Interview: Filmmaker Nancy Meyers on The Intern

Filmmaker Nancy Meyers talks to ComingSoon.net about her new comedy, The Intern, starring Anne Hathaway and Robert De Niro

Filmmaker Nancy Meyers has successfully created a niche market for herself especially with women of a certain age, starting with What Woman Want in 2000, and followed by 2003’s Something’s Gotta Give and 2009’s It’s Complicated, all three movies grossing $100 million while catering to that specific audience. 

Even before she directed those hit films, Meyers was a go-to Hollywood screenwriter responsible for the likes of Private Benjamin (her first and only Oscar nomination so far), Jumpin’ Jack Flash and Father of the Bride, with a career that now spans thirty-five years. 

Meyers’ latest film, The Intern, is a little different because it explores the relationship between a man and a woman without there being any romance involved. It stars Robert De Niro as Ben, a 70-year-old widower who decides retirement isn’t for him, so he takes on a senior internship at a fashion website run by Anne Hathaway’s Jules, and soon becomes a close friend and even mentor to the stressed young woman trying to run her start-up company.

It’s another strong comedy from Meyers that should appeal to more than just women thanks to De Niro’s presence and the fact that a lot of the humor in the movie is fairly universal, rather than being gender-specific.

ComingSoon.net had a chance to sit down with Meyers recently to talk about her film, but a day earlier, at the press conference for The Intern, Anne Hathaway had this to say about their director:

“You look at Nancy and you see this tiny, adorable woman with awesome hair, and at least at first glance, I had no idea the tenacious, uncompromising, inexhaustible powerhouse that she is. Nancy is the funniest person I’ve ever met. I think she’s probably the smartest person in any room she’s ever been in, and I imagine having been a woman in this industry for the last 30 years, it’s not easy being the smartest, funniest person in the room, and being a woman, but she’s handled it with tremendous grace. And I think she’s underrated.”

And it’s with that lofty build-up that we sat down with Meyers the next day for the following interview to talk about her latest movie, as well as discussing some of the issues women in the industry have been vocal about in recent months.

ComingSoon.net: You’ve always written and directed all your movies, which also means that it takes longer between movies.

Nancy Meyers: Yes, because I have to come up with an idea, I have to write it, I have to sell it, I have to cast it, and I have to make it. The making of it in itself is a year and a half… Well, this time, it took longer than normal. I was on an every three-year cycle for a while, and then this one took twice as long.

CS: I’ve talked to a couple of directors who wrote their own material and after a while, they just decided they want to make more movies and stay behind the camera to direct rather than writing. Would you ever do that or have any interest in doing that?

Nancy Meyers: No, none.

Nancy Meyers: Yes, right. If I don’t know it inside out, I’m not sure I’d be the best person to do it.

CS: Oh, I see. With something like this, do you generally start with the characters or the concept or the themes?

Nancy Meyers: Yeah, I started with his character.

CS: With Ben?

Nancy Meyers: Exactly. From there, I thought about him. It starts with always kind of a comedic premise, honestly. I think of the hook, like an older man goes to work as an intern at a startup. I don’t know what kind of startup, who runs it. Then, from there, it becomes something I care about, because I do like comedy. I want to write it. Those are the movies I personally love to go to, but it’s not enough for me just to sort of do a whole movie about generational jokes and stuff. I want to get into some stuff.

CS: That’s one of the things I liked about the movie, that you avoided the obvious ageist humor.

Nancy Meyers: Yeah, I mean, there’s some of it. He doesn’t know how to turn on his computer.

CS: I’ve seen movies where it was just ridiculous.

Nancy Meyers: Because I would get bored.

CS: As far as the development process, do you just literally sit there and grind it out for a year?

Nancy Meyers: Yeah, probably less than a year, six to eight, nine months, something like that. Some movies take a year. This one took maybe six or seven months.

CS: Because you’re really focused on one thing at that point?

Nancy Meyers: That’s all I do all day. No, I don’t have multiple projects. I do not have multiple ideas. Somebody said to me yesterday something about the Woody Allen drawer with all the ideas.

CS: Right, the Woody Allen drawer where he has a pile of scripts to make.

Nancy Meyers: I don’t have the Woody Allen drawer, no.

CS: It’s pretty wild how he can literally sit down and write a movie and shoot it within a year.

Nancy Meyers: Well, he’s amazing. His mind is so fertile, I really don’t have that, I don’t. My drawer does not have anything in it like that. It’s sad.

CS: Maybe in the future that’s something you can develop.

Nancy Meyers: Right. Well, if I grow up, get older, yeah.

