thin, focused on eating disorders) look like after three years, multiple foreclosures, countless hours in the editing room, and a lawsuit? (David Siegel has filed a defamation suit against Greenfield and her associates.)

Beyond that: what’s it like to watch a house of cards tumble in slow motion and remain behind the lens?

Greenfield and I sat down for a chat last week in New York ahead of the film’s limited release.

Read the interview behind the jump, or at The Hairpin, where it was originally published.

Kase Wickman: For a documentarian to find a story like this seems almost too good to be true. How did you meet Jackie?

Lauren Greenfield: I’m also a photographer and I’ve been working on a photography project about wealth, consumerism, and the American Dream. I was following Donatella Versace, and Jackie showed up at one of her parties. It was a private party, and Jackie was one of Versace’s best customers at the time. I made a picture, which became a really important picture for me, of Jackie’s purse and two other purses and it became one of TIME Magazine’s pictures of the year, representing, as the caption read, “the high life.” This picture represented kind of the gilded age, at the end of 2007.

When Jackie told me about building the biggest house in America, I was hooked, because I was really interested in this connection between homeownership and the American Dream, and how the home had gotten bigger and bigger and more and more an expression of self — not just a place to live. We started filming, and about a year later, very suddenly, the house got put on the market. That was when David explained that the bankers forced them to put the house up for sale. For the first time, he explained to me that he had never taken anything off the table, and he had personally signed for everything at the business. That’s when I realized what the stakes were. Before that, I didn’t think that billionaires would even be affected by a crash. I thought they were totally insulated. So at that point, I realized — I had photographed foreclosure cities in California and I had photographed the crash in Dubai — I realized there was something very familiar about this feeling of losing your dream home. I realized that their story was really symbolic and important and like everybody else, but supersized.

In your director’s statement, you call the film an epic story. You didn’t know it would turn into this, though, off that first talk with Jackie. What drew you to her?

I was drawn to her as a person, part of it was her openness and her accessibility. I thought it might be an inside way to look at wealth, and a real view — not what we see on reality TV, but real cinema verite, what’s it like to be in that world. As a photographer, I’ve realized that there is very little true representation of the wealthy. In the archives at the Smithsonian or whatever photography archives you go to, there’s mostly commissioned portraiture and society pictures. We’re very good at doing documentary work about the third world and the disenfranchised, but not wealthy people who tend to really control their image. The fact that they were open to being filmed, I thought, this is really unique. And another thing is that their story is really representative of the American Dream: they were both self-made success stories, come up from nothing, and this is what they wanted. It was kind of a look at what the American Dream had become.

Did it take any cajoling to get them to let you film them?

No, [Jackie] really was always very open. I think the amazing thing about Jackie and David in this process is that they were open when things were good, but they were equally open when things were bad. It’s opposite of the way you’d expect. When things got bad, we already had a relationship and I’d been filming for a year.

Would you call yourself friends with Jackie?

Well, we’re definitely friendly and I like Jackie a lot. I tried to … you know, I’m a documentarian and you always have to be very transparent about that rule too, but of course you become fond of the people you spend a lot of time with. Jackie was always the heart of the story, and I feel close to her.

There was a real sense of intimacy there. Was anything ever off-limits?

No, in fact I remember on the last trip there, she said, I said, “If this movie goes to Sundance, will you come?” And she said yes, and she said, “Is this story about how we lost everything?” And we talked about what the story, kind of the journey–

What did you tell her?

I said yes. I said that it’s about that, but it’s also about what you found along the way and who she is. She said, “well, you know, I am who I am.”

The thing that was great for me about Jackie and David is that they never had any shame about what happened. They never tried to cover anything up. They were very upfront about it all, and I think it’s because they were very proud of their accomplishments. Even when things got hard, David certainly was fighting the good fight, and I was there documenting that every step of the way.

And it seems like Jackie’s seen kind of every level: rich, poor…

She came from probably middle class, Binghamton, New York, the town that IBM made great and then suffered when IBM left. I think it was kind of a typical American upbringing. Her friend’s grandmother says she never forgot her friends. That’s the thing about Jackie: she was able to go right back in and sit and have a glass of wine with her friends. She even stayed at her friend Beth’s home. She didn’t look for the nicest hotel in Binghamton. She’s kind of strangely classless but clearly loves all the stuff of the luxurious life, too.

But her kids, several times throughout the film, seemed to be trying to get Jackie to tone it down. One of them made a snotty comment about her wearing a fur coat.

