Kat Dennings on Thor, Her Black List Script, and Her Most Brutal Role to Date

You didn't read the script for Thor before being cast, so how did that process work?

They didn't let us read a script, it was top secret. But I knew, obviously, that it was Thor, that it was Kenneth Branagh, that Natalie was in it -- and that was pretty much all I knew. And that was enough. I mean, say Kenneth Branagh and I'm done. So I auditioned like everybody else.

What did you know of your character going in?

They gave me a brief character description and like two pages of a sort of fake scene, because they didn't even use the names Darcy or Jane. They used different names so that no one could say what the movie's about. You just had no idea.

Ah, the internet age.

People are ruthless, man. You never know. You have to be really careful.

Were you looking for a project on this scale?

I never really look for anything, I just see what comes to me. I was hoping that eventually I'd get to be in a movie like this, and it happened.

Looking at the films you've made, you seem to work with people that you stay close with after the job's done.

Yeah! I've been really lucky. I've worked with some really great people and made some amazing friends out of it. I just met my new best friend, Juliana Harkavy, on this movie Renee. She's just like a soulmate that I've waited my whole life to meet.

Renee's sort of a change of pace for you, isn't it?

It's based on To Write Love on Her Arms. So it's about Renee Yohe, who that was sort of started for. I play her, and it's very heavy. Really, really heavy stuff, so totally different. And Juliana plays my best friend in it. Brutal. Really brutal. [Per the organization's website, To Write Love on Her Arms is "a non-profit movement dedicated to presenting hope and finding help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. TWLOHA exists to encourage, inform, inspire and also to invest directly into treatment and recovery."]

Is it the heaviest role you've played to date?

Absolutely. The heaviest role I've ever played, and the heaviest role I could ever play, probably. Suicide, drugs, depression, self-harm, bi-polar, the whole thing. I'm still exhausted. I just finished that a month ago.

Has that taken time and space to decompress from?

It really does. This is the first time that I haven't really had a break, because I went straight from that into filming a pilot for CBS that I just wrapped yesterday. It's called Two Broke Girls; Whitney Cummings and Michael Patrick King wrote it and are producing it together.

You've got another film coming out soon -- Daydream Nation, with Reece Thompson and Josh Lucas.

Oh, yes.

I imagine it's a tough choice to be torn between the two of them.

It's pretty amazing. It's very romantic, and kind of intense. Yeah, I've been pretty busy, which is amazing. Lot of different kinds of things, so I think my next project is a nap.

You've branched out into screenwriting already; have you considered moving into producing or directing?

Absolutely! I don't really talk that much about it but I write, and directing is on the horizon one day. Directing is something I really want to do. I wrote a script with my brother which ended up, somehow, on the Black List in 2008.

That's right! Your Dreams Suck. What's going on with it now?

It's still... I mean, the process of getting a movie made is so ridiculous so it's still in the pipeline. We have amazing producers and we're giving it to people to read right now.

Do you plan on acting in it as well?

No. Just writing!

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