Actor and director Dave Franco (The Rental) was walking around his hometown of Palo Alto, California, one day with his wife, actress Alison Brie (Community), when the idea for a romantic comedy started forming in their heads.
"It's a genre that we both love," Franco, 37, told the Current during a recent interview. "We started thinking about the idea of coming home and reconnecting with your roots and with the people we used to know; what that says about who you were back then versus who you are now."
The brainstorming session prompted Franco and Brie to co-write the script for Somebody I Used to Know, the story of Ally (Brie), a reality show producer who returns to her hometown after years away to seek a break from Hollywood. While there, she learns that her ex-boyfriend is about to get married. Overcome with feelings of regret, Ally begins piecing together a plan to break up the couple and win him back.
"'The one that got away' is a common trope in romantic comedies that I've witnessed in real life with friends of mine," Brie, 40, told the Current. "I think a sort of relationship amnesia can happen where you romanticize something after the fact, even though there are glaring reasons why it doesn't work."
During our interview with Franco, who directed the movie, and Brie, they talked about what it's like writing a script together. Brie alluded to a scene of the film in which she sheds her clothes and goes streaking.
Somebody I Used to Know premieres on Amazon Prime on Feb. 10.
First, one million bonus points to whoever's idea it was to put a poster of American Movie in Ally's childhood room.
Dave Franco: Thank you for noticing. So, we needed posters from that time period for [Ally's] room. It was like the late 1990s. [American Movie] is just one of the greatest documentaries ever made. You can imagine my affection for it. There are similarities to The Room and The Disaster Artist. So, those types of movies are right up my alley.
Alison Brie: We had a great production designer that really knocked it out of the park with Ally's bedroom. There are so many specific posters on the wall — of the music she was listening to. It really gives you a sense of who Ally was.
DF: She's got Sleater-Kinney on the wall. Dazed and Confused. Reality Bites.
AB: [Ally] was rebelling a bit, but she genuinely had a love for film and the art form. I think she wanted to do edgy, cool work when she was younger. She didn't envision herself [producing] a reality show series.
On that note, aside from the rom-com aspects, there is another narrative in the movie about devoting your life to things you are passionate about versus things that are less fulfilling. Have either of you experienced that in your career?
AB: Yeah, I think there was a time early on where I felt so fortunate to be working and having a choice about what I was going to do next. I think I had this mindset of choosing [projects] based on what I thought was the right next step as opposed to doing things that I would have fun doing and that I feel passionate about.
As you wrote this script together, what happened when you disagreed on something? How did that get resolved?
DF: It's very rare that we'll disagree on something, but it will happen. Usually, it'll kind of marinate for a couple of days. Then, when it gets brought up again, we'll be like, "Here's why I think it needs to be this way."
AB: I think it starts with fireworks. We'll get passionate or defensive about a moment or a character and we go head-to-head on it. And then we say, "Let's not make any decisions about it," and we let it lie. Usually, there's a little bit of compromise on both sides.
Dave, this being your second film as a director, was it a conscious decision to do something completely different than your first movie, The Rental, which was a horror-thriller?
DF: I don't think I thought too much about it. When we started writing this, it was at the very beginning of the pandemic. The movies we were watching were romantic comedies and movies that were very uplifting and joyous. It was all we could stomach at the time. So, I think we just had this idea of putting our own project in the world that would hopefully bring people some positivity. That said, I love horror so much. If people want me to keep directing, I will make another horror movie for sure.
You could've easily given Ally a knife.
AB: (Laughs.) Streaking with a knife.
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