Filmmaker Massy Tadjedin Breaks Through With Keira Knightley Drama Last Night

So how did Last Night come about?

I had just finished an assignment, and Last Night... You know, Last Night was the script I wrote in the shortest amount of time. I wrote the first draft in about three weeks. Really, how it came about was that I went to the blank page and this is what I started to write about. As I started to write a little bit more, I had some ideas of how I wanted it to be. I wanted it to be contained within a certain amount of time. I was very interested at the time in noticing how life changes in these short periods that you don't really plan. And a night in your life can kind of change your perspective. It's not an autobiographical story by any means, but it is personal, and I think sometimes when you write something, there's that luxury of going to the blank page and sort of illuminating for yourself what you're thinking about.

Are you married?

Yes. I am married.

How did marriage -- and any related perspective changes -- influence writing Last Night?

I think I certainly brought some experience to the table, but I think that happens with pretty much everything you write. Even if it's a really far-fetched premise, you wind up bringing something personal, always. But I finished this script, and my husband, when he first read it, he was definitely like, "Why would you write this?" [Laughs] Which I think is a natural response. I think I'd have the same response if he wrote something like this. He's not a writer; he's a doctor. But I think I brought some of that to the table. But a lot of times some writers -- or not even writers, but some people -- happen to receive many stories or confidences of friends. I think I brought a lot of friends' occurrences and things that kept reoccurring -- things that I knew were issues. I think that's why there are so many films about fidelity and infidelity or temptation and how you navigate around it. It was just in the headspace and in the air around my life at the time. I think that where it sort of came from.

Why is it a New York film? It didn't have to be, but it really works for this.

To be honest with you, the very first draft that I wrote was set between Los Angeles and New Mexico. And then you finish your first draft, and again, this script wasn't the easiest, but it was the one I finished in the shortest amount of time. And I'd been to New York a lot, and I'd visited friends there during and after college. There is a romance to that city that is intoxicating. And for me, Last Night is not an issue film. It's still a romance, though the experience might be different for people watching it. But it felt very natural to move it to New York.

And then, as I started to cast it, I sort of had the idea that these people wouldn't be all American. That also nudged me in the direction of New York. And New York, for me, every experience I've ever had there has been much contained than L.A., in a weird way. L.A. is so spread out. Maybe it's by virtue of not being from there that I have much more momentous events when I'm there. But it is a city for me where you do walk around a corner and happen to run into someone you know. It's a massive city, but in some ways it's a smaller city. And downtown is just magical. Downtown at night has this energy at night that is very, very palpable. So I thought if some that that can be stolen for the screen, for this story, then it would just work.

How did this ensemble come together?

Well, it's a chemistry-dependent film. I didn't try to cast the four roles simultaneously; I knew I had to start with Joanna, just because you have to start somewhere, and to me, she was the window in. So Keira I had known since the jacket. And when I first wrote the film, it was about four years ago, now. Keira was very young at the time; she was just 18 when we made The Jacket. I just wondered if she was old enough to play this woman, which is the only reason my mind didn't even go there initially: She was, in my head, a little too young to play a woman in her late 20s. But then it took about two years to come together, and in those years for women -- I don't know about men -- but there's a moment where you do kind of grow up. I don't know. I just very distinctly remember waking up one morning and saying, "It's Keira." I called her and she said she was actually taking a year off, and maybe hoping to take a little bit more time off. She didn't want to do it. And I had told her about the project when she was in L.A., but I never asked her to do it until then. I really, really wanted her to do it, and she really _ really_ didn't want to work for a year. So I had to talk her into it.

Once she signed on, I knew that I'd have to find a Michael who has a certain kind of chemistry with her, and an Alex who has a very different kind of chemistry with her. And Sam Worthington I had actually met while he was shooting Avatar; this was before Avatar became what Avatar became. But I had watched Sam with Abbie Cornish in Somersault, a small Australian film. And I really liked him. So I met him, and he responded to the script, so he came on board. And Guillaume Canet I met because when he came to L.A., he had a small screening of Tell No One, the film he directed. He introduced the film and I met him very briefly after the screening, and there was something about him that sort of etched itself in my head. I didn't know his work as an actor so much, but I did my homework after he landed in my head and stayed there. And then Eva had read the script and responded, and when I met here, she has this great, inherent warmth that I really wanted for Laura so she would be as sympathetic as possible. So I just went with my gut, like with all casting. I was very lucky; they're an established cast.

The film wound up in limbo at Miramax when Disney put the studio up for sale. What was that experience like, and how did you find your way out of it?

We thought that when we sold the film to Miramax -- they came on board and acquired the film in the last week of shooting -- there was this sense of relief. "Oh, the film has a home" -- and a great home, because Miramax was Miramax then. It was a little studio releasing these films. But then it gave us that lesson very early on that there are no guarantees when you're making a film how its life will continue after you're done. It reinforced the idea that you have to love the process in order to keep your sanity. Otherwise, if you just do a results-based approach, I think the disappointment might be shattering.

So I took solace in that, but I'm not going to lie to you: It was just a difficult period, because our film was handed over to Disney, and it's definitely not a Disney movie. And we had to meet new people who were all very sympathetic to our situation, but we were trying to figure out, "What's going to happen to this film?" We were one of six or so left over from Miramax. Finally it ended up with the people who now own Miramax, and they were overwhelmed, I'm sure, that they had this whole library and now these six film. We were just lucky that Tribeca was looking to get into distribution, and they made a proposal to Miramax that I guess made sense for them. And we got a release. It was frustrating in the sense that for all of us -- the actors and the crew -- to work so hard and have the film and just not be able to show it to anyone. It was just there in this suspended state. But it was a lesson that was important to learn: You just have to love the process, and you have to trust that it will find an audience when it finds an audience. I think it's a lesson I can articulate now in hindsight, but there were moments in the process where it was a little tough. We didn't know if we would see the light of day for a while.

So what's next?

I'm writing the next one. There's always a question with me of whether it will survive or if I'll archive it or throw it in the trash. Right now I think it will survive; I think it's the next one. Hopefully. But until I finish it and print it and re-read it, I'm never sure if it's The One. But the next step is to make another movie as soon as possible.

Pages: 1 2