The kids were almost embarrassed at their wealth, they didn’t like being different from other kids. Especially when they switched to public school. There was one day where David really got on his mom’s case for picking her up in a big car driven by a nanny with her in it. He’s like, “Why can’t you pick me up like all the other moms?”

What did she say?

She was like, she just kinda laughed it off, like “what’s unusual about our life? We have a black car, you want to be picked up in a red car.”

Sundance was the first time Jackie saw the film, and you warned ahead of time that she wouldn’t answer questions from the audience because she “needed time to absorb it.” What was the first thing she said about the film?

I think the first time she saw it, she was really sad about things, but now I don’t notice that with her as much. More laughing. Now, what I noticed at Silverdocs in Washington, is people came up to her and thanked her for sharing her story. She’s somebody who does connect with other people, and I think that was moving for her to have that experience.

David has very publicly filed suit against you, saying you defamed him in the film, but Jackie has been coming to premieres, and obviously spending time with you. Is that kind of an elephant in the room?

We try not to talk about it. I know she’s not happy about it, but I’m glad she’s been able to share the rollout of the film and come here and help promote the film and come to festivals and come here.

Do you think you’ll still have a relationship once the promotion for the film is over?

I do.

How would you characterize your relationship? Are you friends?

We talk a lot, we text a lot. I made a film called Thin that came out in 2006; it was about eating disorders. Shelly, who was the main person in the film, continued to struggle with eating disorders even after the film. When Queen of Versailles premiered at Sundance, Shelly was in the audience. Every time I go to Sundance we meet at the airport and have a coffee. I think it’s a very unusual bond. It’s like I was saying to Jackie when we were on the Today show: “We’re never going to be here again. Let’s just remember this moment.” We were so nervous, but let’s just remember this moment and enjoy it and take a picture of us in front of NBC. Because when you’re schlepping around in the field and doing it every day — and Jackie gave us a lot of time — you just don’t know if it’ll ever turn out to be anything, and so it’s just very exciting and so I think it’s an experience you never forget.

Obviously you got a lot of Jackie when you were filming. You even watched her get Botox and facial peels. How much of that same kind of, I don’t know if the word is intimacy, did she get from you?

I think that she took a lot from our visits. I think she was always sad when we left. I remember the last trip. We both knew this was the last trip and we were both like “Oh, this is over.” It’s bittersweet.

Did she ever ask your advice on anything? What did you talk about?

Um, no, she didn’t really ask me for advice. Jackie kind of does what Jackie does. She sometimes would want to know about my life. Like she would ask my field producer, “What’s Lauren’s house like?”

She’s never seen your house? You spent almost the entire filming process in her house.

No, she wanted to come out to the LA Film Festival, but then it didn’t work out.

Did you ever have any moments of doubt that the film wouldn’t come together?

When [Versailles] went on the market, I knew something more universal and more important was happening, so I was just trying to keep up with it and cover it. The thing that was most difficult and [made me question whether we would] be able to keep going was that we never had the money for the next trip. This was a very independently made movie and it was only pretty far after the turn happened that any backers signed on. In the beginning, people just didn’t get why this was interesting. And so every trip, it was like “Can we afford it, can we make deals, can we make it happen?” And then while we were editing there were a lot of events unfolding, and it wasn’t until the very end when David lost possession of Vegas, which was a huge piece for the end of the film. It was like, “Can we finish, are we gonna be done, can we do this? Do we need another year?” When that shoe dropped I felt like the movie was done.

There was an interview near the end of the film that really surprised me, like it was a direct response to all the viewers wondering what this woman was thinking. Jackie says something along the lines of “People think I’m stupid, but I’m not stupid, I just don’t know. I wasn’t told about any of this.”

That was really amazing, because I didn’t realize until pretty close to the end how little communication there was between Jackie and David about the financial. She actually found out that Versailles house was in foreclosure by listening in to my interview. That interview outside was right after that, where she was like, “I didn’t know.” The thing that was really powerful to me was you can see how she is in front of camera at that point: she has no makeup on, she’s not wearing shoes, she had just allowed me to film her getting 20 layers blasted off her face. If you contrast that with the opening scene, where she’s posing for my camera and perfect hair and makeup and the outfit — there was just a real evolution in our relationship and in the intimacy of what was going on and how she became real.

In the beginning it’s about this pose and this posturing and you see all these family photos and what they want to present to the world, and by the end it’s just like, telling the truth, letting it all hang out and being yourself.

