Spanning the course of four decades, Barney's Version chronicles the story of Barney Panofsky, a brusque TV executive who manages to marry three times and may or may not have killed his best friend. Pike portrays spouse number three, Miriam, who meets Barney at his wedding to his second wife (Minnie Driver). Movieline met with Pike at her Manhattan hotel to discuss her new film, why she knows all to well what it's like to have a date pass out from alcohol, and how she wound up in Doom.
It's very nice to meet you.
Oh, I thought she said Meg Ryan. The way it comes out -- "mikeryan."
I apologize in advance that I have no added insight on Joe Versus the Volcano. She did say it very fast.
She did, "mikeryan." [Laughs]
So I just watched Barney's Version again last night.
You did? You have a DVD? I'd like to have the DVD. I want to watch it tonight because I haven't seen it since Venice.
This is not an easy movie to summarize. How do you describe it to people?
No, it's not. It's a sort of romantic, serious, chaotic look at a life well- and ill-lived, I suppose. With all it's reality and smudginess, hilarity and sadness that goes with life. The trouble is that you talk about it and you talk about this wonderful love story and then you forget that it also has got a kind of murder element and this amazing thing about fathers and sons. And this whole rock-and-roll past of drugs and booze and women in Rome. And you think, This is all in one film! And you can't get a handle on it.
Is that a problem in terms of getting people to the theater?
I think the English poster sells it better than the American one. The English poster has got Paul in the center then little almost like TV screens of images, which kinds of give you the idea of this sort of frenetic life. This one, the American one, because they put Dustin [Hoffman] on it, it's slightly misleading.
It's an interesting problem. I mean, I get why they want to put Dustin Hoffman on the poster.
Of course! He's wonderful in it and funny.
At the same time, it's not really his story.
No. And yet he certainly made the element of the father and son a lot to do with redeeming Barney's character. But it's funny: So many people start the interviews with, "So what is there to like about Barney?" And I say, "What isn't there to like about him, really?" He's the kind of guy that I adore. You know, maybe, yeah, he's a selfish, narcissistic loon. But I think those people are fun to be around.
He's for sure an interesting personality to be around.
I mean, yes, you have to be a certain type of woman. I mean, I'm not fit to be with him -- but Miriam is. And she's a caretaker and an observer and a forgiver. She's able to accommodate somebody else's selfish sort of highs and lows. But, within that, she gets a wonderful life. He makes magic. Nothing stops his sort of appetite. If he decides to go and buy a house in Lake Como, he's going to go and do it.
The only thing that is shady is that he hits on her at his own wedding. But he's definitely an interesting guy.
Still! You see this guy, he's trying to reinvent himself. He's had this horrific thing happen where his wife whom he married because he felt a sense of duty has committed suicide. He tries something totally different; the life that he made for himself didn't work out. So he decides to get serious and do what other people think that he should do. So he marries someone totally acceptable and he knows that he's miserable. There, at the wedding, he sees the person that he should be with.
And to be fair, she doesn't immediately accept him.
No. She's polite and charming but she's not in any way flirtatious. Yeah, and he loves her so truly. He really does just adore her. That makes her feel very safe. I think she feels that his love is constant.
At one point Barney does something that he shouldn't have done, but he admits it to Miriam -- something he would never have done in past relationships. In a way, it's quite endearing.
I know, he couldn't lie to her. I know, that's the thing. He doesn't lie; he's a truth teller. For Miriam, that's the one thing where she drew the line and she always said that she would.
The first-date lunch scene is hard to watch.
When he's drunk?
Yes.
I love that scene.
It's so uncomfortable.
It was so fun to do. Paul plays drunk brilliantly. So people always ask me what I learned from Paul in making this film and I say that when I have to play a middle-aged, cigar-smoking, heavy-drinking, whiskey-loving soak... I will do a mean job of it. Because he just manages to do that scene, making it funny, and keeping the emotional truth of it. Of the guy's nerves and anxieties and love and trying to make it work. It's brilliant.
Have you ever had a first date that was remotely similar?
As far as passing out?
Or any other similarities?
Yeah, I have experienced someone being so nervous... [Pauses then laughs] I've experienced going away with somebody, and I had a meeting, and then they came back to meet me afterward. And they were so drunk they couldn't even stand up. So I have experienced something like that. That was in New York, actually.
Did your reaction differ from your character's reaction?
Well, again, the same thing, he passed out.
And you had to wait around?
Yeah, I did, I had to read a book. It was exactly the same thing! Funny, I did exactly the same thing.
Were you thinking about that while filming the scene?
No, I haven't thought about it since, until you just mentioned it. I haven't thought about it for years. [Laughs] And then, when he came around, we went to Coney Island. I remember that.
The Cyclone is a great way to cure a hangover.
I know! It's a test. Sober up! Or it will make him even more unstable.
I'm assuming this story doesn't end like the film version...
As Miriam and Barney, no. But I think what happens, of course, is that Miriam takes him up to his room and the Dom Pérignon and roses arrive and she sees that with her sense of humor. And then she finds his crib notes for topics of conversation. And I definitely was doing that. I remember writing down topics of conversations when I was about 14 and was going to make a phone call to the boy I really liked.
Do you remember your topics?
I honestly can't remember, but I'm sure they were quite interesting. I was sort of a weird, interesting... It probably put him right off.
I do want to ask about one of your past movies. Was it a risk at all to star in a James Bond movie [Die Another Day]? To get the "Bond Girl" label?
To tell the truth, I was so naïve about the whole film industry at that time that I wouldn't have known what that meant. People said things like, "Do you think this could ruin your career?" I didn't even have a career at that point. There's not much ruining that could be done. [Laughs] So I didn't think strategically in any way. It just seemed like a really fun part to play.
And you were really fortunate with the name.
Miranda Frost? I chose it! We worked on it together. Barbara Broccoli came and she said, "OK, we want something icy. Something to do with ice." Then she said, "We want something quintessentially English so pick a Shakespeare character and we will give her that name." So I think I suggested Arial, but they thought that was too weird. So I suggested Miranda and that's the one that stuck.
What I've always liked about your career is that I can't think of two movies that are as different as Pride & Prejudice and Doom.
[Laughs] I know! And I got the job in Doom... The only reason that I took it is because I was in a cornfield in a bonnet. My agent rang up and said, "They want you to be in Doom." And I was like, "Really? They should see me now. They should see me now!" And I thought that would be fun. But at the time that I signed on, it was going to be directed by somebody different and Ray Winstone was going to play the part that The Rock played. So the director fell out and Ray fell out, but I didn't really realize or understand at that point that that would turn the whole film into... a completely different thing.
[Top photo: WireImage]