The Verge: Stephanie Szostak

There are a couple changes that the American version has made to the French original -- namely, the leads are more sympathetic. Are French audiences more willing to tolerate main characters who don't always do the right thing?

I don't know, because it's so outrageous -- all the circumstances are so ridiculous that you don't have time to think about it. I do remember watching the French one when it came out and thinking, "This could never be an American movie!" It's so cruel -- which made it very funny -- but I thought it would never work. In the American movie, you like Paul Rudd's character, and in the French movie, he's really an a**hole. That's a big difference.

It's interesting that Jay is so drawn to these out-of-control comedic situations in his films, and yet he's so calm and centered himself.

He is. He's very sweet with everybody, the crew and all the departments. He knew exactly how to talk to me: He'd just come quietly and say a couple of things, and then, boom. I feel very lucky that this is my first big film and he was the director, because he's really amazing.

For comedy purposes, you're even more of a straight man in this movie than Paul is. When was it hardest to keep composed?

When Steve Carell and Jemaine [Clement] are together! The scene near the end of the movie where they say bye to each other, they started improvising this thing where they put their hands on each other faces, and that was very hard to keep a straight face during. Jemaine and I have a scene with goats, and I never knew what he was doing behind me. Every time I turned around, I would go, "Oh my God!"

You used to work for Chanel. How did you get from there to here?

I just realized I didn't want to be in the corporate world anymore. Kind of chance, I got involved with the possibility of going into the modeling world, and I thought, "OK, I'll do that, and then I'll figure out what it is I want to do." Then I took an acting class, and I remembered thinking, "Oh my God, this is it. This is what I want to do." I started studying, and I threw everything out the window and started over.

When you worked in fashion, did you find people there to be as cutthroat as Meryl Streep's character in The Devil Wears Prada?

Yes. [Laughs] Yes, yes.

Is Hollywood even more cutthroat?

No, no. From my experience, it's different. People in fashion treat it as a business...I guess Hollywood is a business too, but you talk about story, you talk about a more artistic world than in fashion. It's more real, and it sounds so weird when I say that, because it's the opposite of what you hear, but so far, I love it!

[Photo Credit: Michael Loccisano/Getty Images]

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