Tagline: All is fair in love and Rome.
An ambitious young New Yorker, disillusioned with romance, takes a whirlwind trip to Rome, where she defiantly plucks magic coins from a fountain of love, inexplicably igniting the passion of those who threw them in: a sausage magnate, a street magician, an adoring painter and a self-admiring model. But when a charming reporter pursues her with equal zest, how will she know if his love is the real thing?
For director Mark Steven Johnson, who is best known for comic book adaptations like “Daredevil” and “Ghost Rider,” a comedy like “WHEN IN ROME” is a bit of a departure. In this movie, jokes the director, “no one’s head explodes,” but the film is a return to Johnson’s roots. “Comedy is where I started—writing ‘Grumpy Old Men’—and I really wanted to get back to it.”
Johnson, along with producer Gary Foster, recognized the comedy potential of “WHEN IN ROME.” “I’m a guy, and I’m not a big romantic-comedy guy,” says the director. “I wanted to make a comedy with romance, versus a ‘romantic comedy.’ I wanted to make a comedy that was really funny that also had a big heart to it. We had fun with this film, blowing out a lot of the conventions of a traditional romantic comedy.”
Producer Andrew Panay came to the project with comedies like “Wedding Crashers” and “Old Dogs” under his belt; he helped bring that signature sense of humor to this film. “We have a very strong male perspective and a strong female perspective, and you meld it together and get something for everybody,” says Panay.
For the film’s leading lady, the filmmakers called on Kristen Bell. “Kristen is incredible, an amazing actor,” says Johnson. “I have never worked with anyone like her. I really felt like you could build a whole movie around this girl and it was really exciting.”
Bell portrays Beth, a young curator at the Guggenheim Museum in Manhattan. “Beth is a ‘gallerina,’” says Bell, “which is a term I’ve learned for young women who run any sort of gallery. It’s sort of a high-pressure job, which is why she’s always so frazzled.”
And her life is about to get even more frazzled, thanks to a wedding, some champagne and a few magic coins, says Bell. “My character goes to her sister’s wedding in Rome and has one too many glasses of champagne. She ends up wading through a fountain, gathering coins.” What she doesn’t know is that the coins belong to people who’ve wished for love, and are now magically inclined to pursue the woman who holds their coins. “When she gets home, these suitors start to come after her. They’re madly in love. There’s a lot of chasing, a lot of running in heels.”
“I just wanted to surround Kristen with the funniest people I could,” says Johnson. “The script was originally written with Kristen as more of the straight man, reacting to all these funny guys, but she’s so funny I kept giving her more to do—more physical comedy—because she really has the ability in a way I haven’t seen in a long time.”
Josh Duhamel was tapped as Beth’s leading man, Nick, whom she meets at the wedding, finds an instant connection, then fears he’s under the same spell as the rest of her pursuers. “I would say Nick and Beth have the same outlook on life,” says Duhamel. “Both of them are very driven in their given professions and neither is really looking for love. It’s one of those things, I guess, you usually find it when you’re not looking.”
The unexpectedly awkward quality that Duhamel brought to the character made him that much funnier and more endearing, says producer Panay. “One of Josh’s greatest gifts is his ability to be physically funny. He was a college quarterback in real life, so he’s very coordinated. But to watch him scramble, fall and run into things—it’s absolutely, incredibly funny. And he’s so natural.”
Producer Gary Foster adds, “Josh is from South Dakota, and he has just got this very authentic way about him. He’s really kind of ‘aw shucks.’ He works really hard. He’s a very competitive guy, a former athlete, and that drive is still there.”
The filmmakers turned to top comic performers to cast the suitors that give Duhamel’s character a run for his money. Danny DeVito, Will Arnett, Jon Heder and Dax Shepard were called on to pursue Bell’s character with a little more zest than the average love story.
It was almost too much of a good time, says Bell. “I sometimes could not stop laughing on set because they’re all so funny.”
Danny DeVito portrays Al, a successful sausage magnate who calls on Bell’s character for private tours of the museum. “He’s one of the funniest guys ever,” says Foster. “He’s a smart, great filmmaker—not only for his acting prowess but because he is also a master of directing comedy. He was great about sharing ideas and stories.”