CS: The movie turned out different from what I was expecting from the trailer, because when we see Anne as the boss, we remember her from “Prada” and think she’ll play someone more like the Meryl Streep character in that. We think she’s going to be that really tough boss, but that’s not what she’s like at all.

Nancy Meyers: No, I didn’t write that movie, so I have nothing to do with it. It didn’t even occur to me until I started doing some press and people talked about “Prada,” but I don’t think there’s a single conversation about fashion in this movie. That’s the product her company sells, but she’s not a fashionista, you know?

CS: But I think also because of that previous movie she did.

Nancy Meyers: Well, you’re used to thinking of her as the kid and now she’s the boss, but you have to remember, bosses in startup land are kids, so in my mind, she’s still a bit of a kid. She’s 30, early 30s.

CS: Bob and Anne are obviously great and can do lots of different things, but I really liked the casting around them. For instance, you have Linda Lavin in a role, who we haven’t seen in a long time, and you have Nat Wolff, who is this really hot actor now, basically doing a single scene.

Nancy Meyers: Well, because when I cast him, he wasn’t that hot. Yeah, I know he’s in only one scene. I had read him to be one of the interns, and it was kind of a long casting process because it just took a while for him to come in, and then by the time I really saw him, he had already committed to a Mickey Rourke movie (Note: The movie is Ashby, also out this week). So he’d come in for the intern, but he really wasn’t available to be one of the interns. It’s very possible he could’ve been one of them. I didn’t cast, so I don’t know, but that’s what he originally came in for. But then, when I finally really met with him, he was no longer even available. He said, “I don’t know. I’m not really available.” I said, “I have a little part maybe you could do.”

CS: It was funny seeing him because I was like, “Oh, there’s Nat Wolff,” and then he’s gone.

Nancy Meyers: Yes, I know. That was not like I cut anything, no. I loved him. I think he’s adorable. He’s the kind of kid that I want to say, “Come over to my house for lunch. Let’s hang out.” He’s just an adorable kid.

CS: Did you see the Paul Weitz movie he did “Admission” with Paul Rudd and Tina Fey?

Nancy Meyers: Oh, yes, I did. That’s where I met him. I was at one of those kind of Hollywood parties for a movie, like a screening and a party, but it wasn’t for his movie. It was just some other movie. He was there, and I had just the night before seen “Admission.” I said, “Wait, you’re the kid in ‘Admission.’ You’re terrific.” He said, “Oh, thank you so much.” He couldn’t believe someone recognized him from that, then a year or two later, he comes in for this.

CS: When you’re casting a movie like this, besides getting Bob and Anne, how important is it to have people like Adam DeVine or Nat that younger people would recognize? Do you think a lot about the audience in terms of getting financing when casting it?

Nancy Meyers: Well, in those parts, no. I just wanted the best kids. I didn’t know Adam DeVine that well, to be honest with you. I knew he had been in “Pitch Perfect.” That’s all I really know, and then someone said, “He has a TV show called ‘Workaholics,’” which I really wasn’t that aware of. Now I am, but I wasn’t that aware of it when I cast him. So and Zack Pearlman, I don’t think you’ve ever seen, have you?

CS: I don’t think so, no.

Nancy Meyers: The other kid you don’t know, because he used to be my intern. Then Becky, the girl who has a really big part, 19 years old, has never been in anything. So there were main people that came in for that for sure, oh definitely, but no, I preferred her. She seemed like exactly what I wanted, and I think she’s really good comedic timing, that kid, really, really good. Loved her.

CS: I think it is one of those movies where every role is well cast. There are other comedies where you think, “Oh, maybe that person isn’t right.” Everyone fits together well.

Nancy Meyers: Oh, good. Thanks so much, and like you mentioned Linda Lavin. So I’d met quite a few women for that part, and then someone said, “What about Linda Lavin?” I went, “Oh my God, she’d be amazing,” because like you I hadn’t seen her in years. Of almost all the people in the movie, that woman makes me laugh more than anybody. Her few little scenes in the movie, I made her do so many times because she kept making me laugh. I knew I had it, but I just kept doing it because I couldn’t stop laughing at her.

CS: Is that the main criteria, when you’re casting?

Nancy Meyers: If it’s a comedic part, yeah, and they’re not making me laugh. I’m not going to cast them, like Christina Scherer who came in for Becky, you look at her resume, there’s nothing on it. I think she did a Dominos commercial, a local Dominos. It was something like that. So when she left, I said to the casting director, “Who is this girl?” She said, “She’s brand new.” I brought her back a few times, and because I like to see people more than once. I think I’ll see their range and stuff, and then she never left my mind. I kept seeing other people, bigger names. People would think, “Oh, see so and so, would do it.” “Oh really? That person would do that part?” I kept going, “Well, what about that girl that we saw in the beginning?” I loved her.

