There are various approaches to shooting a movie. Some shoots are freeform and offer plenty of improvisation. And others, like Scarlett Bermingham and Andrew Rhymer’s “All That She Wants,” run on a tight, brisk schedule.
Bermingham and Rhymer stopped by TheWrap’s studio at the Toronto International Film Festival to talk about their new age-gap romance, which stars “Schitt’s Creek” alum Annie Murphy and “Cha Cha Real Smooth” director Cooper Raiff as Emma and Luke, a pair whose one-night stand leads to embarrassment, and then meaningful connection, after Emma realizes she used to be the younger Luke’s babysitter when he was a boy.
The filmmakers had a tight 22-day filming schedule with no wiggle room and knew going in how they wanted to block every scene. To keep things on schedule, they gave Murphy, Raiff and the rest of the cast only two takes maximum to complete each scene.
“We really wanted it to be about the performances,” Rhymer said. “But it wasn’t like a vintage Apatow shoot where we’re gonna shoot for 60 days and do 19 takes of everything and improv away our way into a scene. That just wasn’t an option.”
Bermingham added: “But it’s such a testament, though, to Annie and our entire cast that everyone just showed up so incredibly prepared and ready to go. She was in almost every scene of the movie, and she was just so on every single time.”
While discussing her character, Murphy told TheWrap that she identified with Emma’s need for order in her life and her struggle to cope when the world refuses to provide it, especially as she finds herself in a complicated relationship dynamic.
“I think there are big similarities between me and Emma in terms of really wanting, so badly, to do the right thing in the right order, and then being confronted with the fact that that’s not actually how life goes,” she said. “And it takes all of these different twists and turns because that’s actually what’s supposed to be happening for you.”
Elsewhere in the conversation, Bermingham gave a shoutout to production designer Caitlin Burns, who reflected Emma’s arc through the atmospheric differences between Luke’s dorm room and Emma’s home.
“I think she helped really create these environments where we talked a lot about how the places where Emma’s character should be the most uncomfortable, like the dorm room, was actually kind of the coziest and warmest looking place,” she said. “Whereas the place where you think she would be most comfortable, like her family home, which she’s known all her life, it was actually more cold and sterile.”
“All That She Wants” is currently seeking distribution.