Portraying the “Italian” painter Antonio is “Arrested Development” star Will Arnett. “The film had such a great ensemble vibe, and I’m friends with a lot of people in the cast already. So being able to come and work with those guys, go to Rome and have that experience is kind of like going to movie camp.”
Jon Heder, who starred in “Blades of Glory” with Arnett, portrays Lance, whom he calls “a creepy street magician. I think that’s what I liked most. Street magicians are creepy.”
Dax Shepard, who plays aspiring male model Gale, agrees. “Arnett and I had a blast. We only had a couple of scenes together, but we did everything in our power to steal those scenes from one another.”
Shepard found interesting comic material in the narcissistic Gale. “I don’t fancy myself very attractive, so I thought it would be the ultimate challenge to play a guy in a movie who’s supposed to be a model, and never got there with his face so he relied on working out a lot and dieting—extreme dieting.”
To pull it off, Shepard actually had to commit to a diet with the same zeal as the delusional Gale. “I don’t think genetically I’m supposed to look like that. My next role is going to be the owner of a donut shop, I think.”
The filmmakers turned to Anjelica Huston for the role of Beth’s intimidating boss, Celeste. “I really wanted Anjelica badly,” says Johnson. “I thought she would give it some weight. We needed someone who seemed like she would really be a threat to Beth—Anjelica is so strong, she’s such a great actress and such a lovely person, too.”
Alexis Dziena portrays Beth’s sister Joan, who decides rather suddenly to get married in Rome to an Italian guy she’s known for only a few weeks. Peggy Lipton portrays Beth’s mother. “Saturday Night Live’s” Bobby Moynihan was called on to play Nick’s best friend, Puck, Kate Micucci plays Stacey, Beth’s assistant, and Italian star Luca Calvani portrays Joan’s groom Umberto.
“Everyone knew there was something kind of special going on,” says Johnson. “The whole cast added so much to the film and everyone would improvise—but they always did so within the constraints of the scene—nobody would just go off—that can sometimes be a danger when you have so many funny people competing for laughs. They were all really good about serving the story with their improvisation.”
“Mark allows the talent to do what they do best,” says Foster. “He has this great way about him. People trust him, they want to support him, and they want to do well for him. He allows them to play and do their craft.”
With a Guggenheim curator, a painter, and the city of Rome all central to the story, “WHEN IN ROME” was a huge assignment for production designer Kirk Petruccelli. “This whole film is based on art—we get it in every way imaginable,” he says. “We’ve gone from all the classics in Italy to the classics from great American artists, the Guggenheim’s collections through contemporary artists, some hip and upcoming artists that are making their marks in the world now, to street stuff—everything that goes on in the art world.”
One of the biggest art elements of the film is the world-famous Guggenheim Museum, says Johnson. “I did feel that the Guggenheim was a real character in the movie. It’s an incredibly romantic place, a really special building, and there’s nothing else like it.”
Using a museum like the Guggenheim as a film location and an integral part of the story is not an easy prospect, says Johnson, but “I went the extra mile to make it work.”
Luckily, the Guggenheim was an enthusiastic partner. “We loved the idea,” says the Guggenheim’s managing director, Karen Meyerhoff. “There are a lot of things that were authentic about the script.”
Meyerhoff says her team thought the script captured how passionate curators are about their jobs. “One of my favorite scenes is a scene in which Beth the curator brings Nick into the museum at night, which is one of the things that is wonderful about working in museums—you have access to these spaces when there’s no one else around. They come into the museum when all the lights are off and the moonlight is streaming in. It’s very romantic. And she takes him to the galleries to show him one of her favorite pictures in the collection which is a portrait.
She tells him the story about the woman in the portrait—Marie- Therese Walter—who, as a young girl of 17, had a clandestine relationship with the artist—Picasso. And she tells him that because it was a secret relationship the artist put the girl’s initials into some of his paintings, hiding it. That’s all true. Not only is the scene authentic, because we often do bring our close friends into the museum at night, but also the story is real. It’s a wonderful moment. And she also reveals something about her own character, her reason for being so cynical about relationships, her affection for the Guggenheim, her passion for art.”
