Michael Dowse: I was sent the script. I loved the script. The sript was fantastic. It’s a blacklist script. What I loved about the script is it used comedy to fuel the romance, which I think is a trick that a lot of these rom-coms miss. The two characters express their affection for each other through banter and through jokes. As the movie goes on, and it boils more and more, you see that while they’re ripping the **** out of each other and bantering back and forth, they’re really just showing their affection. It’s a beautiful friendship and a beautiful relationship between the two.

George Stroumboulopoulis: When you say ‘blacklist,’ there’s a bunch of films that never get made, right? Screenplays that don’t get made?
Dowse: Yeah, it’s basically a poll from all the assistants in Hollywood where they vote on what their favorite unmade screenplay is.

Stroumboulopoulis: Because an assistant will read a screenplay long before an agent often does, right?
Dowse: Exactly, a hundred percent.
Stroumboulopoulis: They just come up with this separate list. You read it and went, “This is the film I want to make.”
Dowse: Yeah, I read it.

Stroumboulopoulis: How do you get Adam Driver, Harry Potter, Zoe Kazan? Radcliffe’s a really good actor. He’s separated himself from that Potter stuff. How do you get all these people together in this picture?
Dowse: You start with Dan. You start with getting Daniel. We knew he was looking to branch out and he was interested in a role like this. It was a very quick and simple process, which it normally isn’t. Where you send him the script and he read it, and within ten days I was in London meeting with him.

Stroumboulopoulis: You sent it to his agent? How did you meet him?
Dowse: Yeah we sent it to the agent. I wrote him a letter. We sent it to him. He read it very quickly. I was on a Skype call within a week, and in London ten days later and meeting him. Everything got sealed away quite quickly. And then once we had Dan, then you have your cornerstone and then you start building. It’s a fantastic cast. I couldn’t be happier with the cast.