Theron stars as Mavis, a hard-living young-adult novelist who embarks on a quixotic journey to her hometown in the hopes of reigniting her high-school romance with Buddy (Patrick Wilson). Alas, Buddy is married with a new baby -- a minor obstacle to Mavis, despite the urgent counsel of Matt Freehauf (Oswalt), another former schoolmate who has managed graver struggles of his own in the years since graduation. Their unlikely alliance opens Mavis's eyes to a humanity that eludes her, but will it hold enough of an appeal to adapt to as she pushes middle age?
Written by Diablo Cody and directed by her Juno partner in crime Jason Reitman, Young Adult offers a bracing, darkly comic glimpse at the past, present and future of an American generation at odds with itself. Oswalt talked it over recently with Movieline.
First things first: You recently attended the Academy's Governors Awards. How did that go?
That was so much fun. It just shows you what a movie geek I am: The person I was most excited about was Dick Smith, because I owned his movie makeup kit when I was a little kid. I would mix the Flex Flesh and put it in the mold and make the bullet wound and the Quasimodo eye... I had all that stuff. And then I was also so excited because over at the next table... I mean, Gore Verbinski was there, Tom McCarthy -- who I ended up frightening because I kind of got in his face because I love his movies so much. And he was like, "OK! Have fun!" "But in Win Win, the angel falls off the window, I think that's symbolic of the..." And then he said, "OK, I'm gonna go." But two tables over is the actor Ed Lauter. You know?
Absolutely.
From The Longest Yard and stuff? I got so... [Pause] I go and I get in Tom McCarthy's face, but I don't have the nerve to go up to Ed Lauter. That's what a movie geek I am. It's pathetic.
So how did you get involved with Young Adult?
I met Jason years ago. I was presenting an award at the ACE editors awards, and I was -- again -- such a movie geek that I recognized all the editors. I actually knew who they were. I'm like the music geek who recognizes the bassists. "Oh, it's that guy." And so I met Jason there, and we both bonded over how much we love movies -- and also the fact that we both own French bulldogs. So we exchanged e-mails. He said, "I do these screenings at my house; you should start coming to those." Those were really great. And then he got this script and he said, "I want to see how this sounds out loud; I heard you do a lot of table reads. Why don't you come over and we can read this?" And we did. We did two or three different reads with two or three different people, and by the time Charlize got there, I just kept doing the reads. "And he was just like, "You know what? You're Matt." And also, when Charlize and I read it, our chemistry just... boom. It really worked.
How so?
I don't know what it was, but we were so comfortable with each other. We were adversarial in a fun way. We were immediately cool with teasing each other. It's not anything I can describe with any sort of articulation; it's just that we got along and it worked. You know what it is? What did John Huston say about movies? "The thing just happens"? He's made a lot of movies that were just disasters, and there are obviously some that are amazing. He's asked how he made the ones that are amazing, and he says, "The thing just happens." You look up there, and the thing just happens. That was one of those cases -- the thing just happened.
The thing that struck me was how deceptively physical it is. Of course Matt has a disability, but how did disability -- once who you got into the role -- impact the way you developed this character?
Well, the script itself was so nuanced in terms of dialogue and character. I hired an acting coach and worked with her for three months -- this woman Nancy Banks, who's amazing. I worked with a physical therapist to figure our how my leg didn't work. How would I compensate? How would I work with a crutch? I did that over and over again until it wasn't really on my mind. But then what I realized was... [Stands up] Then, psychologically, what would happen --I'm not sure if you noticed this; I didn't even realize I was doing it -- was that in the scenes where I'm walking along almost too fast? Or faster than I should be going, because I want to keep up with her? [Performs Matt's walk] I had this stoic look on my face, like, "I know what I look like, and I'm not going to acknowledge it, and we're just going to get this done so I can stop." It's saying, "I'm so sick of people pitying me -- 'Oh, look at this poor guy' -- that I'm going to power through and not acknowledge it." But all that was there because of all the work I did with the physical therapist and with Nancy -- working out what this character's bio was, what had happened to him. It was moments like that that I didn't realize would come out, but came out because of all the work that I did.
There's this amazing shot of you when she walks up to the garage, and you're in there with the blow torch and the barrel--
Oh, yeah! That was a cool shot, wasn't it? I didn't know it was going to look that cool.
What did you think when saw it for the first time?
I was just like, "Fuck!" It must have been like when you about actors who see shots of themselves and say, "Oh, I didn't know you were going to make me look that cool." That was great! I got to experience that.