Director Mark Steven Johnson worked closely with the museum team to facilitate the production’s needs, ensuring the safety of the artwork and determining what items would be captured on film. He found the museum’s exhibit “I Want to Believe,” by artist Cai Guo- Qiang, particularly moving. “It was so mind blowing—we got so lucky with Cai Guo-Qiang. His work is fantastic. In the opening shots of the movie, we come into the Guggenheim and we’re seeing all this work and are just blown away. It’s really inspiring. It was serendipitous, because when you do show up at the Guggenheim, whatever is there, you are working with it. It’s not like you can move it. I thought there would be paintings or sculpture and then I saw Cai’s work and I thought, ‘Wow, this is going to be in my movie.’”
The schedule at the Guggenheim covered the opening scenes of the film as well as the Circle of Gold gala, taking advantage of the famous first-floor atrium area and the ramp at the Guggenheim, plus other scenes that required the creation of Guggenheim offices and the Tannhauser Gallery on a sound stage in Brooklyn.
“Our galleries were re-created,” says Meyerhoff, “and they re-created some of the masterworks in our collection—fake Gauguins and Picassos. It was just astounding.”
The scenic painters in the art department painted reproductions of many different paintings, from Toulouse-Lautrec, Van Gogh, Seurat, Monet and Manet, to more cubist, abstract pieces like Picasso’s “Woman with Yellow Hair,” featured in the night scene with Beth and Nick. Painting copies of masters in front of a panel of judges is actually part of the test required to join the scenic painters union, in addition to a written exam and a take-home project.
Beyond the Tannhauser Gallery, the art department was responsible for creating paintings for the Pain exhibit, all of Antonio’s art, and Renaissance-style paintings that adorn the palazzo where Joan’s wedding reception takes place. The Pain exhibit actually drew the Guggenheim’s participation, says Karen Meyerhoff. “We decided to bring some authenticity to it, bringing in a young artist, Slater Bradley, who we’d worked with and who was in our collection, to introduce his own work into the show and to curate the exhibition so that it would all come from one point of view.”
The exhibit includes different types of works from artists in addition to Bradley, resulting in a combination of paintings, sculpture and photography. A key piece in the Pain exhibit is “The Hit,” the fictional famous photograph that Nick gives to Beth to keep her from getting in trouble with Celeste.
For the ubiquitous images of Beth done by Antonio, the scenic painters in the art department channeled the great Italian Renaissance painters. “Our joy was to create these notions of grandeur, but in simplistic terms,” explains production designer Kirk Petruccelli. For the mural of Beth that appears on the street on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, the painters worked for several weeks—though they had to make it look as though it had been painted overnight in a burst of inspiration.
The art department did more classical Italian paintings for the Roman palazzo where Joan has her wedding. The scenes were actually done in New York at the Surrogate’s Court Building on Chambers Street. Due to the number of extras and the amount of shooting days required for all of the wedding scenes, it was more feasible to shoot the interior of the wedding in New York but make it look like Rome. The building is already an elaborate and ornate New York landmark, and with some set decoration—and the finishing touch of nearly a dozen classical oversized paintings—it was transformed into a believable Italian palace.
With the Guggenheim Museum central to the film’s storyline, filmmakers tapped the Big Apple for a variety of scenes. The area around Central Park’s Bethesda Fountain was used for scenes of Antonio chasing Beth (which culminate in Antonio getting run over by a hansom cab) and his gondola scene, in which he paddles by Beth and Celeste having lunch at an outdoor cafe. Columbus Circle, at the entrance to Central Park, was the location of Lance’s first meeting with Beth where the magician showcases the first of a few misguided tricks. Onlookers might have mistook the comedy for a horror film when Jon Heder pulled a bloody heart from his chest in an effort to make a memorable impression.
Filmmakers hit Soho, including the Blackout on Bleecker restaurant for the scene in which Nick and Beth have a dinner date in the dark, and the bar Pravda, which kicks off Nick’s lightning-threatened journey uptown. Lance stalks Beth in a souvenir shop in Little Italy. In addition, filmmakers used Bond Street for Nick’s loft, locations on the Upper West Side for Beth’s apartment, Upper East Side for the mural location and scenes near the Guggenheim, and Tribeca for the restaurant where Beth meets Gale, as well as City Hall Park and Surrogate’s Court building.