CS: Let’s talk about some of the other ideas in the movie. Obviously, it deals with retirement and being a young person running a business. One of the things you throw out there is comparing the young millennial men to Bob’s generation.

Nancy Meyers: Yes, I do.

CS: Which is a really funny scene, but it’s also very accurate in some ways.

Nancy Meyers: Well, yeah, how can you not be aware of it, you know? I mean, as a little girl growing up with my dad and my uncles, all the men that I looked up to. When I was a kid, they were all World War II vets. They were part of the Great Generation. Now, of course, at my age, I look at my — I have daughters, but they have significant others, and all through high school, their friends. It was like, it would be remarkable to me how men went from a certain kind of guy – and I’m not making mass generalizations. I know it appears that way. There’s wonderful guys and not wonderful guys, you know what I mean? There are good kids, but they’re a little lost. They’re a little lost, I think. 

CS: I think electronics and technology probably didn’t help.

Nancy Meyers: Video games, yeah. I’m not sure video games were the best thing for guys.

CS: I really liked the music in this and the music choices in all of your movies is alway interesting.

Nancy Meyers: Thank you.

CS: You had two of the best music supervisors working on this one.

Nancy Meyers: Randy and George, yeah. They’re great and they’re good friends and I’ve worked with them both for years.

CS: How did you approach the music for this? Did you try to be current?

Nancy Meyers: I’m current if I need to be current. You know, the Meghan Trainor song, which “All About That Bass,” it’s in the movie for a minute. I remember saying to Randy, “It works perfectly, but by the time the movie comes out, it’s not a current song.” He said, “It’s a classic.” So when Randy Poster tells you it’s a classic, I trust him. No, I really do. I trust him. He found the Kendrick Lamar song that we start with. I wasn’t even familiar with it. He found the Ray Charles song. I mean, he found most of them. The guys, yeah, probably all of them. This movie has less needle drops than I’m used to, but it has what this movie needs. It seems to be right for this one.

CS: You spoke earlier about only wanting to direct the movies you wrote, and everything you direct is something you’ve been involved with from beginning to end, so you can take full responsibility for everything.

Nancy Meyers: Yes, I just realized in the last interview that I am the founder of my work, but comparing it to the startup world. I’m like the founder. Yeah, they’re all my babies, yeah.

CS: You’ve been making movies for 30 years, and there’s been a lot of talk within the last year about the difficulty women have in Hollywood and filmmaking.

Nancy Meyers: Yes.

CS: Over the 30 years, did you feel you had a hard time getting money for movies or anything because of that or did the success of “What Women Want” put you on an easier track than most?

Nancy Meyers: You know, I didn’t direct a movie until I was 48. I started really late. I had been writing and producing movies since I was 30, but I didn’t start directing until 18 years later. So by the time I started directing, I was a known person. I had made successful movies. Everybody that I went to work for knew me, knew what I had done, so I don’t recommend that path for everybody. That’s a long time to wait.

CS: Had you wanted to direct that whole time, though?

Nancy Meyers: You know, I’m a mom. I directed when my youngest girl was 10, and I really didn’t want to before then because her dad was the one directing my movies. So I knew that there was something that he did on those movies that I didn’t do a certain amount of hours, where I would say, “You know what? I’m going home with the kids,” and he would stay. I wasn’t willing to be that one to stay. So but when my youngest one, Holly, turned 10, I thought, “I think we’re ready.” She’s a formed human being. She’s a great person. She gets it. Then not even the first movie I did, I gave her a part in it. She’s in “The Parent Trap,” so it was like she never left me. She was with me every minute of that movie.

CS: There’s been a lot of talk lately about why more women aren’t directing the studio tentpoles and blockbusters. Do you think a lot of that is because they don’t want to do that?

Nancy Meyers: Well, that’s the thing. You know, some people think it’s because movies that actually get greenlit are not that appealing to women. There’s some kernel of truth in that. That’s not the whole truth. I think they’re also not on the list, you know? When they take somebody from Sundance and say, “That person could direct ‘Jurassic,’” I’m just wondering when that’s going to happen for a woman. When’s that going to happen for a woman who makes an equally small movie?

The Intern opens on Friday, September 25 with previews on Thursday night.

(Photo credit: Brian To/WENN.com)