Young Adult is an interesting commentary on nostalgia, as if to say that the generation that came of age in the late '80s/early '90s is either too cynical for nostalgia or just knows it's better to move on. Where do you think the film stands? Where do you stand?
I think they're too cynical to acknowledge nostalgia, but they're just as guilty of it -- if not more -- than generations that came before them. Unlike generations that came before them, because they were constantly recontextualizing and mashing up and being meta and post-ironic and postmodern about the stuff they loved as they were loving it, it truly never did go away.
This movie is very much about Generation X approaching 40 and how they're doing it -- and they're not doing it very well, I don't think. And because we grew up much like the vile bodies of the 1920s, where it all about, "You can act bored, but you'd better never be boring." But there's nothing more boring than approaching your mid-40s. And there's also nothing more pathetic than realizing, "I need some simple comforts right now. I need a song I love. I need a movie I sank myself into. I need an old coat that I liked." There's that kind of double tragedy going on.
Between this film and Big Fan, you seem to thrive in the cinema of discomfort. Is that coincidence, or is that the character space you like to inhabit?
I hate to say this, but it's pure coincidence, because I am not at a stage of my career where I get to pick my projects. I do seem to be comfortable in that space, so maybe... I don't want to overstay my welcome there, but I do think that is a very real human condition: Discomfort, or displacement, or having your own identity begin to flicker and fade a little bit, and then you have to keep reconstituting it. Or, as in the case of Big Fan, it flickers and fades and then you have to let it go -- which is very tragic thing that I think happens a lot. I don't know why I'm so comfortable with that. At least lately -- these last 10 years -- I feel pretty comfortable being who I'm being. But when I was younger -- especially when I was in high school or college -- I would change my outlook and identity on a dime because I just didn't know who I was for the longest time. I think people go through that to a certain extent in high school and college; I maybe went through it a little longer than most people. But then, when it really solidified... Maybe I just have those memories. And also, because I went through it for so long, I can spot it in other people.
Why do you think you went through it for so long?
Because I grew up in such a featureless, personality-less suburb. There was nothing to push against. People who come from Jersey or the Deep South or let's say someplace in the Pacific Northwest -- a place where there's a very specific identity and accent and culture -- they can either choose to accept it or rebel against it. We were living in a bedroom community outside of D.C. There was no culture or identity or accent or personality. I was just constantly in this void. I would also get things five years too late -- listening to the Repo Man soundtrack in '84 and thinking I'd discovered punk. That kind of thing was always going on. It wasn't until I went to college and met different people from different areas of life -- and then went to San Francisco and met people who really knew who the hell they were -- that I kind of caught up in a hurry.
You're on Twitter, and social media as a whole is obviously one of the biggest phenomena of our time. But this film doesn't feature any of that. Most people in Mavis's case would probably just go and Facebook-stalk the hell out of Buddy. Do you think Young Adult should have at least recognized that?
The thing is, look at the characters we're following here: Buddy and his wife are so happy with each other. There is a part of my generation that is not on social media because they have happy lives and they're not trying to connect with anybody. And there are other people who are on social media because they need to connect. I'll bet Mavis is on Facebook; they just didn't show it because it was a dead-end for her. And I'll bet Matt's on the Internet a lot as an anonymous commenter; I'll bet he doesn't have a Web presence of his own personality. That's another big factor: If that's going on in you life, then that's not something you share with other people. You know? Mavis wouldn't dare say that she went on Facebook and tried to find Buddy, just as I would never dare mention to Mavis, "Oh, if you just saw the scathing stuff I wrote about the last Fringe episode on their message board..." So yes, there's a lot of social media, but what's really weird is that a lot of it isn't discussed in real life. Anyone who says, "Hey, read this Twitter I wrote," they've got to subconsciously know that everyone is going, "Oh, fuck off. Are you kidding?"
When Matt says to Mavis, "Guys like me are born loving women like you," did you relate to that?
Oh, absolutely. The story of my life! "Why is she going out with that ridiculously hot, physically perfect specimen? Doesn't she see the cool lead figure I painted? Doesn't she know I know every member of the Justice League?" It's just that weird resentment, you know? "Why don't my gifts appeal to that person?"
What do you think happens to Matt? Where do you think he is today?
I have very specific ideas as to what happens to Matt, to Mavis, to Sandra... Sandra? When that door closes on that kitchen? Or Buddy and his wife when they wake up the next day. But I will never say what they are, because every screening I've been to, I hear people in the lobby start talking about what happens in the next scene. They're all different, and they're all right. They all have their own opinions. I love that about this movie -- it makes you go, "Well then what the fuck do you think happens?" But I will never say. I will neeeevver say. But I have very specific ideas.
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