Josh Duhamel was subjected to an intense night in Columbus Circle. The actor’s parents were on set as Duhamel shot part of Nick’s race uptown to Beth—and did his own stunt, rolling over the vintage car driven by his buddy Puck (Bobby Moynihan). “The car was coming at me and was actually going to hit me and I was to roll up on the hood of the car,” says Duhamel. “I was in a sprint and the car was coming pretty fast so, naturally, my momentum was going to take me up on the other side of the car.
“The first couple of times were pretty tense,” the actor continues. “I was OK, I felt fine, but I looked around and everybody’s eyeballs were wide open—‘Oh my God, we are going to have to stop this right now because he’s going to break his neck.’ So when I actually flew over the hood and landed on my neck, everyone was like, ‘Are you all right?!’
“All of the sudden I hear “‘BOOOOOOO!’ in the background, and it’s my old man. Thanks for the support, Dad, I appreciate it! But he knew I was OK—he was the only one who knew.” Duhamel says he tweaked the stunt when he realized that the only thing between him and the other side of the car was the windshield. “Finally I figured out that as soon as I hit the car I had to roll, because the glass was the only thing that was going to stop me from going on the other side of the car. Sure enough, I almost went through it—I broke the windshield. And it wasn’t even a stunt windshield.”
While most of the film takes place in New York, the soul of it, says director Mark Steven Johnson, is really Rome. “The spirit of Rome was so important to the movie. It elevated the film. It’s about love and the two greatest cities in the world. The fun of it is you really feel it and soak it up like Beth does, and once Beth goes back to New York and tries to leave it…
Rome follows her. And now suddenly there are fountains everywhere in New York City, and even the Italian music that we hear in Rome finds its way to the music in New York. And cherubs pop up. It is a really fun thing to bring the essence of Rome back to New York. She tries to leave it behind, but the universe just doesn’t let her.”
Production designer Kirk Petruccelli says, “If you really start looking at the foundation of love or the foundation of art, you have to start with the classics. And I think Rome is where the classics are. There’s an overwhelming sense of honor and privilege to be among the greatest masterpieces of all time.”
The first order of business for Rome was to find the location for one of the film’s other stars, Venus, the goddess of love in the Fontana D’Amore. They needed a square that had ample space, scope, and architectural and visual interest, and also one that did not already have something installed in its center, because the fountain had to be built. Historically, Roman fountains always required the approval of the Vatican. And since Venus is a pagan goddess, she would never have been allowed to be built in a Roman square. The American filmmakers teamed up with Italian producer Enzo Sisti and Italian art director Stefano Ortolani and began scouting locations in the historical center of Rome. Once the filmmakers saw how spacious Piazza Borghese was and how unencumbered its view of surrounding buildings was, they were completely enamored.
Filmmakers were thrilled to secure the Piazza della Maddalena and its Maddalena Church for the film’s church ceremonies. Other Roman locations included the Roman Forum and the Spanish Steps, where Joan and her husband chat on the phone with Beth in NY, plus the stunning terraced apartment near Piazza Venezia that belongs to the very lucky and apparently wealthy newlyweds.
Filmmakers were sure to get beauty shots of the Colosseum, too. The production dared to shoot at the Pantheon and the Fountain of Trevi, requiring a 3 a.m. call time to avoid crowds visiting the historical attractions. But a funny thing happened at the fountain, says executive producer Ezra Swerdlow. “At 3 o’clock, literally, there were about a thousand Spanish students jumping in the fountain with the police trying to control them in a near riot. So that was rather amusing.”
The end-of-exams celebration was broken up in time for shooting, adds Swerdlow. For director Mark Steven Johnson, the entire city of Rome was cinematic. “There is something magical and ethereal about Rome. All the nights there are enchanting. Everyone’s strolling, everyone’s laughing, everyone’s in love, everyone looks great. You think…this is Rome.”
Filmmakers called on an 83-year-old veteran of Italian cinema to sculpt the film’s fictional Fontana D’Amore. Gianni Gianese, who did his first film in 1955, worked on films for legendary directors Federico Fellini, John Huston, Luchino Visconti and Martin Scorsese. The artist was recovering from a serious illness when he was contacted for the project. “This offer recharged my batteries and my spirit more than any medicine. And I have immersed myself in this adventure with great enthusiasm and the result is obvious.”