There are so many characters in this film, but it’s all revolving around Jackie and what she wants and what she does. Is it okay to read this as a sort of meta-commentary on women and society?

A lot of my work focuses on women. I did a book called Girl Culture that’s about how the body has become the primary form of expression for girls and women. And last year I did a short called “Beauty Culture,” which looked at the beauty industry and especially the challenges of aging for women. I’m definitely interested in how the body and beauty become currency for women. And how that currency is used. Jackie has an amazing story because she is an engineer from RIT who realized at a young age that her beauty could get her further in terms of where she wanted to go than her engineering degree. What does that say about our culture?

I think what’s interesting is their relationship, in the beginning, you don’t know what the basis of their relationship is. Did she marry him for love, did she marry him for money, he’s 30 years older and he’s a billionaire. What you realize by the end is that she really loves him and maybe he was attracted by her beauty.

It’s also revealed in the film that Jackie was abused by her first husband. She’s really kept in the dark and made small in her own home, it seems. Has anyone drawn parallels between the situations, or been concerned for Jackie?

Jackie would be really clear that David is nothing like her former husband. I think that’s part of why she loves him, because he’s kind in his own way, and he takes care of her in a kind of doting way. And I think she has pretty low expectations for the way she wants to be treated in a way, in that setting. I think he is good to her in the ways that she thinks are important. And I think I included that first relationship because it’s important to understand both where she’s been, why she’s a survivor and why she really loves David and really yearns for his affection. She’s very clear that it’s never been abusive.

Lastly, there’s a real dearth of women in filmmaking. Do you see it as a boys’ club?

I don’t think there’s that discrimination in the documentary world. I think most fields without money are ghettos that attract smart women. I feel like there are a lot of really talented women documentary filmmakers. I’m also represented for commercials and I’m in a company where the two owners are women, and I think I’m the only woman who’s represented as a director. I think in features and commercials, it’s more of a challenge. But in my work, it’s always been either neutral or a benefit because I’ve told stories about women. We live in a world especially post economic crisis where it’s too competitive to allow for discrimination. I think talent rises.

While members of all military branches participate in the kooky pop culture phenomenon, which was created for children but whose messages of friendship and kindness have surprisingly resonated with an older male demographic, a National Guard soldier caused a furor after he was photographed at BronyCon, the fans’ largest gathering, in Secaucus, N.J., last month wearing a rainbow patch velcroed to his sleeve.

Read more behind the jump, or at The Daily, where this article was originally published.

All branches of the military have regulations banning unauthorized patches on their uniforms.

“I can think of at least four violations here: wearing a duty uniform while supposedly off-duty or at an unauthorized location; wearing an official Army uniform to an event that I guarantee the Army is not officially involved with; wearing a non-sanctioned patch on the uniform in place of current unit patch; and attending a My Little Pony convention,” one miffed commenter wrote on the Military Times site.

A Facebook page titled “Military Bronies” posted a statement yesterday blasting the guardsman’s choice of attire at BronyCon, which was attended by more than 4,000 “My Little Pony” enthusiasts.

“The decision of one or a few individuals does not represent the Military Bronies Community as a whole,” the statement read. “Actions taken by those wearing unauthorized patches were that of their own decision to do so. To all service members who are upset over the matter please restrain yourself from Stereo typing the Military Bronies Community as a whole.”

A 20-year-old Brony who identified himself as “Feulner” told The Daily that as a BronyCon organizer and a member of a volunteer Air Force Auxiliary Search and Rescue team, he appreciates both sides of the issue. While he likes seeing Bronys in uniform so he can “connect with them over military jargon and thank them for their service,” he also knows the rules.

“When you go to events like that and you’re wearing uniform you’re representing the U.S. military,” he said. “They don’t want you to reflect negatively on them.”

However jarring the juxtaposition between military tough guys and a children’s cartoon may seem, there are a number of Brony/military crossover Web pages filled with fan art of ponies doing pushups for screaming pony drill sergeants and rainbow-colored ponies shooting machine guns.

The founder of BronyCon, who goes by Purple Tinker, told The Daily that she wasn’t surprised by the unlikely phenomenon.

“The very nature of the Brony community is that Bronies are people who are not afraid to defy stereotypes,” she said. “These are people who put on uniforms and shoot people for our country and at the same time enjoy pastel colored ponies. And there’s nothing wrong with that. I’m a pacifist. But anyone’s allowed to love ponies, it doesn’t matter if you’re in the military or on the moon.”

Related: Read a culture piece about the Brony phenomenon that I wrote for The Awl in January 2012.

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