Sculptor Giambologna provided the inspiration for the Roman Venus in the Fontana D’Amore. “To make a statue like Giambologna is very hard,” says Gianese, “but I think I was able to do a great job since I have so much experience and expertise in the art of the 1600s. I am very happy with the results of the Venus, also because she is very tall. She is almost seven feet tall, from her toes to the last tuft of hair on her head. And making this statue was very exciting for me—to be able to see it while the statue was taking form, while it was getting bigger, more sumptuous. First I created her nude, then I dressed her and you can feel it. If you look well behind that drapery, there is a wonderful body.”
Indeed, Gianese was not thrilled about having to clothe his Venus. “I wasn’t very happy about it because every Venus that has ever been made was nude. This time we dressed the Venus. It is OK,” he says.
Despite her clothes, production designer Kirk Petruccelli says the filmmakers wanted to add a touch of “naughtiness” to Venus and articulated that through the lively cherubs that surrounded her. The cherubs are tied to the whimsical, fanciful nature of the statue’s power in the film and the effect of her spell on Beth. “Yet, overwhelmingly, she is of love and peace and wisdom,” says Petruccelli. He was amazed by the Italian art department’s ability to interpret their long-distance philosophical and thematic conversations into the fountain, which he considers a “glorious, really beautiful piece of art.”
The fountain took about 40 days to sculpt; it took six days to install, and included a pump system to ensure it functioned as a real fountain. It was placed in the center of the Piazza Borghese with several steps leading up to it. Shooting took place at night in Rome for the first few days, so passing tourists were confused when they could not find a notation for the fountain in their guide books. Some even threw coins into the fountain. The movie artistry created such a convincing illusion, says Petruccelli, that “everybody who walked up had no idea it hadn’t been there for generations.”
Costume designer Sarah Edwards had an interesting challenge in dressing the film’s leading lady. Beth, Edwards says, is a bit of a “control freak,” so for her overall look the costume designer had to find a balance between “a New York woman with style and someone who is interested in more than her clothes.”
Beth’s fashion foil, says Edwards, is her assistant Stacy, who is an “artsy, more downtown funky girl.” For the boss, Celeste, played by Anjelica Huston, Edwards went for “clean lines” and classic pieces by designers like Donna Karan that were powerful yet didn’t scream “villainess.” For the suitors, Edwards had fun playing off their exaggerated personas. Jon Heder, who portrayed Lance the magician, was dressed as a Goth, eccentric type. Will Arnett as artist Antonio was a kind of fictional Italian peasant. For Danny DeVito, Edwards custom-made all of the sausage magnate’s power suits, and for Dax Shepard’s model, she did a lot of research into what pretentious guys in New York would wear. “We put him in designer jeans and flip flops, and these hats that he would wear on the back of his head. You see all these kind of model types around New York and a lot of them wear scarves around their necks and we did all of that. We had a lot of fun.”
Edwards was charged with dressing two brides for the film. Both Kristen Bell and Alexis Dziena donned stunning wedding dresses by renowned bridal designer Amsale. But finding the right design for the two actresses wasn’t the toughest part, says Edwards. “You just don’t think when you read the script the first time that your leading lady’s going to get into a fountain in Rome in a wedding dress. And what that means is that you need to have five of them. And to get five wedding dresses all exactly the same for your leading lady with a very short prep time is hard.”
Luckily, Amsale was a helpful collaborator, making multiples of Joan and Beth’s dresses (which sadly were not salvageable after going into the fountain) as well as all of the bridesmaid dresses.
When in Rome )2010)
Directed by: Mark Steven Johnson
Starring by: Kristen Bell, Josh Duhamel, Will Arnett, Alexis Dziena, Jon Heder, Dax Shepard, Kate Micucci, Bobby Moynihan, Danny DeVito, Anjelica Huston, Peggy Lipton, Kristen Schaal, Ella Dershowitz
Screenplay by: David Diamond, David Weissman
Production Design by: Kirk M. Petruccelli
Cinematography by: John Bailey
Film Editing by: Ryan Folsey, Andrew Marcus
Costume Design by: Sarah Edwards
Set Decoration by: Diane Lederman
Art Direction by: John Kasarda, Stefano Maria Ortolani, Eugenio Ulissi
Music by: Tobias Karlsson, Christopher Young
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for some suggestive content.
Distributed by: Buena Vista Pictures
Release Date: January 29, 2010
